Black receives 2013 Library History Essay Award

Alistair Black
Alistair Black, Professor Emeritus

GSLIS Professor Alistair Black is the recipient of the Library History Essay Award for 2013. The prize is awarded annually by the Library and Information History Group of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) to the best essay on library history relating to, or published in, the British Isles in the previous calendar year. Black’s essay is titled, “Organizational Learning and Home-Grown Writing: The Library Staff Magazine in Britain in the First Half of the Twentieth Century” and appears in Information & Culture, Volume 47, Number 4 (2012).

The abstract reads:

Staff magazines in British public libraries emerged in the early-twentieth century. Unlike staff magazines in private enterprises, which pre-date them by two decades, library staff magazines were more truly the product of employees, inaugurated and operated as they often were by staff associations. This study is based on an analysis of staff magazines in three public library systems—Croydon, Sheffield, and Leeds—in the first half of the twentieth century. Against backdrops of growing popular education, organizational enlargement, changing management styles, and increasing professionalization, the library staff magazine provided opportunities for employees to write. This writing was undertaken as a pastime, as a form of organizational learning and networking, as a contribution to labor and occupational solidarity, and, finally, as a vehicle for personal professional advancement and professional identity formation, though one which contained an element of “othering” of the public as well as of junior and female staff.

“I’m tremendously pleased to have my work honored in this way,” said Black. “I’d like to pay tribute to the wonderful work done over the years by the body that has given me the award, the UK’s Library & Information History Group. I would also like to thank the journal Information & Culture for giving me a platform to broadcast my research, and the publishing house Emerald for funding the prize.”

Black’s research focuses on the history of libraries, librarianship, and information management. At GSLIS, he teaches courses in information history, library buildings and society, historical foundations of the information society, public library history, and libraries in film.

Updated on
Backto the news archive

Related News

iSchool researchers work with diverse groups to improve user experience

iSchool faculty are studying ways to improve user experience, with a common goal of improving technology and applications for the needs of individual users. These researchers are working with diverse groups to gain feedback, and several current projects are focused on experiences for users with disabilities.

Das receives student membership award from ASIS&T

PhD student Puranjani Das has been selected as a recipient of the Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) SIG CMR Student Membership Award for the 2024-2025 academic year. She will receive a complimentary one-year membership in both ASIS&T and SIG CMR, a special interest group focused on classification and metadata research.

Puranjani Das

Student says ‘thank you’ with a helicopter ride

Last month, Michael Ferrer showed appreciation for one of his MSIM instructors in a unique way—by inviting him for an insider’s look at his work as a reservist in the Illinois Army National Guard. For the ILARNG BOSS Lift, which took place on June 18 at Camp Atterbury, Indiana, Ferrer selected Michael Wonderlich, iSchool adjunct lecturer and senior associate director of business intelligence and enterprise architecture for Administrative Information Technology Services (AITS) at the University of Illinois.

Michael Wonderlich and Michael Ferrer hold a U of I flag in front of a military helicopter

Project helps librarians use data storytelling to advocate for public libraries

A toolkit for public librarians can help them use data to communicate the value of their services and justify their funding needs. The Data Storytelling for Librarians Toolkit helps librarians present data in story form using narrative strategies. It was developed by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign information sciences professors.

Kate McDowell

Chan to deliver keynote at SIGCIS 2024

Associate Professor Anita Say Chan will deliver the keynote at the 15th annual conference of the SHOT (Society for the History of Technology) Special Interest Group for Computing, Information, and Society (SIGCIS), which will be held on July 14 in Viña del Mar, Chile. SIGCIS is the leading international group for historians with an interest in the history of information technology and its applications. The theme for SIGCIS 2024 is "System Update: Patches, Tactics, Responses."

Anita Say Chan