Guiding hands
I admit, it’s been a while since I was last in a public library.
The advent of eBay and Amazon meant the last time I was in a library looking for a non textbook to borrow Kurt Cobain was still alive; Nelson Mandella has just been elected and OJ had been accused of killing his wife.
However, faced with a need to know more about a country I’m due to land in tomorrow, I found myself scanning the travel section of my local library recently.
Staring at a complete hotpotch of travel guide titles (the Australian guides had been sanctioned to their own shelf, around the corner from the main stack, in possibly a sardonic comment on history) I noted that the titles were neither alphabetically arranged, nor arranged in any kind of pro-Dewey system.
I may not personally be a librarian, but I know people who are and I know that Dewey is their leader.
As I inquired politely of the librarian what system the Brits use for their travel guides, the knowledgeable chap explained travel guides are arranged geographically. “Always have been, always will be,” he said triumphantly, laughing at my suggestion of the universally acknowledged Dewey system.
The geographic organisation, he explained, used a system of continents and geographic boundaries. And so to find my guide, I needed to know about not only my destination but also countries on the border of my destination.
It was like pub trivia meets Indiana Jones! I’d need to know not only information about my destination but I’d also need to know countries on its border, countries in its time zone and countries with a sympathetic cultural history.
Quite frankly if I knew all that I wouldn’t need the guide.
Don’t get me wrong; I’ve done massive cram sessions on topics before interviewing people so I could ask relatively informed questions and not appear like a complete dunce, but I’ve never thought to bone up on my geography before going to my local library in anticipation of a pop quiz on the rise and fall of the Ottoman Empire.
I recently visited Oxford University with an antipodean librarian mate. As we went through Oxford’s Bodleian library we chuckled to ourselves at a question asked by a tourist from across the pond. Did the Brits use what Americans called the Dewey system, he asked. Our tour guide assured us all that the Dewey system was an international system and well and truly entrenched. Just goes to show how out of touch ivory towered educators are with the social order of today.
I eventually found my guide; shelved with other Eurasian titles, making me realise that not only do I need to buy a world map but I need to learn a whole new lexicon for continents, regions, systems of economic advantage and all that other stuff that had I done geography at school/university I would probably understand. On the other hand, ask me about the contrapuntal technique typified by the Baroque period.
High on my success of finding my travel guide, I briefly considered borrowing a work of fiction. Fearful that I'd be asked to deconstruct a semiotic analysis of the issue of heroines in the 19th novel to qualify for borrowing anything else, I conceded a trip to WH Smith was probably in order.
So, now all I need to do is pack. And find my passport.
The advent of eBay and Amazon meant the last time I was in a library looking for a non textbook to borrow Kurt Cobain was still alive; Nelson Mandella has just been elected and OJ had been accused of killing his wife.
However, faced with a need to know more about a country I’m due to land in tomorrow, I found myself scanning the travel section of my local library recently.
Staring at a complete hotpotch of travel guide titles (the Australian guides had been sanctioned to their own shelf, around the corner from the main stack, in possibly a sardonic comment on history) I noted that the titles were neither alphabetically arranged, nor arranged in any kind of pro-Dewey system.
I may not personally be a librarian, but I know people who are and I know that Dewey is their leader.
As I inquired politely of the librarian what system the Brits use for their travel guides, the knowledgeable chap explained travel guides are arranged geographically. “Always have been, always will be,” he said triumphantly, laughing at my suggestion of the universally acknowledged Dewey system.
The geographic organisation, he explained, used a system of continents and geographic boundaries. And so to find my guide, I needed to know about not only my destination but also countries on the border of my destination.
It was like pub trivia meets Indiana Jones! I’d need to know not only information about my destination but I’d also need to know countries on its border, countries in its time zone and countries with a sympathetic cultural history.
Quite frankly if I knew all that I wouldn’t need the guide.
Don’t get me wrong; I’ve done massive cram sessions on topics before interviewing people so I could ask relatively informed questions and not appear like a complete dunce, but I’ve never thought to bone up on my geography before going to my local library in anticipation of a pop quiz on the rise and fall of the Ottoman Empire.
I recently visited Oxford University with an antipodean librarian mate. As we went through Oxford’s Bodleian library we chuckled to ourselves at a question asked by a tourist from across the pond. Did the Brits use what Americans called the Dewey system, he asked. Our tour guide assured us all that the Dewey system was an international system and well and truly entrenched. Just goes to show how out of touch ivory towered educators are with the social order of today.
From inside the Bodleian Library - Britain's oldest library.
I eventually found my guide; shelved with other Eurasian titles, making me realise that not only do I need to buy a world map but I need to learn a whole new lexicon for continents, regions, systems of economic advantage and all that other stuff that had I done geography at school/university I would probably understand. On the other hand, ask me about the contrapuntal technique typified by the Baroque period.
High on my success of finding my travel guide, I briefly considered borrowing a work of fiction. Fearful that I'd be asked to deconstruct a semiotic analysis of the issue of heroines in the 19th novel to qualify for borrowing anything else, I conceded a trip to WH Smith was probably in order.
So, now all I need to do is pack. And find my passport.
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