Benita Parsons - libraries

Speaker 1 00:01

This is a Vision Australia Radio Podcast. 

Speaker 2

On Vision Australia Radio, welcome to our conversations on the work and experiences of emerging writers. I'm Matthew Erdely, joining the Emerging Writers team with Kate Cooper, and our guest today is Benita Parsons, Librarian from the Parks Library, one of the City of Port Adelaide Enfield Libraries. One of the aims of our program is to include reflections from people and organisations involved in supporting, encouraging and promoting writers and writing. Included in our plan is a series looking at libraries and librarians in our state.
So we're delighted to be able to speak with Benita today about her work in and perspectives on our public libraries. Benita, welcome to the program.

Speaker 3

Thank you. 

Speaker 2

Would you begin by telling us about your background and what inspired you to become a librarian?

Speaker 3 01:17

So I've been a librarian for all of my working life, so 25-ish years, mostly working in public libraries, but previously also in some corporate libraries. I decided to be a librarian because I like learning and curiosity and just knowing a little bit about lots of different things and being able to help people. And I like reading as well. So choosing to be a librarian and working in libraries, you get to do a bit of research and organise knowledge and provide access to information without doing the really deep dives. So you just get to know and be exposed to lots of different things.

Speaker 2 02:02

And if any of our listeners are interested in becoming librarians, what qualifications would they need? 

Speaker 3 02:09

So there's a range of qualifications you can do. If you want to just do some of the technical work, like cataloging the books and organising the information, you can do like a TAFE certificate. To be a librarian, in the traditional sense, there is normally a degree or a graduate diploma that you would do. Some of those are available in South Australia. I'm not sure that there's a degree qualification now. It's a grad dip here in South Australia, but otherwise there's a lot of institutions and universities that offer it online. And we do support students for placements and things like that, who are doing the courses online interstate and then studying and doing their placements here in Adelaide. So people do study all across the country to gain those qualifications.

Speaker 2 02:58

Okay. Where they want to go in terms of academic libraries, special libraries, school libraries, or public libraries. That sounds great. In another life, if I wasn't already employed in a job that I love, I would love to be a librarian. I'm addicted to books. I love that you're a book lover yourself and I look forward to exploring that later in the episode about books. Now, I was lucky enough to record a podcast at the Parks Library in the fantastic media room now named The Sound Studio. Would you tell us first where the Parks Library is located and then which other libraries are part of the city of Port Adelaide and Field?

Speaker 3 03:45

Okay, so the Parks Library is in Angle Park. We're on the corner of Trafford Street and Cowan Street. We're part of the Parks Precinct. So there's a children's centre, a theatre and the YMCA gym and swimming pool all co-located together in the one precinct here in Angle Park. We have other libraries across the city of PAE at Semaphore just on Semaphore Road right near the beach in a beautiful heritage building. Port Adelaide just near the new Port Plaza and then Enfield Library, a little very cute library just tucked away off of Main North Road. And then we also have the Green Acres Library on Foster's Road in Green Acres. So we are spread across the length of the city of Port Adelaide. The Parks Library features on the amazing libraries designs .org .au website.

Speaker 2 04:40

Would you tell us what is so special about the design of the library, and then describe for us the range of services that you offer? 

Speaker 3

Yeah, the Parks is a beautiful library. It's a beautiful building. It's designed as a library and community centre but we just called it a library because people know what it is, what that means. But we not only have quite a large library space, we also have meeting rooms, some community rooms or function rooms, we have a community kitchen, there's a maker space and also the room that we are currently in the sound studio and it's all built around the edge of the block of land that we have, and in the middle is a courtyard. So all of the rooms open up into this courtyard garden which is a beautiful space so it's designed really to flow and be able to to move from one room to another across the courtyard space. 

The library was designed by JPE Architects, a local Adelaide firm and they spend a lot of time and energy researching the sustainability of this building making sure that it has low energy needs. So we've got a concrete floor for that thermal mass. We've got louvres in the windows that circulate air through and they operate automatically. We've got automatic lights, obviously solar panels and water capture as well. Really high ceilings, so it creates a lot of natural light coming through and lots of spaces around the windows where people can sit and read, plug in their devices and have natural light and a view to either the garden or to the outside world.

Speaker 2 06:30

Now I've been fortunate to use some of those services myself when recording and editing my podcast Artist on Earth. The support that I received from the staff at the parks was fantastic. What are some of the rewards of working at the parks library that mean the most to you?

