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Well, it’s that time of year again.  You can tell by the abundance of “in-your-face” advertisements selling the idea of the “perfect” Christmas; the way your home and tree should be decorated, and the gourmet meal and entertainment ideas.  The most blatant advertising though is for what you should buy for your loved ones.  This mass consumerism, though irritating to many, seems to be an accepted part of our mainstream culture.  An Ipsos-Reid survey found that the average gift-giving Canadian will spend over $760 on presents this season, plus an additional $720 on related expenses like party outfits, travel, decorations and entertainment.  As shocking as these numbers are, it doesn’t surprise me.  Year after year I find myself racking my brain to come up with gift ideas for people who don’t need anything.  Myself included.  It seems that gift giving can become a meaningless exchange, with people spending just for the sake of spending.  Bah!  Humbug!

 So, imagine my surprise when I came across the “Buy Nothing for Christmas” website http://buynothingchristmas.org/ , as the “Featured Site” on the homepage of the Winnipeg Public Library’s teen page http://wpl-teens.winnipeg.ca/views/default.cfm .  The “Buy Nothing Christmas” is a national initiative started by Canadian Mennonites but open to everyone “with a thirst for change and a desire for action”.  The founder of this grassroots campaign is Aiden Enns, who works for Adbusters.  Adbusters is a Canadian magazine that is not-for-profit and is supported by readers who are “concerned about the erosion of our physical and cultural environments by commercial forces”.  Check out Adbuster’s “Buy Nothing for Christmas” commercial at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-MQbR3XUZ4&feature=PlayList&p=80B21F3E22CED1AA&playnext=1&index=6 

The “Buy Nothing for Christmas” initiative encourages people to consider alternative gift options: handcrafted gifts, coupons for favours, recipes, a cherished photograph, a special meal, etc.  During week 11, we heard an excellent presentation about youth activists and how the library can become involved.  By featuring the “Buy Nothing for Christmas” website, the Winnipeg Public Library is encouraging teens to think critically about the role of the media in influencing their spending habits.  In the Christmas season of 2004, a group of teen students from Kitchener, Ontario decided to spread the word at their local mall, not talking to shoppers, but “simply handing them a small flyer and a mirror, so they can look at themselves buying stuff they don’t need”.   I’m not sure how I personally would react to this, but it would definitely get the point across! 

Sex and the City (SATC) has always been big, but since the movie has been released-it has literally exploded in popularity. There has been talk of a sequel, but in the meantime, Candace Bushnell (the author responsible for putting SATC on the map) is taking on a new project. She is creating two young adult novels based on the main character, Carrie Bradshaw’s teen years entitled the “Carrie Diaries.”

I have to admit, I was a SATC “virgin” until this year. Everyone seemed to talk about it and though I had read the SATC novel; everyone said that I just had to watch the TV series. Six seasons later…..I have gotten to know a bit more about Carrie Bradshaw.

This independent fashionista has as many shoes (and cosmopolitans) as she does sexual encounters. While that makes for interesting TV, I am not sure how the “sex” can be left out of a SATC teen novel. According to the New York Observer,  the novels will not be quite as racy as the TV show content and it is undecided whether Bushnell will be writing about Carrie’s loss of virginity (which, for the record took place in grade 11, on a ping pong table after a joint).

If there won’t be much “sex”-what will the “Carrie Diaries” be about? They will discuss Carrie’s relationships, romances, her struggles as a teenager and her dream to become a journalist…….will this heroine cause a new generation to dream of becoming sex columnists upon obtaining their high school diploma?

This leaves many of us wondering what the teenage Carrie will be like. Will she be portrayed as the 80’s teen she was? And if it so, would young adults be able to relate to a life prior to text messaging, cell phones and Ipods? Will she be a leader or a follower? According to Bushnell, she will be a leader. Is this the making of another Mean Girls or Gossip Girl, where the pretty, fashionable and popular girls are almost always bitches? But let’s face it, that stuff sells and Carrie Bradshaw’s teenage years will too!

