Library Juice 6:14 - June 3, 2003
Contents:
1. Links
2. Report to SRRT on ALA Council, Toronto, June 2003
3. "The late Librarians' Convention," _The Nation_, Nov. 2, 1876
4. "INDEPENDENT" LIBRARIES AND CUBA, by Brian Campbell
5. CLA CUBA RESOLUTION
6. Ruth Gordon on Cuba and the "Independent Librarians"
7. Ann Sparanese's note discussing Leonard Kniffel's editorial on Cuba
8. Evergreen V.1, No. 2
9. Zine Librarian Zine #2 (review)
10. Amusing searches
Quote for the week:
"Whoever controls the media - the images - controls the culture."
-Allen Ginsberg
Homepage of the week: Kira Barnes
http://www.ailurodrome.com/_________________________________________________________________________top
1. Links
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New on the Libr.org server:
Issue 17, Summer 2003, of Information for Social Change
http://libr.org/ISC/TOC.html-----
"LearningTimes Library Online Conference 2003:
Innovations by Information Professionals"
http://www.libraryconference.com[ from Hope Kandel ]
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http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16309
Sex in the Library
Annalee Newitz, AlterNet
July 1, 2003
Viewed on July 2, 2003[ from Tom Baxter ]
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The Library as a Place: Tradition and Evolution
by William Miller
http://www.libraryissues.com/pub/LI220003.asp[ found surfing ]
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Help ALA Keep Big Brother Out of Your Library!
http://tinyurl.com/fupk[ from Don Wood ]
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CALL FOR PAPERS: SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF PUBLIC POLICY IN THE INFORMATION AGE
TIS guidelines, which can be found at
http://www.slis.indiana.edu/TIS/contributors/authors.html.
SOURCE: The Information Society
http://www.slis.indiana.edu/TIS/contributors/CFP-determinants.html[ from the Benton Foundation ]
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Independent readers vote on the worst book:
http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/books/features/story.jsp?story=419306[ from Pinkmoose ]
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_Free Republic_ thread trashing ALA
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/937679/posts?page[ from Kathleen de la Pena McCook ]
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Librarian Stay-at-Home Parent Yahoo Group Announced
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/librariansahm/[ forgot how this came to me ]
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"A Recent Supreme Court Decision Allowing the Government to Force Public
Libraries to Filter Users' Internet Access Is Less Significant Than It
Might At First Appear"(Findlaw analysis of the Supreme Court decision.)
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/hilden/20030701.html
[ from Don Wood ]
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Updated CIPA FAQ
http://www.dpi.state.wi.us/dltcl/pld/cipafaq.html[ from Karen Schneider ]
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AP story on the "Public Library of Science," which would grant
free online access to all government-funded research:
http://www.sacbee.com/state_wire/story/6924036p-7873441c.html[ from Ava Goldman ]
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The Rotten Library
http://www.rotten.com/library/[ found surfing ]
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The Glasgow Declaration on Libraries, Information Services and Intellectual Freedom
http://www.ifla.org/faife/policy/iflastat/gldeclar-e.html[ from Don Wood ]
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2. Report to SRRT on ALA Council, Toronto, June 2003
This was a very successful meeting in terms of SRRT's concerns. All
resolutions discussed at SRRT Action Council went our way. A very good
revised version of Ann Sparanese, Mark Rosensweig, and Larry Romans'
resolution against FCC deregulation was passed. Concerning the resolution
in support of ERIC, SRRT had urged that some language against
commercialization be inserted, however the original version was approved.
The SRRT endorsed resolution on security and access to government
information was passed. SRRT opposition to the very weak draft resolution
on the Terrorism Information Awareness Program helped transform it into a
strong condemnation. Michael Gorman's and Michael Malinconico's resolution
against the destruction of Iraqi libraries and cultural resources was
weakened in the International Relations Committee (IRC) but mostly restored
by amendment on the Council floor. Finally, the IRC's original State Dept.
friendly resolution on Cuba was overwhelmed by the Canadian Library
Association's strong resolution against foreign intervention. Some of the
Canadian language was inserted in the IRC's original draft, however this
strange hybrid was rejected by ALA Council and sent back to the IRC and
Intellectual Freedom Committee for reconsideration.Many other important issues relating to social responsibility came before
the Council. SRRT's previous successful resolution on providing an ALA
group health insurance plan was finally actualized. It will be open for
enrollment in the fall. The ALA Allied Professional Organization passed
its first resolution, in support of an annual Library Worker's Day. A
resolution supporting several civil liberties bills to amend the Patriot
Act was approved, but a resolution against the leaked Patriot II bill was
defeated. Councilors would not support the second resolution because it
was not an official bill and would likely be changed before surfacing.
