Librarians as Monumental Preservers
Simmons College Graduate School of Library and Information Science Dean Michele Cloonan shares some thoughts about librarians’ roles as the “custodians of culture” when it comes to saving the mememtos of terrorism, disaster, and war in Monumental Preservation: A Call to Action in the September 2004 American Libraries. She illustrates her article with some incidents that either elicited a large reaction from a group of people (like leaving items along the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, DC) or resulted in the destruction of many key cultural objects. Cloonan argues that librarians should preserve the objects and work on safeguarding items before disasters happen.
(The September issue of this magazine is not yet available online.)
