Paper Short Abstract:

The paper consists of a thematic and a methodological part. The data material stems from long-term participant observation, sensory anthropology, and in-depth interviews with patrons (aged 15-88) in public libraries and group interviews and co-creative methods in a university library in Oslo

Paper Abstract:

This paper consists of one thematic and one methodological part. Thematically, I will discuss the following questions:

- What is a library, and what is inalienable about the library?

- Are Norwegian libraries being rebranded against the will of the public, and who is the library public?

- Libraries for the future: enter diversity and plurality, exit mixed-use space?

The discussion builds on data material from long-term participant observation, sensory anthropology, and in-depth students’ photo diaries, maps, and drawings in a university library in Oslo, Norway. People familiar with library research will know that these methods are rare in library science, which mainly rely on surveys, structured or semi-structured interviews (often with stakeholders rather than patrons), policy document analyses, and (non-participant) observation. The remainder of the paper will therefore analyse methodological contributions from explorative, sensory, participatory, and co-creative methods in the investigation of library experience and space.

I am a social anthropologist who, besides long-term fieldworks in libraries, have done ethnographic studies on reading groups, performance poetry and postcolonial changes in urban Europe. I presently teach social science methods and academic writing to social work students who come to the classroom with one or two feet in practice and professional fields and inspire me to discover new connections between academia and practice. My 12 months of library fieldwork will soon result in a monograph preliminary titled The people’s library. An ethnography from Oslo East and West.