This reminds me of the ostrich who buries its head in the sand so it
doesn't have to see what is coming. Also on the negative side, Council
refused to endorse a qualified no-conflict time for Membership Meetings.
This would have prohibited scheduling programs but not committee meetings
during the Membership Meetings. Council continues to refuse to see the
importance of membership input and highlighting a space for vigorous
discussion. Also on the downside, the ALA Executive Board again refused in
general to consider socially responsible investments for its endowment
fund. The Endowment Trustees had asked its current investment firms to
study the question. I and Michael Gorman made a plea for reconsideration,
asking that the same methodology be used by one or two investment companies
that specialize on SRI.Of course, SARS and the ALA budget shortfall was on everyone's mind. ALA
has a plan to deal with the budget and it does not seem like a crisis
situation. The CIPA Supreme Court decision was also discussed, and a press
release was issued. It appears that there will still be room for further
litigation after there is some concrete experience with how filtering
interferes with library service. A strong resolution was passed in support
of school libraries which seem to be suffering more than other types of
libraries under the present budget cuts. The IFLA Glasgow Declaration on
Libraries, Information Services and Intellectual Freedom was endorsed. A
useful privacy policy guidelines document was approved. And of course, a
strong resolution was passed on fixing the ALA website and trying to
prevent further damage in the future through appropriate oversight.As always I will be happy to try to provide any further information or
copies of the documents.Al Kagan
SRRT Councilor
akagan[at]uiuc.edu
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3. "The late Librarians' Convention," _The Nation_, Nov. 2, 1876
pp. 271-2.The late Librarians' Convention was even more successful than its
promoters had expected, and many persons, we are told, have already
expressed their regret that they did not make more effort to be present.
If the increase of good feeling and a better knowledge of one another
were all that it accomplished, that would be sufficient ; but there were
more solid results. The long-desired completion of Poole's 'Index to
Periodical Literature' is now an assured fact. The book will be in the
hands of librarians before the next quinquennial convention. It will
include the 'Index' of 1853, and be brought down to the date of issue.
Another enterprise, hardly less important, was approved by the
Convention and referred to a committee, which, it is to be hoped, will
take steps to commence work with the new year - the publication by the
Library Association of a bi-monthly list (under authors, subjects, and
titles) of the contents of current periodical literature, with a
biennial index. If the few libraries which are most interested
guarantee its publication for the first year, it will prove to be so
useful as easily to acquire a sufficient subscription-list. So much of
our best writing is now appearing in the periodical form that libraries
need a catalogue of their magazine articles as much as of their books ;
but for each to make its own index, as many are now doing, is an
intolerable waste of time. It would be much cheaper for them to
subscribe fifty dollars a year apiece to a printed list than to attempt
to do the work each for itself. Several have already expressed their
willingness so to contribute ; but no such sum will be required if every
library of 10,000 volumes, and a reasonable number of editors and
literary men, think it worth four or five dollars a year. Mr. Poole's
work is to be limited to English periodicals ; the monthly list would
include some foreign journals. A third work of importance, but of less
pressing need, was considered - a subject-index of collections essays.
In part, this would cover the same ground as Poole's 'Index' and
undoubtedly it would be more economical and convenient to publish the
two in a single alphabet than as separate works ; but the incorporation
of essay references would delay the preparation of the periodical index,
which has been delayed long enough already, and the publisher might be
unwilling to undertake so large a volume as would be required. It is,
of course, to be regretted that the Association has not the means to
produce its work in the best possible way, but this is a common
misfortune, and librarians are accustomed to act on the proverb that
half a loaf is better than no bread.These weighty matters were transacted in a few minutes, for no one needed
to be convinced of the necessity of action. The chief discussion was on
the question whether fiction should be encouraged or allowed or excluded
from public libraries. A very interesting report from the guardian of a
small collection of books - about 9,000 volumes - established by the
Quakers in Germantown showed that a library can be carried on, even
among a manufacturing population, and retain its readers, without a
single volume of fiction. Another statement, from the largest library
in the country, showed how by wise management the circulation of fiction
can be transmuted in a very short time into more solid reading. Some
remarks were made in favor of fiction, and in testimony to its value
both in moral education and as a stepping stone to higher intellectual
occupation ; other speakers assumed that its use is always to be
deplored and regarded as at best a concession to the weakness of human
nature. The dispute resembles that between the moral-suasionists and
the prohibitionists, the latter party being decidedly in the minority.
