Libraries for Dummies

Despite my status as an all-knowing library genius, I'd never even heard of renting board and card games from the library until relatively recently, when it was mentioned during an episode of the Untitled Library Podcast. I think it's a brilliant idea that could hopefully stop those pesky gen zers from complaining about "no third spaces" and "loneliness epidemic" and "everything horrible is happening at the same time right now and I'm 19 which is like the worst age for that to happen."

The initial concern with checking out board games is, of course, the itty-bitty pieces. But no librarian has ever said "oh, no, too much information!"

It really is just as simple as adding extra details - like the number and type of pieces in a board game - and then taking the extra time to check the board game box to verify the presence of all the pieces. Totally worth it when you understand all the benefits of having the board games in the first place.

As I mentioned earlier, there really is a lack of places for young people to just… hang out. The library provides a convient solution, but it has a reputation for fostering envinronments not conductive to things such as uproarious laughter, something which I have heard is ideal during "hangs." I wouldn't know, I was born in a test tube and raised by a particularly capable and very strict Alexa.

Anyways, the presence of the board games in the library, and ideally a louder-than-average board game section also within the library will be a great way to get young people into and familiar with the library. Plus, games are good for you. Of course, they help with mental health, but they also increase cognitive functions skills and promote things such as teamwork, patience, and sportsmanship.

Every time I hear "Dewey Decimal System," I think of Dewey from Malcolm in the Middle. Of course, the much-beloved organizational system was actually invented by American librarian Melvil Dewey, but it doesn't hurt anyone if I choose to live in a world where a fictional 2000s sitcom character invented a sorting system that has permanently changed libraries forever. At least Dewey from Malcolm in the Middle is certainly not an anti-semetic, racist, sexual assaulter.

The central idea behind the DDS (Dewey Decimal System) is that all of knowledge can be split into ten main classes. Each of those ten main classes then have ten divisions, and each of those divisions have ten more divisions. In other words, if you look at the three letter Dewey Decimal code - 957, as a random example - 900 will be your main class, 50 will be your first division, and 7 will be your second division (within that first division). In the case of 957, class 900 is history and geography. 950 is history of asia, and then 957 is history of Siberia in asiatic Russia. A decimal after 957 would suggest an even nicher category within the others - certain eras in Siberian history, certain towns/cities, etc.

If you would like to explore Dewey Decimal numbers yourself, here is a link to them.

If your library happens to have a thousand books on the same niche in Siberian history, then the books are organized by author name (then by book name.)

The Dewey Decimal System (DDS) is not perfect, and it has a very flawed past that create problems when using the system today. Some of the issues are easy fixes: topics relating to women were frequently placed next to topics relating to stereotypical things, such as etiquette. So, you swapped women with another category and the problem is solved. Other issues take a little longer to fix due to politics, and thusly need a few revisions to be done correctly. (See: homosexuality first catergorized as a niche under "mental derangements" and "abnormal psychology", then also under "the study of sexes in society" and "social problems," and now it is under all of those and "sexual relations".

Some problems are nearly impossible to fix. For instance, in the 200 class - religion - the 220s, 230s, 240s, 250s, 270s, and 280s, are all about christianity. Other major religions are relgated to second level divisions, such as 296 (Judaism) or 297 (Islam). The problem with this problem is that it affects such a massive chunk of the DDS that it would be incredibly difficult for libraires to update their collections, which would create lots and lots of more problems. I heavily encourage you to read this article by Anna Gooding-Call for more information.

Nothing makes my skin crawl quite like patrons re-shelving books. I appreciate the intention, of course, but the library is the one place where you absolutely should not put things back where you found them. First of all, unless you have photographic evidence of where the book was before you plucked it off the shelf, there is absolutely zero way to know that you're putting said book back into the right spot. Books can shift and move, and gaps between books can widen and slim, making what was once sure now unknown. If anything, the more sure you are that you're right, the worse it is when you're wrong. It is harder for librarians to find and reorganize books that are closer to where they should be. Plus, if everybody moves a book or or two places away from where it should be, inevitably the book will end up on the other side of the library.

But the main reason you shouldn't reshelve your books has nothing to do with memory. If a book was left out, that means a patron was either reading it, interested in it, or looking for books similar to it, which is super valuable data because it effects where libraries spend their money and resources. Even if you go to library and read the same book every day, if you put it right back where you got it from, they may still remove it from the collection forever.

Most libraries provide book carts where patrons should put books after they've been plucked off their shelf. Patrons should avoid placing books on top of the shelf unless you can't find a book cart. If you do want to place a book on top of the shelf, please do not pick a shelf in the deepest depths of the library. The goal is for the book to be found, after all.

image source (further reading)