Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:47:56 +0530 (IST) From: Dr. M. Koteswara Rao Dear Colleagues, I do not mean to hurt the sentiments or demoralise the library profession, but let us be practical in approach. I am aware that librarians are taught about 'book selection' in LIS schools, but it does not mean that they should select books for the library. For a specialised library dealing with a subject or two, the librarian can make the selection. Imagine a University library or a medical library or an engineering library where the subjects are specialised and/or too many, and I am sure that no librarian can really do justice in selecting the books. I think it is foolish to think so, and if someone feels that 'we are experts in all subjects' then we will be called 'jack of all and master of none'. In todays world books are written on very narrow subjects, which our professional colleagues are not able to even classify them. I sincerely feel that we should restrict ourselves to our duties rather than trying to learn all the subjects of the universe of knowledge. I think that Librarians can still command respect and participate in the collection building process in many other ways. Dr. M. Koteswara Rao Librarian, UoH

Dear All,

I presume that there would be some librarians,like me, who think that the selection of books and other documents in a library is the most critical factor in bettering the library services in which librarian should play a very prominent role as a key selector based on the principles he learned from the subject ' book selection' he studied in the library schools.

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Best Regards,

K Rajasekharan Librarian, Kerala Institute of Local Administration(KILA) Mulagunnathukavu, Thrissur - 680581 , India Email rajankila@gmail.com