It seems to us that it did not bring out clearly enough the fact that
the library of a country town, or even of a manufacturing suburb, need
not be treated in exactly the same way as that of a city, and that some
things can be done where the librarian comes into direct contact with
his people which are impossible in the hurry of delivering a thousand
volumes a day ; that the uneducated can be often advised or cajoled into
good reading when the half-educated will resent any advice and the
educated do not need it. The discussion also hardly took sufficient
account of the very great value of the better sort of fiction. There
are novels and novels. It is time that some new name was invented for
the trash of "Ouida" and Southworth and the author of 'Guy Livingstone.'
It is unbearable that these writers should be classed in the same
rubric with Goerge Eliot and George Macdonald, the author of 'John
Halifax,' and the author of 'A Trap to catch a Sunbeam.' As well class
together and condemn alike Fenelon or Channing and a dervish or a Mormon
missionary. They have nothing in common that is essential to the point
under discussion - whether, as some assert of imply, the influence of
fiction is entirely and at all times evil, or, as others believe, the
best fiction is capable of as good an influence, moral and intellectual,
as any other kind of reading.
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4. "INDEPENDENT" LIBRARIES AND CUBA, by Brian Campbell
(Written before the conference.)
Policy towards Cuban "independent" libraries, and therefore Cuba, will be a
major topic of debate during the ALA /CLA conference. This is a defining
moment for both organizations.Librarians will have to decide whether intellectual freedom and access to
information, among our most cherished principles, are ideals to be defended
regardless of social and historical reality. Are these principles
transcendent, even when manipulated as instruments of American foreign
policy in order to prepare for the overthrow of a government embodying many
of the values of humanity upon which our libraries are based?The Cuban debate highlights the impossibility of librarians asserting
neutrality from the real world of politics. Neutrality does not question
the dominant power but accedes to it. Where libraries reflected the social
world that created them, now they must question it. This is an historic
challenge. From the impact of media consolidation on access to
information, neo-liberal budget cutbacks threatening library service or
increased government surveillance, librarians are called upon to defend the
public good and the future of libraries. Cuba is another such issue.Openly available documents on U.S. foreign policy and 50 years experience in
Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Iran and Iraq teach us that the aggressive
stance to Cuba is motivated not by human rights but by the desire to bring
Cuba back into the international marketplace. However, the neo-liberal
marketplace is not compatible with the marketplace of ideas.Cuban society and its leadership is imperfect, both in its day-to-day
reality, and in its lack of full achievement of our ideals of a just and
social society. What country is not? The reality however is that it has
existed in an unwanted state of war with the most powerful nation on earth
for the 44 years since its founding through the overthrow of a corrupt and
exploitive colonial state. During that time, it has achieved remarkable
success in improving literacy, medical care, education, health research and
poverty reduction compared to other South American countries.No other country has survived, let alone continued to develop, under the
economic blockades, assassination attempts, terrorist attacks, subversion
and relentless foreign pressure to which Cuba has been subjected.
Clearly, the social ownership of Cuba's economy is the basis for its
successes and resilience. This is the real source of opposition to Cuba by
those who would return it to its previous colonial position while
integrating it into a world market economy in which divisions between the
poor and the wealthy continue to grow.The so-called "independent" libraries is an important element of this
attack. The objective is to reintegrate Cuba into the American market. The
attacks, as usual, are silent as to historical background, current
political context and the reality of Cuba's present situation.Many librarians will recall current and past propaganda efforts which
justified going to war and which later proved false or inaccurate. The
"Axis of Evil" and the lists of countries, which without evidence include
Cuba, supporting terrorism are part of a highly charged international
political climate. The attacks on Cuba must be understood within this
political climate. Media concentration makes full access to necessary
information on which to judge international issues doubly difficult.Two recent events should have highlighted the nature of these constant
attacks on Cuba but are instead used by the right to celebrate the lack of
human rights in Cuba.The first incident was the recent arrest and imprisonment of 75 Cubans,
including "independent" librarians and "independent" journalists, for
conspiring with the US Interests Section in Havana to destabilize Cuba.
This is a crime in Cuba as it is in most countries. It is illegal in Cuba
to work for the U.S. in undermining Cuba. These laws are similar to U.S.
laws requiring individuals or organizations "subject to foreign control,"
(i.e. receiving money or instructions from a foreign government) to
register with the Attorney General."Independent libraries" are one dimension of a campaign initiated globally
in the early 1980's to use civil society organizations funded through the
CIA, US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the National
Endowment for Democracy (NED) to undermine and disrupt Cuban and other
societies. Through USAID, money has been shifted to Freedom House and the
Center for a Free Cuba. As recently as May 2002 President Bush announced
in Washington and Miami his " Initiative for a New Cuba" and "increased and
direct assistance to help build Cuban civil society".The 75 received a trial in accordance with Cuban law, the charges against
them fitting into a pattern of US interference that is well-documented in
Cuba and many other countries. The US has been very clear about its
objectives and James Cason, the recently appointed Chief of the U.S.