Speaker 3 06:50

That's a great question. As I said, I feel very privileged to work in a space that is as well designed as this one, but really libraries are about people. So to have a space like this and a community like this where you can connect with people, it's a very diverse community culturally and the library works very hard at being welcoming to everyone, regardless of their ability, their mental health, their education, their socioeconomic status. It's a place that you can come for free and use things for free. So that's another benefit of working in a library is you can help people and you don't have to sell them anything. It's just here we can help you and it doesn't cost anything. 

So for people that have come here from other countries where they don't have a public library system, they are blown away. By what they can offer and they say, well, how much does it cost? And like, no, no, it's free. You just sign here and get a card and you can access. All of this. So that is very rewarding to explain the concept of a public library to someone who's never had that before. And then just to see people using the spaces they need to, whether it's for reading or for playing, reading the newspaper, doing the crossword, cooking, as we talked about, having meetings, local organisations will come and book the space and have staff training or staff meetings, people doing art, making things, doing crafty stuff, you know, it is a real community space and it's lovely to be able to see people make it their own.

Speaker 2 08:27

And if that's not the greatest advertisement for becoming a librarian and getting yourself involved in a library space, then I don't know what is. Following on from that question, what are some of the challenges of library work?

Speaker 3 08:42

Probably the not-so-wholesome bits of the nature of a community space where everyone is welcome, does mean that everyone is here and rubbing up against each other and the people that... may have a certain view of how you should behave in public, and other people have a certain view or what their needs are and how they behave when they're in this place. So we do need to manage that and help community members here to understand that everyone is welcome and that is okay and just to be a little bit empathetic and gentle and kind to say, you know, everyone is welcome, this is okay. Libraries are not quiet spaces all of the time. If some people in here are a bit loud, we need to manage that and the expectations so that can be a little bit challenging at times but that's part of the beauty of it.

One of the other challenges we have is to get that message out there so people understand what libraries offer in a modern world and if you haven't been in a library since you were in school, things have changed and we have kept up with technology and the digital offerings as well and there are a lot of things that you might be paying for that you could get for free with your library card but it's really hard to reach people that aren't already library members to say, Hey, here's all this stuff you can get, let us help you. So that marketing and getting the word out to the broader community is a challenge for us as well. Now there is a warm and welcoming sense of community when you walk into the Parks Library.

Speaker 2 10:18

This next question is one that we ask regularly on the program. What does the word "community" mean to you personally? 

Speaker 3

That is an interesting question too. Community can mean lots of different things where people have something in common whether it's geography or culture, language, age, all their areas of interest, their hobbies. Here at Parks Library in particular we do create a bit of a sense of community with the makerspace so people that are inducted into the makerspace and learn how to use the equipment here and we encourage them to teach each other and you know have that sense of you're part of the makerspace community and you can come in here with other makers. So that is one little community that we have here. 

Obviously at Angle Park we do have a fairly high level of Vietnamese community and we do  have a community languages collection of books here so people can read books in their home language and we also have a very active youth community here. There are lots of young students and young adults that hang out in the library so there's some of the communities that we cater for here. For me community is a term I think of who we are trying to provide services and programs for. So we talk about, What do we want to provide for the Port Adelaide and Phil community and we work very hard to create opportunities for people to connect socially with others and build their own sense of community with that areas of interest. 

So meet like-minded people, meet people that enjoy doing the same thing as you do, reduce that sense of isolation. Here is a community space where you can find people that like doing he same thing. I'll talk a bit more about that later as well.

Speaker 2 12:07

On Vision Australia Radio, you're listening to our conversation program, Emerging Writers. Our guest today is Benita Parsons, librarian from the Parks Library, one of the city of Port Adelaide Enfield Libraries.

In addition to the physical library spaces, the Port Adelaide Enfield Library's website offers a range of online services. Would you tell us about these? 

Speaker 3

Yes, that would be good to share. As I said, it's an important thing to talk about because they're a bit hidden, they're not visible, you don't see it when you're walking around the library and browsing the shelves. So we do have subscriptions for the whole public library network in South Australia. So if you have a card to be a member of any library anywhere in South Australia, you will have access to e-books, e-audio books and online magazines.
There's a couple of products that do that. One is called Libby and the other one is called BorrowBox. So they both offer e-books and e-audio books. BorrowBox has a little bit more Australian content. Libby has more from overseas and they do have new releases as well as older titles. So if you want to read a book on screen or listen to a book that's been narrated and download that, then you can do that through BorrowBox or Libby.

We also have films that you can access through a product called Canopy and there's also a children's version of that. for Canopy Kids so some streaming services available with your library card. Also you can do some learning so if you've probably heard of LinkedIn which is a professional networking site so LinkedIn Learning is a product they offer with lots of courses on a very wide range of topics but that does normally cost. So with your library card you can access LinkedIn Learning for free. That's you know something that is really amazing to me that we can we can offer that. And also Ancestry.com if you're doing your family history research you can come into the library and use Ancestry.com for free to to research your family tree and your genealogy.

