How Do We Library That?
Tasks of the Contingent Librarian (2020)
Making a Common Index Zine at the Hold and Release Partyline (2022)
k!words Conversation Map from Keleketla! Library (2021)
HyperCard, a pre-web hypermedia system released by Apple Macintosh (1987)
A moment for Temporary Indexing at Varia (2021)
The digital bootleg library
Jumbie Library, Trinidad & Tobago
Leeszaal Rotterdam West
Context
Libraries are complex, diverse social infrastructures. It's difficult to describe them without speaking in the generic plural "libraries", or specific singular "a library/the library"; as if they were all the same. Universalisms won't help in understanding what is situated about specific libraries, what makes them particular and important to their publics. For most of you reading this text, the word "library" could elicit images of a public library, built on values of open access to knowledge. You may know of one that has closed, or is now managed with proprietory self-service software, or perhaps even an open-source framework.
But libraries do more than simply give access to knowledge. The sharing of texts is a social practice, bringing readers, writers and editors together in an exchange of positions, ideas, approaches and know-how. Libraries are more than just collections of texts, or containers in which they are kept. They are places where many actions are performed, including reading together, annotating, organising and structuring.
Special Issue 19
We will begin with searching for proposals around how we "do" libraries together.
We will question indices and indexical attitudes that point toward universalisms, and discover in the process a library-in-the-making.
In a 2019 interview, researcher and architect Dubravka Sekulić asks, "what is useful knowledge for people to understand what surrounds them? Or for example, what can help to understand the politics of knowledge distribution". It is clear that what we need is to understand "how to offer people tools that allow them to interpret the position in which they are".
Libraries as:
- distribution networks
- sets of practices
- sites of cultural literacy
- sites of production
- sites of learning
- social spaces of text
Rather than looking only at what a library stores, we will also discover what it produces. We will consider collections as not only comprised of things, but also people and actions. In other words, we will attempt to collectively and individually answer the question "How do we library that?".
Schedule
One: Tasks of the Contingent Librarian
Monday, September 19th, 2022
11:00-17:30 Introduction to the Special Issue (with Simon)
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To introduce ourselves we will use cards from Tasks of the Contingent Librarian:
- 52 cards on the table (e.g. bootlegging, indexing, scanning, reading, technologising the word, &c)
- Choose a card that matches your curiosities and/or interests
- Exchange a card with someone else, describing how you relate to the card
- Exchange a card, relate that relation to someone else
- Make a new card, what information does it need?
Tuesday, September 20th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday September 21st, 2022
11:00-18:00 Introduction to Methods with Steve
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Two: Print Screen
Monday, September 26th, 2022
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Tuesday, September 27th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday September 28th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Three: Text, TBC
Monday, October 3rd, 2022
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Tuesday, October 4th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday October 5th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Four: Scribes Getting Personal ☞
Monday, October 10th, 2022
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Tuesday, October 11th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday October 12th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Five: Do e-books dream of electronic spreadsheets?
Monday, October 17th, 2022
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Tuesday, October 18th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday October 19th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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🍁🍁🍁
Autumn Vacation
Six: Binding Along the Spine
Monday, October 31st, 2022
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Tuesday, November 1st, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday November 2nd, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Seven: A Textile, A Framework
Monday, November 7th, 2022
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Tuesday, November 8th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday November 9th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Eight: Paper Machines
Monday, November 14th, 2022
References:
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Tuesday, November 15th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday November 16th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Nine: Readable, Writeable, Executable
Monday, November 21st, 2022
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Tuesday, November 22nd, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday November 23rd, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Ten
Monday, November 28th, 2022
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Tuesday, November 29th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday November 30th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Eleven
Monday, December 5th, 2022
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Tuesday, December 6th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday December 7th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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Twelve
Monday, December 12th, 2022
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Tuesday, December 13th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Prototyping with Manetta & Joseph
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Wednesday December 14th, 2022
11:00-18:00 Methods with Steve
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