Librarianship is a Rodney Dangerfield profession. Librarians don’t get no respect. The classic response to “I’m a degreed librarian” is “you need a master’s degree to shelve books?”

Just last week, in fact, the Loon heard a variant on this that still has her feathers ruffled: “you teach people to shelve books?”

(No. The Loon teaches people to write XML and SQL queries, to create and collect and organize and describe and preserve digital materials, to navigate the treacherous waters of copyright and patent, to understand how scholars work and share, to cope with library-specific technologies, to learn and work with novel technologies smartly and safely, to teach others to do the same, to think broadly and incisively about the intersection of information technologies with law and society. That is the kind of thing the Loon teaches. Just for the record.)

Occasionally, librarians receive golden opportunities to correct the record. Funny how the record still isn’t corrected. What do practitioners do wrong when talking about librarianship, then?

Well, articles like this recent one demonstrate common and wince-worthy problems rather well. Perhaps pointing them out and suggesting an alternative approach will prove worthwhile.

The hyperopinionated Loon wishes that librarians would stop talking about the damned degree in public-relations situations. It sounds defensive, the same kind of I’m-important-really-I-am defensive that makes people laugh at “sanitation engineers.” It’s also empty bluster by itself; in this depressed economy, people with master’s degrees serve coffee and drive cabs. Librarians cannot expect elevated social status on the sole basis of education.

Speaking in terms of audience, who exactly is won over by the educatedness of most service providers, anyway? That tactic barely works for doctors and lawyers; why would it work for librarians? It’s not as though librarians themselves have a particularly high opinion of their degree programs, even! (Note well, the Loon is not suggesting that librarians shouldn’t critique library schools or the MLS in public lest it create a poor impression; the Loon doesn’t hold with hiding dirty laundry.)

Likewise, the best thing to do about librarian stereotypes is ignore them, annoying though they are, tempting though it is to hit out at them. If nothing else, consider for a moment that every mention of a stereotype allows it to lodge in a mind that has never encountered it before, or reinforces it in a mind otherwise open. When speaking for public consumption about librarianship, take for granted that one doesn’t check out books, or shush, or babysit. Indeed, PR opportunities aren’t for talking about what one doesn’t do! Negatives are negative!

It’s bankrupt argumentation, this business of touting degrees and refuting stereotypes. Please, librarianship, move beyond it.

To what? To what librarians actually do, of course, in elevator-pitch form. Isn’t this what librarians constantly complain that no one understands?

Infodumpers that librarians are, elevator pitches seem intimidating to construct. The Loon doesn’t believe they have to be, especially in the soundbite context of the average PR opportunity. The basic goal is to leave the audience thinking “Oh. Huh. I didn’t know that. That’s useful and cool.” Can librarians do that? Well, who better?

• The reference librarian: I answer questions from patrons, ranging from [basic but useful common query] to [a real stumper], in real time as well as via email.
• The collections librarian: I pinch every penny of our library’s budget so that our patrons have the most fun and useful books, newspapers, magazines, music, movies, and Deep Web resources like [brilliant database lots of people would use if they knew you had it].
• The systems librarian: I keep the library catalog and website running, and make sure the library’s computers and wireless work right. Recently we put together [social-media initiative, digitization project, etc.], which drew [large number] of participants.
• The instruction librarian: I help students get top grades on research assignments by demystifying the library for them and helping them pick information needles out of the vast haystack of available resources. I worked with [Professor So-and-so] to craft a research assignment that taught students to [do something useful].

Et cetera. Note the pattern: a readily-understandable statement of occupation carefully phrased to sound vitally useful that slips in at least one specific example by way of additional marketing. Bonus points for highlighting specific outcomes of one’s work.

Of course no one’s job is actually soundbite-simple, nor can one librarian’s job ever be taken as representative of librarianship as a whole. That doesn’t matter. Never ruin a PR opportunity with minutiae. Broad statement, specific example, outcomes if they’re available, stop. The librarian whose job spans more than one area of work may usefully repeat this pattern for each area s/he works in.

The Loon used this elevator pitch for several years: “I take care of digital materials like websites and digital photos the same way libraries have always taken care of books. Recently I rescued [collection description].” It generally worked—the Loon’s interlocutors were intrigued, impressed, and practically always eager to continue talking.

Some librarians of the Loon’s acquaintance already do this quite well, luckily for librarianship. Jessamyn West is one, of course. Suggestions of others are welcome in the comments.

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