So that's what you can get from any library in South Australia. Here at Port Adelaide Enfield Libraries we have a few extra online. Databases or services that we subscribe to. So there's LOAT for kids, which has children's books in a range of languages, languages other than English. And those are e-books, but also, you know, picture books. So you'll see the page as well as having it read to you. And that includes Auslan as well. I recently signed up to Freagle, which is a music streaming service you can access for free. And there's some other specialist resources like Craft and Hobby, Ready Learn, which is a children's reference service related to the Australian curriculum, if you have a child at school. And also a coding program called Fiero Code, which is used by our Code Club programmers in the libraries as well.

Speaker 2 15:24

Now I'm going to ask two questions that are natural follow-ups. And no doubt, everyone, all of our listeners are definitely thinking about this. But what do libraries not do? 

Speaker 3

There's probably things that we don't do. I'm really focused on what we do do. But you know, it's a loungeroom. So whatever you might do at home in your loungeroom, you can pretty much do here as well. 

Speaker 2

That is great to know. And then the second one, well, I don't know if everyone, all of us, were thinking about this one. Maybe it's just me. But speaking of Ancestry.com, have you tried it? And do you have any like cool like pharaohs, kings or queens or super famous people in your history? 

Speaker 3

No, I haven't dug very deep in in my history. I have some uncles in my family that are very passionate about the family tree. And I leave that to them. So they can just tell me anything that they dig up that's interesting. 

Speaker 2

I tried listeners. I tried. Now, I'd like to remind our listeners now that there is also a Libraries SA app, which they can download onto their mobile phones. Would you tell us about the features of the Library SA app? 

Speaker 3

Sure, so it is an app that goes on your phone but it acts as your library card so you can store your barcode and use that to check your items in and out. You don't need to always have your card with you. As a parent I love it because I can have my family members cards in there as well so I can check things out on my card and on their cards and I can see what they've got and when it's due back and I can manage all of the renewals and what's overdue I can see that all in the app. You can search the catalogue and put items on hold and choose which of the libraries you want to pick them up from and one of the really cool features is if you're out and about and might be in a bookstore and you think I really want that book but that's really expensive. You can scan the barcode in the library's essay app and it will take you straight to the catalogue record for that book in your local library and you can put it on hold. 

Speaker 2 17:34

Let's go to the next question. How does your library service bring to listeners the work of emerging and newly published writers in our South Australian community? And how do libraries support creative writing processes, writers and writing?

Speaker 3 17:53

So we support published South Australian authors by purchasing their books obviously. We do also highlight those books by South Australian authors. We have a little sticker on the on the spine of the book saying I Choose Essay. So they're highlighted in the shelf and also in the catalogue as part of the I Choose Essay collection. So you can see you know that one's written by someone from South Australia and makes it more visible to people when they're when they're browsing the shelves. We do host local author talks from time to time. Sometimes if they're very new or niche authors, we might do is a panel session. Or if it's a single author that's well known enough to attract an audience, then they might have a session on their own.

So we do have a few of those each year. In terms of supporting writers who are not yet published, we don't often host workshops about writing. We have partnered with City of Portland Enfield Council events team to present nature writing workshops in a festival in in recent years. So those sorts of things do happen from time to time. But we do find author talks are a really good way for writers to speak to other well known and published writers and get some tips and inspiration. So whenever I'm hosting an author talk, there's always other writers in the room that want to pick their braid about their writing technique and how they go about getting published and hear those stories. So that's a very important part of what we do.

Speaker 2 19:30

Thank you. Would you tell us about your own reading preferences? What types of books do you like to read? And do you have any favourite reading places? 

Speaker 3 

I do like to read a physical book. As someone who spends a lot of time on the computer during the day, I don't read e -books. I like to actually hold a book in my hand. And you know, you love the smell of the book and the feel of the paper and all those things. So I do read physical books. I have a mix of fiction and non-fiction. So if I'm reading fiction, it'll just be something light, maybe a light romance or something just to wind down at the end of the day. I do also enjoy books with fairly strong female lead characters, so things like Lessons in Chemistry or The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo. Some interesting stories where women have struggled against the kind of the patriarchy and the time that they're in and how they're expected to behave in society and how they make their own way. So I enjoy those stories.

In terms of non-fiction, I'm quite passionate about the environment and sustainability. So I do read a lot around sustainability, gardening, architecture, minimalism, passive houses. So I like reading books and magazines around those. And if I'm able to read at home at night, you know, that that's just a thing on the couch or in bed when you just ready to wind down. Or if I get to read on the weekend, which is rare, just on the back porch with a cup of tea and enjoy some sunshine.