Interests Section in Havana has been blatant in supporting Cuban
dissidents.The development and support of Cuba's "independent libraries" is part of
this supposed increased "democratization" of Cuba. Both the organizations
listed above support the "independent" libraries. I was able to visit two
out of five independent libraries that I tried to locate. Their
collections consisted of a few book shelves, material provided by the
Catholic Church and right wing organizations in Spain, Puerto Rica and
Miami as well as a few individual donations. The people running the
libraries were not librarians and were clearly opposition political
activists receiving funds from outside Cuba. They had the best phones and
faxes that I saw in Cuba.The second incident involves the arrest of 10 individuals for hijacking a
regular coastal commuter ferry and taking it into open waters thus
jeopardizing the lives of the other ferry passengers, including holding a
knife to the throat of a woman passenger. Cuba, which had not executed
any prisoners for several years, executed three leaders of the hijacking.
Compare this to the number of executions per capita in Texas.Again, this must be looked at in the context of the international political
climate. Cubans can leave Cuba. Through an agreement demanded by the
U.S., 20,000 U.S. visas can be given out each year. Since October, 2002,
only 700 visas were issued. Thus a safety valve had been closed. At the
same time, another 29 hijackings plots were being thwarted by Cuban
authorities as the U.S. warned Cuba that "any more hijackings would be
viewed as a serious threat to U.S. National Security." Despite the U.S.
position, Cuban hijackers who make it to the U.S. have been given asylum
and none have been prosecuted despite international agreements in place
regarding hijacking. The combination of limiting visas and rewarding
hijackers has resulted in the spate of hijacking. Cuban policy is directed
towards not providing the U.S. with an excuse for a naval blockade, aerial
bombardment or other escalation. There have been no hijackings since the
executions.In the end, your position on Cuba and the "independent" libraries will
reflect not just your understanding of the specific circumstances of Cuba
but your most basic political and social values. Is Cuba a threat to the
U.S.? Are its policies the main threat to human rights internationally?
What is the way forward to a more just and humane international world
order? Is Cuba to be judged against some idealized version of society
operating in a peaceful geo-political environment or in a realistic way
taking into consideration the 44 years of aggression that has distorted the
possibility of developing a fully human society? Are human rights to be
defined only in terms of freedom of expression and access to information,
despite limitations in our countries imposed by the media consolidation and
government secrecy? Does the military imbalance count for anything? What
are the human rights values of having a high literacy rate, free education
and healthcare and acceptable shelter? And finally, will we allow library
values to be used to undermine a struggling country with demonstrated
success in maintaining an imperfect but humane society.Important questions are raised for librarians on freedom of information
access. How much does the political context affect our policy. How does
freedom of access function in poor countries when major corporate media and
their values can overpower local resources? Indeed, how much freedom of
access to information exists all North America when so much information of
vital importance, including information on Cuba, is not available.I for one will not put my library principles at the service of American
foreign policy. I critically support Cuba and believe that it has
accomplished much in raising the living standards and hopes of the Cuban
people.This is a personal statement from Brian Campbell: past-Chair of the British
Columbia Library Association (BCLA) Intellectual Freedom Committee, past
member of the CLA Intellectual freedom committee, past Chair of the CLA
Information Policy Committee, winner of the UBC School of Library, Archival
and Information Studies Outstanding Graduate Award, the BCLA President's
Award, the Canadian Association of Public Libraries Outstanding Service to
Canadian Public Libraries Award and the 2003 Canadian Library Association
Outstanding Service to Librarianship award. I visited Cuba as a tourist in
1993 and as part of a library tour in 2001 to look at "independent"
libraries.
