Last week, an interesting email mistake compromised the sanity of many neurotic Lehigh seniors, including myself. Sent to all members of the graduating class, an email from Lehigh Library Services stated that we were ineligible for graduation because of our failure to return books. In the days that followed, my conversations with my peers revealed an interesting theme. Most of my friends and classmates were extremely confused by the email, not because they had failed to return books, but because they have never taken books out of the library during their four years here.
As a history major, I've spent my fair share of time rooting through the stacks in Linderman, and departed with a bag laden with dust covered texts. My friends, however, have not had similar experiences. So I started to wonder, have my friends used the internet in place of books? Or, have professors become so immersed in the internet that their assignments eliminate the need for library books? The internet is a fantastic resource for conducting research, and has certainly helped me get out of several binds with my assignments. However, with the vast internet environment available at the click of a button, I think many students have been programmed to automatically use web-based tools, as opposed to traditional sources. This isolated example at Lehigh ties to the larger transformation of the traditional media environment into a web-based, digital environment. As my peers expressed in their personal anecdotes regarding their failure to utilize the library, why take out a book when it is available online through Google Books.
Hilary,
ReplyDeleteI actually had an interesting experience that relates to your post. I was writing a research paper for a sociology class a few months ago and my Professor suggested that I go to Fairmart to look up a word in the Sociology Encyclopedia. I happened to be working on the paper in Fairmart, so I went ahead with his suggestion and started looking for the encyclopedia. Well, after about 5 minutes of roaming around the stacks, I decided to return to my seat and use the Internet instead. Within minutes, I had the definition I was looking for.
Throughout my two years at Lehigh, there's never been a time where I have ever checked out or even looked through a book in one of our libraries. I guess I just haven't had the need to do this. It's really convenient that the Internet can provide me with information found in traditional library books, but it's also a little sad that I don't know how to find books or utilize libraries. Since our world is becoming more dependent on the Internet everyday, at this point I feel like there is no point to learn how to use the library or check out books when I can read books and obtain information for research online.