Government Documents Librarianship: A Guide for the Neo‐Depository Era

Citation

Lee Eden, B. (2009), "Government Documents Librarianship: A Guide for the Neo‐Depository Era", Collection Building, Vol. 28 No. 2, pp. 87-87. https://doi.org/10.1108/01604950910953143

This book is about managing government resources in a depository library, and the author is quite clear in stating that it is not a manual for using government resources. Most of the information contained in this book resulted from a unique experience: bringing a non‐compliant depository library back from the brink of probation and elimination. Aspects of government documents librarianship are presented and examined in detail.

Chapter 1 discusses career opportunities in both Federal Depository Libraries (FDLs) and non‐depository libraries. Chapter 2 provides a history of both the Government Printing Office (GPO) and the Federal Library Depository Program (FLDP). Current and future issues with the GPO and the FLDP (or the neo‐depository era) are presented in Chapter 3. An examination of FLDP requirements takes up the bulk of Chapter 4. Moving into government documents librarianship specifically, and dealing with issues such as training, networking, the literature, and resources, is the topic of Chapter 5. Dealing with everyday issues such as working with people, paperwork, disaster recovery, housing the collection, and contacting the GPO or FLDP are discussed in Chapter 6. Chapter 7 looks at public services topics such as reference services, print and online sources, instruction and marketing, while Chapter 8 looks at technical services topics such as SuDocs cataloging, processing, collection development, preservation and version control. There are several appendices, a bibliography and an index.

The overall exuberance and excitement of the author is apparent throughout the book, and it is obvious that she feels that government documents librarians are viable and important in this new online environment. Both this attitude and the nature of the contents make this a useful resource for anyone interested in, or working in, government documents management.