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5. CLA CUBA RESOLUTION
Whereas Cuba is a small impoverished island of 11 million people;
And Whereas Cuba has achieved for its entire population a high standard of
healthcare, basic literacy, nutrition and education;And Whereas Cuba has been subject to continuous foreign attempts to
undermine its government through economic blockades, subversion, military
adventures, assassination attempts and funding of political opposition
through "civil society" organizations;And Whereas Cuba is being challenged by foreign governments and
organizations for not upholding the core library principles of intellectual
freedom and access to information regarding its libraries as part of a
broader effort to overthrow the Cuban government;And Whereas ending such foreign intervention is a precondition for enabling
Cuba to develop fully its own social economy and broad democratic
participation and debate;And Whereas Cuban libraries can play an important role in developing a full
and democratic culture within Cuba;Therefore Be It Resolved that CLA opposes any foreign government attempts to
undermine Cuba's government through economic blockades, subversion,
military adventures, assassination attempts and outside funding of
political opposition through "civil society" organizations;And Be It Further Resolved that CLA call upon International Federation of
Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) to convene an international
Commission of eminent and independent librarians to hold public hearings to
investigate further the role of "independent libraries" in Cuba and charges
that they are funded through foreign agencies whose political program is
regime change;And Be It Further Resolved that CLA encourage such a Commission to publish
and disseminate widely the results of its findings.Moved By Brian Campbell
Seconded by Martin Dowding
Passed by Canadian Library Association 7/23/03]
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6. Ruth Gordon on Cuba and the "Independent Librarians"
[MEMBER-FORUM:198] A question, re: Cuba
Date: Tue, 1 Jul 2003 20:10:17 -0800
From: druthgo[at]sonic.net (Ruth I Gordon)
To: member-forum[at]ala.org
Reply to: druthgo[at]sonic.netI am sorry that I no longer have the question posed by someone re: ALA &
Cuba. However, I believe that the reason that ALA has not acted on this
matter is that the information we receive from Mr. Kent is so totally
slanted and too often excepted from longer articles that we do not know
where the truth lies. Most of his information is from some group, Friends
of Cuban Libraries, which probably is produced by one of those extreme
Cubano groups which infest Miami. There is absolutely no neurality in his
releases--only extreme rightist anti-Castro propaganda. Despite a quite
long article on the so-called Cuban libraries (bookshelves supplied by the
U.S. interest group in Cuba, an offshoot U.S. government agency), Mr.
Kent's releases are, at best, paid-for propaganda--from which Mr. Kent has
gained the great benefit of paid-for travel to Cuba.It would not surprise me in the least to learn that he is also paid by the
U.S. government in one of its many "anti" funds.I don't believe that Cuba is paradise, but I do believe that its literacy
rate, among other things, is far higher than our own, and that present-day
Cuban ordinary citizens are far better off now then they were during the
reign of "our" dictator, pre-Castro.Everything would be better in that beleagured island if this nation, the
U.S., would wake up and smell the sugar (and cigars) and call off its
nonsensical and anti-human boycott.Big Grandma
(who is once again certain that Ashcroft's Department of Injustice will be
after her and put her name on one of its many lists.)"You may not be able to change the world, but at least you can embarrass
the guilty." Jessica Mitford (1917-1996)
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7. Ann Sparanese's note discussing Leonard Kniffel's editorial on Cuba
Written to colleagues
-----
More on Cuba Agenda Item & Kniffels piece
Date: Wed, 11 Jun 2003 09:22:30 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ann Sparanese <sparanese[at]yahoo.com>Yes, Kniffel's editorial is maddening. I think he
does stop short of calling them librarians and
instead tries to draw the lesson that what we do is
dangerous. Yes, indeedy, with Ashcroft & co., it
certainly is, but he doesn't say that.(At the end of this email I have incldued some
additional URLs that will help people to understand
what is going on. )Well, the wolf dresses up in sheep's clothing to fool
the sheep (and then to gobble them up).What Leonard and others fail to understand is that
it's not about libraries, it's not about
intellectual freedom or free expression, it's not even
about "dissidence" as we would understand it -- it's
about the money. The US, mandated by the Helms
Burton law (and everyone should read it, especially
Section 109) pours millions of dollars into creating
and buying "dissidents" in Cuba. It is explicitly
against Cuban law for Cubans to collaborate with
Helms-Burton law. The Helms-Burton calls for a
"transition" to democracy, which is actually the total
overthrow of the Cuban government and economic system.
It dictates who may run in Cuban elections, how they
must be conducted, and that Cuba must have a "market
economy" and a bunch of other conditions. Helms Burton
monies -- millions of dollars of them -- must be
dedicated to bring about this U.S. dictated
"transition" in Cuba.The people arrested broke the Cuban law that forbids
its citizens to collaborate with that. This is why
these people were arrested, call themselves what they
will: alternately "journalists" "librarians" etc.
They have chosen "professions" that their U.S.
handlers think will gain them sympathy and hide what
they have really done: taken money from their
country's sworn enemy to subvert their own government.The United States has the same kind of law -- it
criminalizes, with long prison sentences, US citizens
who operate at the behest of a foreign government.