Finally, will the “Carrie Diaries” inspire young women to follow their dreams and lead independent lives? Or will it lead to a generation armed with designer handbags and Manolo Blahniks looking for their next cosmopolitan or sexual encounter?

It seems like one of the best ways to get teens interested in visiting the library is to get them involved in the library. By giving teens a voice and listening to what they have to say, we can better serve their unique needs. It’s apparent that these needs go way beyond just basic information needs – teens definitely have social needs, too. If the library is portrayed as a welcoming space where teens can hang out, contribute, and have their ideas heard, perhaps teens could view the library as more than just a building full of books and shushing librarians, but as a social hub that they themselves have helped mold.

It looks as if more and more libraries are creating Teen Councils. I scanned back through some old posts and saw that there were a couple that mentioned teen councils, particularly the Teen Annex at LPL, so I’ll only briefly talk about teen councils. I wanted to see if all teen councils have similar aims, so I looked at a few different libraries’ web sites to see how they describe what their teen councils do.

From the Homewood Public Library (http://www.homewoodlibrary.org/teens/teen-council.html):

“The Homewood Library Teen Council gives teens the opportunity to help make the library serve them even better - through fun programs (like gaming and movie nights and teen trips) and materials (books, DVDs, CDs, etc).”

From the Sidney Memorial Public Library (http://www.4cls.org/sidney/teens.html):

“The Teen Council plans special events, contests, and trips…. Members have fun while helping to make the library more fun for other teens.”

From Coquitlam Public Library (http://www.library.coquitlam.bc.ca/Programs+and+Services/ Teens/Teen+Council.htm):

“The Teen Advisory Council meets from October until June to talk about cool books, as well as to suggest services, materials and program ideas for the library.”

And, my personal favourite description, from the San Francisco Public Library – I found this description to be quite comprehensive (http://sfpl.lib.ca.us/sfplonline/teen/councilnew.htm):

“The San Francisco Public Library Teen Advisory Council is a group of San Francisco high school students who want to make the Public Library a better place for teens. We meet every month to plan Library events such as the teen summer read program, Teen Zine production, and other teen-related programs… We aim to make the Library more visible for teenagers, so that they will know about the great free resources we have right here in our city. Each Council member is responsible for advertising Library programs in our area of the city. We talk to other students about what the library has to offer. We also want teens to participate in library decisions. We meet with library administrators to let them know what improvements the Library can make to invite all teens inside the doors. “

Teen councils aren’t the only way to get teens interested in visiting libraries. After a lot of poking around on the Internet, I found that some libraries are doing some very interesting things to bring out the creative side of teens. The Denver Public Library, for example, held a contest where teens could win prizes by creating a video using one of the Internet’s most popular sites: YouTube. “How I Have Fun at the Library” was the theme of the contest, and teens sent in their videos for a chance to win an MP3 player.  Here is a link to the contest site, and the winning videos (the 2nd place video is no longer available, but the 1st place video is still viewable): http://teens.denverlibrary.org/media/youtube.html#entries.

Virtual library websites have also become an outlet for teens to express themselves and express their creativity. The Internet Public Library, for example, hosts a Teen Poetry Wiki (http://www4.ipl.org:8080/index.php/Main_Page) where teens can read, write, and anonymously post their poetry. As well, Thinkquest.org (a learning website where students can create learning projects) holds annual competitions for teens aged 19 and under to create websites, and win free trips, laptop computers, digital cameras, and school monetary grants. All of the websites are posted to the Thinkquest Library, where the winners are listed under each topic (http://www.thinkquest.org/library/).

