I’ve been playing catch-up around the new apartment, so now I get to play digital catch-up with the blog. Expect three or so posts one post and a couple unpublished drafts throughout the course of today.
The hip librarians article made the rounds of the biblioblogosphere last week. At first glance, I thought it was a refreshing change from how librarians are normally portrayed — and it’s true that today’s librarians aren’t exactly the habitual shushers of yesteryear.
But my biggest concern is this : what’s so great about being hip?
I started thinking about what most people consider hip, and for some reason, my mind went to Justin Timberlake (even though I couldn’t care less what he’s bring sexy back from). But then my mind went a little further, and suddenly I was thinking of Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan — the people who dominate the tabloid headlines today, but who will eventually fall out of the spotlight five or six years from now (assuming the spotlight even lasts that long). Sure, LiLo and Paris know the best clubs and wear the hottest clothes — but their lives are social trainwrecks, and whatever fleeting impression they leave now will be lost pretty quickly. So in the big picture, the word “hip” doesn’t mean, well, anything.
Maybe I’m thinking about this too much, or maybe I’m being too reactionary. When I was in high school, I was never a cool kid. But I still did what I could to make myself relevant : I volunteered with Beta Club, I helped take our debate team to a state championship, I organized study groups with other AP calculus students. And I was never hip, but people knew my name. And that felt pretty good.
It’s nice to know that Library Land is attracting young, vibrant talent. But libraries and librarians should fight to be relevant — not necessarily cool. Who cares about your tattoos? Who cares about your trendy drink?
The fight for relevance (rather than hipness) is the one that best serves our customers and our communities — and, if you ask me, it’s really the only fight worth fighting.