Check out USCA Title 18 Section 951. (There is a US
citizen of Cuban extraction currently serving 15 years
in US prison for violating that law and who knows who
else?)After the passage of the interventionist Helms Burton
law, the Cuban National Assembly (yup, they have
one!)passed several laws to criminalize collaboration
with it. One is the 1999 law 88 which prohibits
citizens from subversive collaboration with a foreign
power.These kinds of laws probably exist in most countries,
which have a sovereign right not to have their
political processes corrupted by foreign money (Sound
familiar? Think Democrats and China) Are they wrong?
If so, repeal should begin at home. I don't know any
civil libertarians or human rights activists in the US
currently challenging Title 18, Section 951 of US law.Furthermore, there are European NGOs operating in Cuba
with whom Cuban citizens work and are not penalized,
punished or imprisoned. There are Cubans at the grass
roots level working for change in their society --
their kind of change, not the kind dictated by Miami
and Washington -- who are not jailed or imprisoned.In fact, one of the most well-known human rights
activists in Cuba, Elizardo Sanchez, made statements
over a year ago (when Bush announced an increase of
Helms-Burton activity and funding) that Cuban
dissidents who take money and work in conjunction with
the US government are doing a disservice to the
movement. He is not in prison. (People like him also
call for an end to the economic blockade, about which
Kent & Co. could not care less. Kent also has nothing
to say about the US travel ban against Cuba, which
keeps ordinary US citizens -- at the risk of steep
fines -- from seeing Cuba themselves and forming their
own impressions about it.)The lies of Kent etc. are so numerous as to require
cataloging. But the idea that books by Martin Luther
King, George Orwell, and their own national hero, Jose
Marti would be banned, is truly hysterical. (There is
a Martin Luther King Center in Cuba, schools named
after him and other civil rights leaders and he is
revered there.) This is a very poor country with 99%
literacy, which is awash in books and libraries. You
can buy all kinds books (mainly old and tattered but
books noetheless) on the street. I've purchased all
kinds of stuff there, including the works of Marti.Check out the report by the ALA delegation to ACURIL
to see what they said about Cuban library collections
as they found them in their investigation. The idea
that anyone has been jailed for having books is
even denied by the so-called "independent
librarians" themselves!! (See that in the ACURIL
report) Only Robert Kent's FCL and Cubanet, that
internet outlet totally funded by USAID and and other
"anti Castro" donors, asserts otherwise. Cubanet is
then used as a source quoted by other objective and
erudite press such as the Washington Times!Folks, I could go on and on. Kent's campaign is
cynical, hypocritical, bogus, but very dangerous
because it has the power and press of the extreme
right wing press as well as government policy. If ALA
were to succumb in any way to Kent's demands, it makes
us an instrument of a failed and exceedingly ugly
foreign policy. US librarians are professionals who
are able to travel to Cuba with a US license (at least
for the moment!) and see for themselves. They can even
visit the "independent libraries". Our colleagues have
done all that and you can read the results!We have to educate our colleagues on Council who are
not of the same political attitudes as us. I think
most folks on Council have no access ot the
understanding the real situation and are sympathetic,
of course, to claims of violations of intellectual
freedoms of "librarians" etc. This is understandable,
but I think we will have to work to change their
minds.I don't put Leonard K. in this category because he
should know better, I don't know why he writes what
he does. I think he is striving for some great
intellectual profundity which only demonstrates his
profound conformity to so-called conventional wisdom
(which is conventional but seldom wise).Ann Sparanese
***
http://ciponline.org/cuba/humanrights/USfunding.htm
This is a good article by Center for International
Policy, a liberal foreign policy think tank -- one of
its staff is Wayne Smith, the former US Intersts
Section Ambassador in Cuba. They have a whole Cuba
project on their site and they give a good rundown of
the Helms-Burton USAID funding.http://www.usaid.gov/regions/lac/cu/program_report/profile.html
You can read about the USAID program relating to Cuba
at their own site. One of the main grantees is
Freedom House -- which is who paid for Robert Kent's
trip(s) to Cuba as a courier -- for which he was
deported from Cuba and only then initiated his
organization FCL. He admits to carrying money for the
kinds of people who have been arrested. In fact,
Freedom House received the very first Helms Burton
funding back in 1996.Do you believe this URL??!! Anyway, this is from the
IRC pages of the new ALA website. It is the report of
the ALA delegation to the ACURIL conference in Havana
in May 2001. Of particular interest is Part Four
written by Pat Wand.This is the result of the last time Robert Kent made