Here are some of the many, many winner websites created by teens from Thinkquest that I thought were a bit fun and pretty unique:

Mom! You’re Embarrassing Me! (http://library.thinkquest.org/05aug/01023/)

Chicken Dumplings For Your Mind (http://library.thinkquest.org/05aug/00044/)

I Don’t Flip Burgers!! – The Student’s Webguide to Entrepreneurial Success (http://library.thinkquest.org/C0114800/about/index.php)

Jammin’ ‘bout Diabetes (http://library.thinkquest.org/06aug/00281/)

Pee or Poo – Break the Taboo! (http://library.thinkquest.org/07aug/00581/) (yes, this was one of the winning websites!)

And, just for us librarians:

Do We Really Know Dewey? (http://library.thinkquest.org/5002/)

Has anyone else witnessed creative ideas used at public libraries to draw the attention of teens (beyond more ordinary tactics like gaming, book clubs, movie nights, ect)?

Cyber-bullying appears to be a growing issue and (as the documentary we watched in class demonstrated) it can have terrible consequences. I’m not sure what direct role librarians can play in preventing e-bullying, but maybe raising awareness is enough.

I found this cyber-bullying awareness video. Some of the comments posted below it critisize it for encouraging bullying in person. Maybe that’s so, but maybe that’s not such a bad thing since we know that, unlike face-to-face bullying, cyber-bullying:
• Can follow kids home 24-7, becoming inescapable
• Doesn’t give visible feedback about the consequences of actions, so bullying can continue last past the point it would in person.
• Is often anonymous, which means it is very hard to implement consequences for bullies

Here’s some food for thought about cyber-bullying courtesy of the CLA website:
• A cyber-bully may be violating the Canadian Human Rights Act if he or she spreads hate or discrimination based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, family status or disability.
• Under the Criminal Code of Canada, it’s a crime to communicate repeatedly with someone if your communication causes them to fear for their own safety or for the safety of others (Department of Justice Canada , 2005).
• It’s a crime to publish a “defamatory libel”—something likely to injure a person’s reputation by exposing him or her to hatred, contempt or ridicule (Department of Justice Canada , 2006).

Since most cyber-bullying centres around race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, family status or disability, almost all of it is sure to fall into this first category. Often cyber-bullying is done through instant- or text-messaging, but there are several cases where the bullies created websites, which means the bullying is “published” and thus is criminal libel. It is unlikely teenagers will be prosecuted for human rights abuses, but maybe awareness about the severity of these actions can help. What do you think?

Okay, so we’ve all heard about the permanence of our actions online (here’s hoping these blog entries won’t be judged too harshly by my grandchildren), but I want to explore this idea a little bit first. This post is going to be be a bit all over the place…but hey, it’s a blog, right?

A Caveat
First of all, I’d like to point out that the argument about the permanency of internet posts, etc. is dependent upon indefinite and endless storage capacity. As we are discovering, however, server space is not unlimited and digital files can degrade over time. However, maybe storage space will be expanded, or maybe things won’t be permanent, but will hang around longer than we’d like them to.

Think Before You Post Videos
The “Think Before You Post” videos demonstrate this concept pretty well. I think one of the best ways to get teens to think before they post is to hammer home more immediate consequences, rather than focusing on the long-term.

Speaking of Long-Term Consequences
Another wrinkle, however (and one we like not to think about), is the online legacy we leave when we pass away. Teens in particular, are generally not thinking about the possibility of unexpected death. This Toronto Star article highlights the complications surrounding ownership of online identities after a death. Makes me want to write down all my passwords somewhere. Not that I’ve done it yet.

Parents
Of course, the idea of online permanency makes parents crazy. The author of an article “Smile: you’re in the internet” argues that “Once upon a time, kids could go a little wild, and no permanent harm would be done.” First of all, this statement simply isn’t true: kids have always gone a little wild and some kids have always suffered for it the rest of their lives (drinking and driving, for instance). The author asks: “Who’ll see those images? Colleges? Future employers? The parents of your child’s serious boyfriend or girlfriend?”

The article gets a bit better near the end with the point that in order to protect our children, we have to actually parent them. I couldn’t agree more.

