Addressing the dilemma of the ironic librarian: Self-reported strategies librarians use to enhance approachability

Abstract

Although librarians have the goal of helping patrons, one component of the librarian stereotype is that librarians are authoritarian and therefore unapproachable. The stereotype then serves as a means by which librarians become an unintended barrier to effective library use. We term this contradiction between wanting to be helpful and yet perceived as being unapproachable as the problem of the “ironic librarian.” In this research, we used in-depth interviews to examine how individual reference librarians tried to resolve the problem of the ironic librarian. Respondents reported several strategies they used to make themselves more approachable and to alter pa-trons’ expectations of librarians. Although respondents felt they were successful in enhancing their approachability, they noted that their efforts could also lead them to feel exploited by pa-trons. These results suggest that librarians can become more approachable and contradict the perspective that views the library as an intimidating space.