demands on ALA to condemn Cuba.http://www.washtimes.com/world/20030605-094205-8417r.htm
This last one is the recent article published by that
paradigm of objectivity the Washinton Post which tries
to substitute redbaiting Mark and me for reporting
anything about the real issues. By the way I gave
him a lengthy, not a brief, interview. He never asked
me about the Venceremos Brigade which he writes about
at the end as a "marxist" organization. (FYI, the
Venceremos Brigade, from from being a "marxist"
organization, is a project that since 1969 has defied
and challenged the US economic, information and travel
policies towards Cuba, sending thousands of US
citizens--from marxists to the apolitical to budding
capitalists-- to see Cuba for themselves. It's a
work/travel people-to-people exchange! Anyone
interested in this summer's trip should write me!)=====
Ann C. Sparanese,MLS
Head of Adult & Young Adult Services
Englewood Public Library
Englewood, NJ 07631
212-568-2215, ext 229
Councilor-At-Large
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8. Evergreen V.1, No. 2
by Michael McGrorty
I admit with no reluctance to a certain weakness for old books. An old
book contains two stories: its contents and whatever tales its users have
attached to it over the years. Sometimes I like a book because of the way
it has worn: like an old shoe or a favorite hat, books break in and become
comfortable; their spines relax and their pages lie flat without effort;
they smell of someone's home-they carry the memory of the owner's hair, his
cigar, her perfume, the particular dust of the place, the residue of
curtains or carpets or hardwood shelves or sometimes the faint aroma of a
musty attic trunk. I look for books like that, sniff and feel for them
like a hog searches for a hidden acorn, and for the same reason.As a result my house occasionally resembles an old bookshop. In order for
it to function as a home, the woman who functions as my wife will sometimes
request that I transfer certain of my selections to the care of others,
permanently. I suppose the solution to this situation would be to reduce
my intake of new old books, but that discipline would be difficult if not
impossible to maintain, and the added burden of the enforcement would work
a hardship upon my wife.I have found that the best places to obtain new material for my
ever-shifting collection is at library book sales. Public libraries
discard quite a few good old books. It isn't that they don't care about
books; quite the opposite. The librarians care more for the books than the
patrons, but the nature of the library is such that it continually
replenishes its supply; it is not an archive nor a museum but a collection
for use by a public whose tastes change and whose appetites are constantly
whetted by new releases from the publishing world. What this means of
course is that many a worthy title goes out to the Friends' book sale, and
sometimes to my hands.The other day I came across a small gem which had been donated to a library
near me, but never saw a day of life on the shelf. One of the staff
probably gave it a glance and decided it didn't merit space. That is too
bad for the library, and quite good for me.The book is not really a book but a periodical. By way of title it is
Evergreen Review, volume 1, number 2, which emerged from Barney Rosset's
Grove Press in 1957. The serious student of modern literature will by the
conclusion of the last sentence have begun to feel the hairs arise upon the
back of his neck; for the rest of the world, a brief explanation is in
order.The Evergreen Review was a little project of Rosset's fertile mind. Rosset
brought D.H. Lawrence's lively story about Lady Chatterley and her
gamekeeper to the American market (and the courts) as well as Henry
Miller's Tropic of Cancer; Grove Press existed at the bright and dangerous
cutting edge of publishing from 1951 to its demise in 1985, and it was only
natural that Rosset would undertake a magazine to showcase the newest
bright (and dark!) lights of the time. Hence the Review, whose first issue
showcased Rosset's pals Jean-Paul Sartre, Samuel Beckett and Mark Schorer,
among others in 201 provocative pages.The second issue, which rests in my lap, bore the title 'San Francisco
Scene,' and featured a jostling crowd of Beats and fellow travelers: Allen
Ginsberg's Howl appears here, along with work by Jack Kerouac, Henry Miller
and Lawrence Ferlinghetti. It is quite something even at this late date to
flip to page 137 and imagine an impressionable young man absorbing these
lines, obtained for one dollar American, while sucking on a Galois in the
espresso-stained gloom of some college-town coffeehouse:I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving
hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn
looking for an angry fix . . .That line alone is probably responsible for half the English majors of my
generation, not to mention quite a bit of the most sincere form of
flattery, most of which stunk badly in comparison, but that's life:
Ginsberg is as vulnerable to bad imitation as Hemingway or Shakespeare or
anybody with a distinct style, and that, of course, he had in spades.