I have several thoughts about the kind of fear-mongering that is raised at the beginning of the article, however.
1. If everybody has regrettable material posted online then how can we expect anyone to feel ashamed about it? How negative an impact can it have if everyone has embarrassing pictures up? Maybe we should be encouraging reckless posting to even the playing field… Just kidding.
2. Is this much-feared lack of anonymity really anything new? Are we simply re-creating a world where we are accountable for our every action – much like the small towns of yester-year where anybody’s business was eveybody’s business and indescretions could plague you for a lifetime? And what will our response be? Maybe a little accountability isn’t such a bad thing.
3. I wonder sometimes when the ultra-conservative backlash will truly start, because I feel it in the air. I’m not sure what’s scarier: hyper-sexualized, liberal, careless teens or neo-conservative teens who are interested in quashing liberal ideas and re-insituting orthodox sexuality (I’m thinking uninformed teens wearing “promise rings” and giving or receiving unprotected oral sex).

“His all-time favourite teacher is the one he calls Mr. Google. He doesn’t need lectures or classrooms, he says, because he can ask Mr. Google and learn everything he wants to know.”

When you have a few moments, read through White’s observations of 4 Toronto teens.

Let us know what you think.

Well, I’ve really enjoyed putting these few blog posts together and I hope I’ve given you some good information and some stuff to think about. I thought I’d wrap up my time as daily-blogger with a little story.

Before I came to library school I worked as a reader’s advisor at a public library. I had the urge to put on a gaming program for teens; we had never done one before and had no idea how the turn out would be. I partnered up with another staff member at the library and together we rounded up 4 PS2s (one was the library’s, 1 was my own, and 2 we borrowed from our pages) and 4 digital projectors (2 were the library’s and 2 we borrowed from the school district who graciously let us borrow them for free.)

So, at the time we decided to do this, Guitar Hero 3 had just come out and my partner and I were busy rocking out at home. We happened to own all 4 versions of the game (GH1, 2, Rock the 80s, and now GH3) but only had 2 of the guitar controllers ourselves. With a stroke of luck, the two pages we had borrowed the PS2s from also had 1 GH controller each, so we were set to have 3 of the 4 PS2s playing Guitar Hero. For the fourth, we decided to set up the library’s 2 DDR mats and the DDR game so people could get their groove on.

We put the word out via our web site, posters, and flyers that we handed out at a regularly attended high-profile Lego program just 2 weeks before the gamer day was scheduled to take place. Who knew if advertising such a short period of time would be enough?

The program was scheduled to take place for 2 hours in the afternoon on a professional development day, a Friday, when kids were out of school. I arrived early and my co-worker and I set up four separate gaming stations in separate areas of the room, 3 with different versions of Guitar Hero, and 1 with DDR.

It was still almost an hour before the event was scheduled to start, and I was informed by one of the ref. desk staff that some boys were already here and asking if we needed help to set up!! They were chomping at the bit to get in the room and get rocking.

We finally decided to let them in when it got closer to starting time, and didn’t look back. Older kids, teens, aunts, uncles, parents, grandmas and grandpas poured in and challenged each other to DDR dance offs and rocked out to Guitar Hero. People sang, people played along, they danced. It was dark, loud, and the atmosphere was great. For a first ever gaming program at a medium-sized library with mostly borrowed equipment and 2 staff who’d never done anything like this before, we smashed it out of the park. I counted 45+ people that day, which was amazing for our program attendance numbers, especially considering we had advertised it so late and were in competition with other Pro-D events happening throughout the city.

Some highlights of the day:

An uncle who exclaimed, “This is awesome! Can I play too?” who had brought his 3 nieces into the library that day not knowing our gamer day was planned

2 very confused-looking teen boys who had never come to the library before. Guitar Hero brought them in, and our CD collection got them browsing. “I didn’t know the library had CDs!!” You can bet I gave them a library tour!

2 young brothers who were Guitar Hero rock gods and who blew everyone away. They couldn’t have been older than 9, but they were shredding on expert level and everyone was amazed!!!

