School’s out, I’m no longer sick, and the blog is no longer down! In honor of the evolving focus of this column, I’ve changed its title and broadened my scope. But don’t worry; I’ll still be trolling the various databases for hard-hitting research, too. The first month of summer is usually the busy one, in which students are still finishing school, are already in summer school, or have begun to embark on busy summer adventures, like camp and travel. So the ideas I’m offering you are a bit more low-key or focused on the librarian, rather than the patron, since I gather that your patrons are not exactly in the mood yet for anything that requires a lot of commitment.
Last weekend, PostSecret put up a (trigger warning) postcard from someone who dislikes being labeled intolerant for saying that certain types of people are, maybe, hypocritical about oppression. That made me think of a tumblr I found once upon a time called Oppressed Brown Girls Doing Things, whose tagline, “Because we’re still oppressed,” is awesomely readable in a multitude of ways. You might just find this fun to read when there’s a lull in your day, but I know I’d love to see some of these posts find their way into a collage on a library wall, a bookmarks list on a library computer, or into the meeting of any group that meets in your teen room. While the content ranges from NSFW language to sarcastic gifs, the blog also brings up a lot of pertinent points about what it means to be a woman of color.
While definitely NSFW, I have to share this music video based on a Jay-Z and Kanye West song whose title I won’t put here. Two Brooklynites re-set the song to be all about how hard it is to be a cool, reading girl who can’t find a guy to keep up with her tastes or pronounce Proust correctly. If you have an advisory group or teen book club that meets, you might show the video to spark a conversation about what it means to be “nerdy,” who the video is aimed at, or what it means to take a genre so known for its subculture and turn it on its head by making it about something usually so “uncool.”
Judith Butler is widely known for her groundbreaking works on gender identity and the idea that gender is a social construct that is performed by members of society, not a biological, unchangeable aspect of a person like eye color. It is Butler’s ideas that so many feminists, media critics, psychologists, and other professionals grapple with when trying to understand how images and stereotypes in the media affect self image and self performance, as well as how damaging it can be to force someone to perform normatively. But in a fascinating ethnographic study, Olga Ivashkevich discovered that young pre-teen girls are much more willing to play with body representation, drag, and non-normative physical ideals than many researchers think. The girls Isvashkevich studied drew each other as various vegetables, allowing them to skew various parts of their bodies, and other anecdotes in the article reveal how even something as obviously “damaging” as a Barbie doll can lead girls to experiment in cross dressing, mutilation, and more. If you and your children’s librarian colleagues have been searching for a way to reach tweens, as well as younger teens, this might be your in. Try leaving a box of Barbies, paper dolls, fashion magazines, or other objects that support alteration and creation on the body, as well as relevant clothing items and art supplies, with a note explaining that patrons are welcome to experiment with the box and maybe even reflect on what they’ve done by taking a digital photo and writing about it for the library’s blog, or s
My library is in a community heavy on teen foot-traffic and light on teen activities (outside of the library), so during the summer it is common to see the room filled to the brim with teens escaping the heat, annoyed at the friends they have spent every hour of every day with, looking for something–anything–to do. How can we help them find that “anything” that actually keeps them entertained, and excited to return to do it again? Planning summer programs for a Teen Center is an imperfect art, but if you see it is such – an art – then you won’t feel as bad when things don’t come out perfectly, and conversely you will be astonished when the boring turns exciting. Here are a few passive and active programming ideas that I urge you to try in your own library. With a little money, and as little or as much librarian involvement as you can afford, these programs have the ability to interest the regulars and pull in the new patrons.
Art Gallery: If you have empty wall space, you have an art gallery. Post flyers calling for artists to submit their work, photography, drawings, paintings, computer graphics, etc. Using painters tape (which is safe for the walls and the art), hang the art. Make sure to include their name (and school? Age? Inspirational quote?) so they get credit. If funds and time permit, host an artist reception on the day you hang new art. Anyone whose art is hanging on the wall for that week/month (or however long of a rotation you decide upon) are guests of honor, but of course all library patrons can attend the “opening”.
Board Game Tournaments: We have all hosted gaming tournaments, and even though the gaming systems are always being used, it is safe to assume that even the teens are bored with Mario Kart and RockBand. Therefore, grab the Monopoly game from your attic and plan a board game tournament. As teens sign up for the tournament have them choose their playing piece, so there are no disagreements on the day of the tournament. This is sure to keep the teens buys for a couple of hours, and the only cost to you should be a cool prize for the winner and runner-ups, such as a “Tax Refund” (waived overdue fines), monocle, or a 100 Grand candy bar (do they even make those anymore??).
Contact your local MLS program: These students are smack-dab in the middle of their higher education experience and are probably dying for some practical experience. Ask them to come in and co-host a program you currently lead, or lead the teens in a simple craft project or volunteer activity (greeting cards for senior citizens, toys for shelter animals). This way the teens can meet a new person, and you can have time to do all the billion things you put aside between June and August.
“I’m Bored” Boxes: Grab a few empty shoeboxes and fill them with any craft item you can find (make sure you include glue or tape) and let the kids get creative. Scrapbook paper, glue, ribbon, buttons, safety pins, duct tape, etc. You would be amazed at what they can make out of seemingly nonsensical stuff.
Volunteers: Have scrap paper that needs cutting? Children’s crafts that need preparing? Keyboards and mice and shelving that need dusting? Call in the volunteers! Teens who I never would have thought wanted to donate anything but crumbs and noise to the Teen Center approached me last summer to volunteer. I set them right to work, and a couple of them even came back a couple times over the school year. You never know what boredom can push a person to do.