There is a photograph of him in the gallery which begins on page 65,
appallingly young in denim shirt, nursing the inevitable dying remnant of a
flattened smoke between his fingers, staring into the camera and our souls,
not a gray hair on his head, frozen in time here on these pages, which
scholars will turn and read and marvel at when our grandchildren are long
in their graves.Not far before the picture gallery there is a piece by Ralph J. Gleason,
'The San Francisco Jazz Scene.' Gleason's writing style was forged at the
old Chronicle and honed in the dim light of cigar-box clubs; his piece
begins "San Francisco has always been a good-time town. For periods it has
been a wide-open town." This is more than a music review; it is
witness-journalism mated with the spare style of the noir novel, and
Gleason made it work for himself and us through a career that spanned
musical light-years in terms of the changes he witnessed and wrote about
first-hand. Gleason would one day join Jann Wenner in founding Rolling
Stone magazine; before that he would be an early champion of Lenny Bruce,
Miles Davis and Bob Dylan. He lived fifty-eight years by the calendar, and
he was about forty and in his prime when this piece found its place in the
Review.Jack Kerouac gives us a sample of himself in 'October in the Railroad
Earth,' whose opening sentence runs nearly the length of a page and rambles
like a dope-smoking street bum through an edgy film loop of San Francisco
in a long moment that took place just back of the Southern Pacific station
at Third and Townsend. This is Kerouac before the booze sets in; in the
same year he will become famous from the publication of On the Road, and be
unable to deal with all that. I would quote you some of this, give you
some idea, but he doesn't use periods any more than a hurricane and I
wouldn't know when to make it quit. Go see for yourself.And so it lies here in my lap, this gem of a discard, mine for two bits to
do with as I please. Right now I have been pleasing to try to describe
this faded little magazine without implying somehow that the library from
which it was obtained might better have thrown a call number across its
narrow back and let another generation of youth become polluted by its
content, but I'm not going to suggest that and if they want some of this
they can probably get it on the Internet, if they can find it by
themselves.Michael McGrorty
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9. Zine Librarian Zine #2 (review)
Greig Means, of the Independent Publishing Resource Center in Portland, OR,
has sent out issue two of his very interesting Zine Librarian Zine, "Advice
for the young zine librarian." It's a zine about zine librarianship, with
contributions from zine librarians in the US and Britain. Issue #1 was
reviewed in Library Juice 5:11, March 22, 2002 -
http://www.libr.org/Juice/issues/vol5/LJ_5.11.html#15 .As you can tell from the subtitle, the theme of this issue is advice for
people wanting to make zine collections accessible, either in actual
libraries or in infoshops. So, this one is really a practical resource
that's worth picking up and cataloging as a single item even if you don't
want to collect the zine. Really it's a LIS title that deserves to be on
the shelf, because it deals with problems of collection development,
cataloging, collection management, and public services.Of course it's also a reunion with the zine librarians we met in issue 1,
talking about their collections, and a few new ones. Included in this
issue are articles by Brooke Young of the Salt Lake City Public Library,
Ellen Knutson of the Urbana-Champaign IMC, Michael Basinski of SUNY
Buffalo, Deanna Hitchcock of the Pittsburgh Zine Library and Archive, John
Held, Jr., of the Modern Realism Archive in San Francisco (a collection of
Mail Art), Amy Leigh of the Sallie Bingham Center for Women's History and
Culture in Durham, NC, Colleen McKee of the Bread and Roses
Library/Infoshop in St. Louis, MO, Penny Collins of the Misfit Theater Zine
Library in Auckland, NZ, Andrea Grimes of the Little Maga/Zine Collection
at the San Francisco Public Library (started in the 1960's), Sean Stewart
(not a zine librarian but a zinester and zine reviewer), X-Chris of 56a
Infoshop in South London, and Greig Means himself.You can write to Greig at:
Zine Librarian Zine
PO Box 12409
Portland, OR 97212You can also buy issues of ZLZ #'s 1 & 2 from Microcosm Distro, at
http://www.microcosmpublishing.com
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10. Amusing searches
The following are some amusing search expressions that led web users from
search engines, mostly Google, to pages on Libr.org:email addresses of richest black women in usa
extreme america fear monty python exaggeration
free dragon ball z porn
Dunkin Donuts bibliography
ALASKA KNIVES YULE
"penis copy" -system -kit -shop make own your -doh
"Rat Robot" software
insane quotes
Photo of a "male devil"
dirt bike consumers nationwide demographic
the strongest hulk that exists pics
st lawrence the martyr - a children's guide
"reader" and "patron" and "user" and "drug user"
i miss communism
define Friday the 13th
a humorous look at quantification
kellogs pig latin
hippy yearbook quotes
5 foot bongs
should librarian express personal opinions
needles haystacks whatever
quotes pertaining to idiots
Is "cannibalism legal"?
searching to see if i have a warant on me
christian subjects amy goodman won't discuss
how to use arabic bongs
pickle juice refreshment
_________________________________________________________________________top
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