And finally, my personal favourite, 4 of our “usual boys” who come to the library in the morning and don’t leave until it closes and are on the computers all day long. As the program was ending, they begged me to leave up one system so they could battle each other in GH3. I literally had to kick them out of the room 15 minutes before closing so I could dismantle everything in time to go home. As I ushered them out the door, they asked, “When is the next gamer day?”

How can I argue with that?

Okay, I don’t expect you all to be able to participate in a flame war or anything after reading this, but my goal is to simply make you aware of the irony, humour, and rich culture that saturates the online gaming world inhabited by today’s youth.

Step 1: Take everything you know about English vocabulary and grammar usage and chuck it out the window.

A great example of language at work is Lolcats, the infamous “i can has cheezburger?” site where gamers have been putting leetspeak to work captioning hilarious pictures of cats. Yes, this is funny.

Oddly enough, “w00t”, a common gamer phrase that really means “woohoo!!!” (think celebration here people), was named Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Year in 2007.

Step 2: It’s all about the pwnage. To “pwn” is to “own” or really at its most basic level, to be the ultimate winner. Whether it’s Chuck Norris or boom headshot, pwning is, well… pwn.

Step 3: You’re a noob. Accept it. Whether it’s nub, nubbins, nubcakes, newbie, newb, n00b, the point is, you’re new, and you suck. Deal with it.

Step 4: Online friends are real friends. Whether it’s your guild members or a new flame, the relationships gamers make online are real, and don’t try to tell them otherwise. There’s an extremely popular webcast called The Guild that pokes fun at just how important a gamer’s guild can be in their daily lives.

Step 5: Ascii and emotes are funny. Some hate them, some love them. Here’s some of my favs:

Look at these ones sideways:

8| ← how I feel when a prof. has just reminded us that a huge paper is due next week that I forgot about.

:O ← shock, pure and simple.

>:( ← sad and angry, all at the same time

<3 ← a heart

Look at these ones normally:

T_T ← the ever popular wince/cry

>.< ← oh noes!! covering of the eyes

^_^ ← anime smiley

That’s it folks. Go forth and conquer.

Hello, my name is Amy, and I play videogames.

By now I’m sure most of you are familiar with the fact that libraries are using video games and gaming programs to reach the younger segments of their community. Some librarians, myself included, think this is a fantastic way to reinvent our selves and our services to reach a segment that is historically underserved. Others are skeptical, wondering why libraries are encouraging kids, who already spend way too much time in front of screens, to plug in even more.

Should libraries be in on gaming? Should we be encouraging, supporting, and enabling young people to play?

My answer? Yes.

The fact is, lots of people play videogames, and it’s not just the wee ones. The latest stat from ESA shows the average age of gamers is 35. So you’re thinking, yeah, okay a 35 year old doesn’t really fall into our pre-teen to early-twenties YA services age group. And yeah, you’re probably right.

But what this does mean is that those 35 year old gamers have and are having children who are born into families where gaming is not only the norm, it’s a family past time. Shouldn’t libraries, then, get with gaming now so that when in a few years down the road that kid, who has grown up with gaming in their family, walks into their local public library and sees their values reflected there?

The average age of the gamer might be 35, but that doesn’t mean the age stops there. There are scads of young people, boys as well as girls (yep, it’s true!) who play videogames all the time as a hobby, way to kill time after school, or as a way to interact with friends.

To be honest, I don’t see what the big deal is. I’ve read a ton of pro-gaming and anti-gaming arguments, and I’m sick of the media driven fear-mongering that says video games make kids fat and lazy. With today’s innovative gaming technologies—such as the Nintendo Wii and its active-style of gaming—we could argue that videogames make kids skinny and active. Then there’s the videogames make kids violent argument… but on the other side, there’s credible thinkers and researchers that debunk this myth.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that for every negative argument for videogames, there’s a corresponding positive to balance it out.

