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Irony of Librarians profession: LIS Teachers can be treated as Librarian but not via-versa

In a recent Librarians Day Celebration by Dept. of Public Libraries, Karnatka awarded 5 eminent LIS professionals as “Best Librarians”.

Due respect to all the awardees, I would like to raise few questions:

  1. Librarians and LIS Teachers are equal?
  2. LIS teachers are additionally handling Libraries, but is there any example of Librarian running the LIS Department after LIS teacher got retired?
  3. Any Assistant Librarian, is allowed to apply for Associate Professorship in LIS?
  4. Does IATLIS ever awarded “Best Teacher” to any practicing Librarian, but as per my knowledge ILA has awarded as many LIS Teachers as Librarians.

Now coming back to Best Librarian by Dept. of Public Libraries, Karnataka. Dear Sir/ Madam, please if you wanted to award teachers award them as “Best LIS Teachers”, please do not award as “Best Librarian”. Librarian is on who practices Librarianship as profession, not who teaches Library Science.

Please forgive if me, if hurts your sentiments. Still I expect your views as comments.

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Permalink Reply by Munesh Kumar on August 20, 2016 at 2:18

I agree with all the points.

It is in the same row where a poorly educated person leads the team of toppers of IAS exam, a film-actor leads to real hero of sports without any sport qualification, a film actress leads the team of social welfare, caste over the intellectuality etc... it is not cheating with Librarians only, it is with all if you see carefully, "its all the game of chance".

Permalink Reply by sangita saxena on August 21, 2016 at 19:36

yes i m also agree with  your all this pont

Permalink Reply by Surajit on August 21, 2016 at 20:06

Madam,

I think most of us do agree with your bold statement. We are living in a world of dichotomy.  Here all are happened or pursued only for the benefit of those who are already in a benefited position.  From the dias. they speaks something, and do something else...  I also agree with Mr Munesh with his statement.  

Permalink Reply by Archana Rampujan Prasad on August 21, 2016 at 22:21

   

 I agree with the above mentioned status and biased behaviour towards librarians.

We all know that we are told to treat librarians as equal as teachers but in our own domain we are treated as strangers. How can we achieve equal rights, opportunity, status and privelege when such condition exists in the field of LIS itself. Even in some institutions name of librarians are mentioned along with the non-teaching staff.If such conditions exists the future of librarianship which was dreamt off would be vouge.

Permalink Reply by M. Koteswara Rao on August 22, 2016 at 22:55

Yes, you are absolutely right. I felt the same and had reported this anomaly and biased treatment earlier in LIS-Forum to which none of the LIS teachers have responded. Giving the 'Best Librarian' award to LIS teachers is ridiculous, unethical and I think it is nothing less than an act of 'favoritism'. If all the library professionals are equal, then why do we have so many different types of library associations? It looks odd for the Dept. of public libraries of Karnataka to felicitate LIS teachers instead of  librarians of public libraries when there are bodies like IATLIS for conferring awards to LIS teachers?

I do not mean to hurt LIS teachers but, given the fact that almost 90% of LIS professionals are librarians and the remaining are engaged in teaching, one should not encroach upon the others domain in any way.  However, we often see that LIS teachers become library-in-charge in the absence of a full-time librarians whereby creating unemployment and mistrust. Will the LIS faculty allow the Librarian/Dy librarian to be the in-charge HOD or guide students for their research? I have come across many cases of such 'isolation' of Library officers from the LIS department although both are equally qualified in their domain.  It is an irony that the library profession stems into a 'dichotomy' of two careers, but this 'undue glorification' of LIS teachers by everybody and for everything does not augur well in academics. It is time that we should respect each others careers without encroaching upon one another and try to peacefully coexistence.   

Dr. M. Koteswara Rao

Former librarian, UoH

Permalink Reply by shradhashesh on August 24, 2016 at 19:48

Dear Shweta Patil n Munesh Kumar

Your statement seriously true, lots of things are irrelevant in our education system

Permalink Reply by Siddhartha Shankar Ray on August 25, 2016 at 22:02

Many thanks Ms. Sweta Patil for the burning example of 'dichotomy' prevailing in our profession.

I whole heartedly thank Dr. Rao.for expressing his views without any reservations. In fact I often feel that it should be made mandatory for the LIS teachers of having at least 5 years' working experience in Libraries as recruitment qualification.

It is a bare fact that often LIS teachers become members of recruitment committees for librarians even in senior positions! I wonder how a person without having even a day's working experience in a Library can judge competence of a senior professional!! Earlier, when even M.LibSc.s were extremely limited, Professional Librarians used to teach in the departments and they were excellent teachers as we  realised when we went to work. We realised that they have taught from their practical experience and their vast experience of trouble shooting which often helped us in real life situations.

Coming to this context, I presume that though the LIS teachers constitute a small community, they often have bigger say in our profession as due to the colonial hangover still existing in our guts! we are used to give priority to theoreticians over practical creative minds. I think the people of the Dept of Public Libraries of Karnataka have the same mindset and they failed to spot and highlight the competent Librarians of Public Libraries in that State.

To conclude, I must add here that I have no personal grudge against the LIS Teachers;but giving priority (which are, at times, undue) to a certain section of a community is not fair!

Sincerely,

Siddhartha S. Ray 

Permalink Reply by Munesh Kumar on August 26, 2016 at 0:06

Dear Sir/Ma'am

I would like to add few points which are out the context of this forum and do not point to anyone, Librarian or Teacher. Most of the universities are having old syllabus, distance education based systems can be placed on top in this rows rest we can go through their syllabus to find out the usefulness of the content and things as of now. University libraries are also victims of the old and manual based system which meets the audit related requirements more than the users need. There are few universities who maintain the level of education and student get jobs in bigger setups, where they practice the real sense of Library as a Science. 

Library Science is a subject of subjects which get changed by few other external factors and changes taking place in other domains; IT, Management and Library Science itself. Being at practical side, we change our system and adopt the updates, if it is required and start services as per the requirement with the help of such thing (exceptions do exists) whereas it takes very long time to implement in syllabus as subject or part of coursework. The matter comes, if Library Science is a subject and matter of service then who is more updated? 
The credit of above goes to the teachers who have taught us. But, I mean to say system should not play blindly like happened in Karnataka, it unnecessary creates an unwanted gap between the people of same profession. There are lots awards which are can be given teachers why to give a designated honor like best librarian. I would request to all the teacher of this domain, if a system fails to personify a correct person kindly help system to find the same. Do not lead or practice anything which is impracticable.

Thank you.   

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