The library report of public service: the social dimension of mediation

Abstract

Through the description of French municipal libraries organization, the work shows how far librarians’ debates and issues stay from the local and daily life of inhabitants, especially in poor metropolitan areas. Based on different ethnographical studies on contemporary readers and other public libraries patrons, the author argues that poor life and social misery lead to poor literacy and fragile (feeling of) citizenship. Consequently, it is hard to imagine how young people, largely born in France from immigrated parents, and left together in poor suburbs could both abandon school without a solid education and keep the desire of reading literature. Actually, like school, local libraries tend to maintain social and cultural distance rather than break down barriers thanks to a real social and grounded action. Instead, we can see that implicite rules in libraries and médiathèques as well as the presentation of collections and media itself continue to keep poor-literate (young) people apart by strongly making them feel as permanent strangers.