Speaker 2 21:18

When you were talking about, you know, sitting out on the porch with a cup of tea, with a drink, like that's one of my favorite places to read. It's just outside with a bit of sunshine. Maybe the sun is setting and you've just got that just that little bit of light. I love being outside with like natural natural sounds. Let's move on. We got a few questions left. Do you usually have several books on the go at once or do you prefer to read one book at a time? 

Speaker 3 21:46

I do read several books at once. And as I said, because I'm kind of mixing it up between fiction and nonfiction, depending on my mood and my energy level. So it will there will always be a stack of things to choose from. 

Speaker 2

Now, why do you think that libraries will always be an essential part of our community and our cultural life in South Australia?

Speaker 3 22:10

I do think they will always be an essential part of our community and of every democratic society, because libraries are about access to information, which is really important for democracy and for your population and citizens to be informed and connected. So for people to be literate, to be educated, to have access to information, particularly as everything is more. Online, to have the skills to be able to access that, and also to think critically about what information you're being exposed to. Libraries pay a really big part in that. We can help people with whatever they might need in terms of information and skills development, or refer them on to other services. 

But from a cultural perspective as well, that free access to literature, to stories, that connection to identity and culture. So for that sense of belonging and empathy is really important for us as human beings and for our well-being. People are storytellers, and every culture has has different ways of of telling and sharing stories and you know the written word and literature is our way of of doing that. So to read those stories and hold those stories for future generations is a really important thing. 

Also I talked about the access to learning and education. For public libraries we have a really important role to play in supporting parents with their young children because parents are their first teachers and those first three years in particular from birth to three years is very important for brain development. So libraries holding programs like Baby Bounce and Storytime, having a range of picture books and toys available and modelling for parents. This is how you read to your children, this is how you can see nursery rhymes, talk with your children, play with your children will increase that brain development and help them to be ready for school and socialised and able to read and have those language skills which will then set them up for the rest of their life.

So those those first few years of life are really crucial and that's something that the libraries play a big part of. And then through the other stages of life, so lifelong learning, my role in community learning as a leader we talk about learning opportunities for people through their whole lives lifelong and life-wide. So you can explore anything that you're interested in, there will be books and information online that you can access and we can help you with that. And what you know once you're through your working life or even changing careers or in retirement wanting to be active in retirement and learning different things, the library is a place that can help you do that.

Our world keeps changing and it will continue to do so when the pace of change is increasing. So that ability to learn and having somewhere to go to learn particularly if you You don't have a lot of access to funds to go to an institution to learn those things. To be able to teach yourself and learn what you're interested in for free is a really important thing just to keep up, really. And as I mentioned earlier, that reduction of isolation. As our homes get smaller and families get smaller and people might move away from where the family has come from, you need to connect with other human beings and the libraries are a great space to be able to go where it's not school or work or home, there's another place to connect with community. Even if you just need somewhere to study or to, you know, if you're doing work out of, if you're not working at a workplace but working remotely, somewhere where you can do that without being alone, it's really important.

And lastly, would you tell our listeners again? where the Parks Library is located and also the opening hours. Okay so the Parks Library is at number 46 Trafford Street but the entrance is actually facing Parks Street and Yerter Walk. So as I said it's in the Parks Complex next door to the Theatre, Parks Children's Centre and the YMCA. So if you find your way to Trafford Street, Cowan Street, you'll find the Library. We are open seven days a week. Most days are 9am to 5pm. We are open until 7 on Wednesdays and Fridays and Saturdays and Sundays are open from 10am to 4pm. 

So it is seven days a week, and you know most of the time and I can also mention that the community rooms or function rooms that are here are available for hire outside of those hours as well so if you do need somewhere to hold a function or a training session and those hours don't suit you then still talk to us because we may be able to help give you access to those rooms outside of the Library opening hours.

Speaker 2 27:32

To all listeners tuning in at the moment please do take advantage of the Parks Library and all the services that they have to offer. Thank you so much Benita. Our guest on Emerging Writers today was Benita Parsons, Librarian from the Parks Library, one of the City of Port Adelaide Enfield Libraries.

This program can be heard at the same time each week here on Vision Australia Radio, VA Radio on Digital, online at varadio.org and also on Vision Australia Radio podcasts where you can catch up on earlier episodes. Thanks for listening to this Vision Australia Radio podcast. Don't forget to subscribe on your preferred podcast platform. Visit varadio.org for more. 

Speaker 1 (THEME) 

Vision Australia Radio. Blindness. Low vision. Opportunity.