My question? Which side are you on?

I began thinking about this topic while browsing the Teen Annex webpage of the LPL.  They have a section titled “My Body and Soul.”  In the past, the connection between libraries and spirituality was more evident in that many libraries existed solely to serve religions.  So, with a desire to serve teens of a multitude of beliefs, what role does / might the public library play in spiritual lives of youth in Canada today?  I will return to discuss the “My Body and Soul” page in a later post, but I initially want to consider some of aspects of this topic.

Are youth interested in the spirituality?

In a Canadian study in 2000, sociologist R. Bibby found that 22% of teens (15-18) attended weekly worship services, 75% of teens identified themselves as members of a religion, with 77% of girls believing in God’s existence in comparison in comparison to 69% of boys (Cnaan, Ram A., Richard J.Gelles, and Jill W. Sinha.  (2004).  Youth and religion: the Gameboy generation goes to “Church.”  Social Indicators Research 68(2), 175-200.  Retrieved March 31, 2008 from MetaPress, DOI: 10.1023/13.SOCI.0000025592.60815.37).     

While there is potentially a significant difference in the levels of religiosity between Canada and the United States a study by American researcher Lynn Schofield Clark may be considered in this discussion.  She conducted 250 interviews with teens and families about spirituality and culture.  She published the book From angels to aliens: teenagers, the media, and the supernatural (Oxford, 2003) in which she identified five groups of teens who interacted differently to the religious / spiritual content often found in pop culture.  These groups include:

Resisters: not interested in organized religion, have an identification with anti-establishment themes often found in supernatural dramas like the X-Files.

Mystics: also not part of the organized church, have an interest in programs like Touched by an Angel.Experimenters: possess a high interest in spirituality, can be interested in trying out something like Wicca, for example.  Programs such as Charmed have an impact on them.

Traditionalists: includes most evangelical Christian, conservative Mormons and Muslim teens, with a concern for the place of personal morality within pop culture and how such media will help or hurt their spiritual walks.

The Intrigued: have a commitment to their faith but are also open to investigating how traditional beliefs fit with new information the receive from the media.

(Steve Rabey (c.2004).  Investigating Teens, Pop Culture, and Spirituality.  Youth Specialties.  Retrieved March 31, 2008 from www.youthspecialties.com/articles/topics/culture/teens.php).     

What locations exist for young people to learn about aspects or access materials of faith, religion, or spirituality?

If young people are feeling less attached to organized religion than in the past but still have an interest in learning about and discussing spirituality, where do they go to seek out these things?I came across a quote by Lois Sweet, who authored a book called God in the Classroom, expressing the opinion that public schools in Canada were not providing students with sufficient opportunities to investigate and learn about a range of religious ideas.  Might libraries be uniquely positioned to offer access to a wide range of materials and opportunities for discussion where schools are not or cannot?

What can libraries do to help teenagers in their searches?

I will soon post a few examples of what libraries are doing and what resources may exist to help librarians answer RA questions about books with spiritual content.   

Back in high school, I and a small group of girls marched down to the principal’s office and demanded the right to wear pants. Prior to that impromptu meeting, all female students were required to wear dresses to school.

Looking back on that episode, I recognize that it was an era in which young people were steeped in media images of activism: students were protesting the Vietnam War; African-Americans were marching for their civil rights under the guidance of Dr. Martin Luther King; women were burning their bras in gestures of solidarity with Gloria Steinham and other feminists who insisted that women deserved equality under the law.

Surrounded by these images, is it any wonder why we were inspired and emboldened to challenge the authority in our own small corner of the world? Not only did we confront the school’s authority, but we won the right to dress as we pleased. Within months, both male and female students were wearing faded jean bell-bottoms complete with rips and fraying hems.

Fast forward to this week—ironically, the week of Gloria Steinham’s birthday and an era when feminism is considered by many to be an f-word.

