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Snow, Wasted Words
13 Dec 06
Snow, Richard. “Wasted Words: The Written Collection Development Policy and the Academic Library.” Journal of Academic Librarianship 22.3, 1996.
Snow cites various studies showing low rates of compliance with the received wisdom that CD policies are essential. A 1977 survey of 69 ARL libraries showed only 20 had a policy. In 1988 only one of five academic or research libraries in Alabama studied had a written policy, “with pleas of poverty, lack of time and overwork offered as excuses” (191). Another 1988 study of small to midsized libraries showed 58% had written policies.
“One possible explanation for the absence of universal acceptance of the written policy, despite its near unanimous endorsement in librarianship’s literature, is the lack of precise definition of what a written policy is as opposed to what it does.” (191)
This speaks to a couple of my concerns. I tend to find written collection policies bloated and unwieldy. The challenge, or perhaps the trade-off, is in trying to make the thing relatively short and still useful. What, then, is the usefulness of a CD policy?
Snow points out the danger of tautological arguments in favour of CD policies, supporting policies because they are essential or necessary (192). Here’s a quick bullet list of his “gentle reservations”:
- the problem of evaluation
- weaknesses of the conspectus model
- inflexibility and unresponsiveness to change
- duplication of work maintaining CD policy and approval plans
Recognizing that the conspectus model is kinda lame, I wonder how the other of Snow’s reservations might be addressed. His central concern seems to be that it is a waste of the bibliographer’s time to develop written policies, that the gnarly issue of collection evaluation and the development of approval plans (living documents that produce results) would be a better use of time. Yet he insists throughout his article on written policies, the implication being that institutions that don’t have written policies have unwritten ones. “Experienced bibliographers with a thorough familiarity with the curriculum often see little reason to commit their knowledge to the written page” (193). Perhaps I’m becoming too much of a bureaucrat, but it seems to me that an unwritten policy is no policy at all. OED gives “4. A principle or course of action adopted or proposed as desirable, advantageous, or expedient; esp. one formally advocated by a government, political party, etc. Also as a mass noun: method of acting on matters of principle, settled practice. (Now the usual sense.)” as its definition, so I stand somewhat corrected; but it still seems as though for purposes of communication and clarification, a written policy document is the way to go.
Posted by pzed on December 13, 2006 at 12.29pm
Categories: collection policies, libraries
Comments on "Snow, Wasted Words"
[...] words all fail the magic prize « Snow, Wasted Words [...]
Posted by words » Blog Archive » Wood and Hoffmann, Library Collection Development Policies on December 14, 2006 at 11.57am :: link
[...] The “against” section is, naturally, richer. He covers much of the same ground as Snow, but has surveyed the literature perhaps a little more broadly. Rather than cover that ground again, here are some tantalizing excerpts from Vickery’s conclusion: What is required is not merely a traditionally detailed written document, but a broad statement of purpose and a flexible, continually-revised description of the library’s aims. (341) [...]
Posted by words » Blog Archive » Vickery, Making a Statement on January 23, 2007 at 8.05pm :: link