Apparently, a furor has erupted over the online game Miss Bimbo. Aimed at girls aged from 9 to 16, players start with a naked virtual character and then, compete for “bimbo dollars” to give their virtual dolls facelifts, breast implants and a regime of diet pills to keep their weight in check. For instance, breast implants sell at 11,500 bimbo dollars and net the buyer 2000 bimbo attitudes; thus, making her more popular. In a game where the aim is to be the coolest, richest and most famous bimbo in the world, bagging a billionaire boyfriend becomes the pinnacle of success. In France, the game has 1.2 million subscribers only a year after its launch. A month after the site opened in Britain, it had attracted over 200,000 members.

When questioned about the game on Canada AM this week, Merryl Bear, Director of the National Eating Disorder Information Centre in Toronto, made the comment that Miss Bimbo was just an extreme example of the kind of image which we see in the media all the time. Rather than ban the game, she suggested that it should be used as a teaching tool and stated that there was a need to teach media literacy to young people. This comment echoes that of Amy Jussel, the Executive Director of Shaping Youth, who wrote in her blog that it should be used to “open new dialogue on new ways to counter-market this crud” and that she plans to use it “to get people brainstorming on how to teach critical thinking skills.”

They make a good point. I can’t help but wonder whether my teenage self would have been able to hear the messages of King and Steinham had they been trying to communicate through the din of today’s media.

In fact, I would suggest that a challenge for public libraries, and specifically for those of us in the FIMS program, is to empower today’s youth through media literacy so they, too, will be inspired to make an active difference in the world.

“Miss Bimbo website promotes extreme diets and surgery to 9-year-olds”  TimesOnline

http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article3613881.ece 

“Bimbo Bait: Is Silence or Outrage the Solution for Digital Drek?”  Shaping Youth Blog

http://www.shapingyouth.org/blog/?p=1280

I found that video we viewed about Coolhunting was really interesting, and it got me thinking about new and different ways that we as librarians could market to teens. Wouldn’t it be fantastic to get away from that stereotype of being uncool and boring, without compromising our librarian integrity? I think one of our best assets is to keep informed, whether it be with the news, with literature, with library issues, and for youth work especially, with new and upcoming TRENDS!

Granted, it could be difficult and expensive to insert new trends into the library atmosphere (ie. It may be practically impossible to replace furniture constantly or computer technology) but online environments could be enhanced by keeping up-to-date, as well as programming, and art displays, etc. I found a trendhunting site from a journalist in Toronto named Bianca Bartz. I will post the link on the blog for future reference.

http://www.trendhunter.com/bianca 

Bianca posts constantly about the newest, hottest things, both for teens and in general. I thought I would use this blog space to point out some new things that have been identified as “up and coming”, as well as illustrate the importance of using this kind of tool to stay current.

These crazes may be short lasting or long lasting, no real way to tell. However, I do think that trendhunting sites would be a fresh new way for librarians to keep on top of the ever changing world of teens! Even if we can’t possibly do everything, we can at least keep up to date on what’s going on and be able to talk about it. Here are a few of the things I found most intriguing, and that I think could be incorporated into libraries in some way, shape or form:

Manga: Business Scenarios (for a slightly older audience)

“Manga is becoming hugely popular in North America, but we’re missing a whole genre,” Pink says. “In Japan, there’s manga for adults on business topics. We don’t have that here.  So I decided to create the first business book in manga for a western audience.”

Pimp My Flats: Shoe Decorating Making a Comeback (Cool Programming Idea?)

A plain, white pair of tennis shoes provides way too much creative potential to leave them as they come. Case in point, the Pimp My Flats exhibit has some stellar designs, showcasing ordinary plimsol shoes that have been taken to the next level of hip. Each pair of Lazy Oaf shoes has been decorated differently, from designs that are wearable, even seriously desirable, to others which are just plain hideous.

…fun and “scientifically proven” by a prof at McGill. I just played the demo — it is worth checking out.

http://www.mindhabits.com/index.php