Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Are Celebrities the Answer?


Drew Carey, after winning half a million on the Celebrity Edition of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire,” donated the money to a cause of his choice – the library! This happened in Ohio nine years ago, and is still being brought up in The Cleveland Leader. This rare happening was paired with his opinion on the Governors new plan to cut the library’s budget in half. His answer to this new ordeal – a fundraising carwash! Still, his playful solution is only a hypothetical answer.

Luckily, after much rallying and teamwork, the resulting budget cut in Ohio was not as drastic as Governor Ted Strickland proposed, with a reduction of “$84.3 million over the next two years, rather than the $227.3 million.” It is believed that the overpowering support of the community is one reason the governor’s cuts were rejected. This goes to show that with enough voices in a community, a library budget can be saved.

One thing I could not help thinking about is the strength of a celebrity’s voice in comparison to a community. A celebrity has the ability to get the attention of more people across the nation, while a community’s voice is usually not heard far beyond city limits. Celebrities have the ability to record public commercials and are used in pro-reading posters. So why not ask celebrities to join in on the community level of fighting to save libraries?

After further research I found a union of celebrities and libraries. In 2006 the U.K. began a campaign to improve libraries; it goes by the name Love Libraries. The campaign consists of “50 celebrity supporters from JK Rowling to the Hairy Bikers,” along with 500 champions, consisting of everyday people. As a Love Library Champion, it is easy to sign up to receive updates and the campaign uses this outlet to ask for consultations from supporters.

Perhaps we can utilize this hybrid idea from across the seas and make a Love Libraries for the United States. Who knows what can happen through the power of many voices.

For Some Free Poster Downloads of Celebrity's Promoting Reading visit: http://www.getcaughtreading.org/celebrityposters.htm

4 comments:

  1. I definitely agree that more has to be done to get the word out there about libraries and drum up support for them. I mean if we don't talk ourselves up who else will. A few months ago a friend of mine introduced me to a cool site called Geek the Library. (http://www.geekthelibrary.org/) It is basically a site where people can show what they "geek" (i.e. I geek vampires.) and show their support for libraries. This site is sponsored by OCLC and is being piloted in Georgia, Iowa and a few other cities right now, but I hope it catches on and spreads to Michigan.

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  2. Another thing to consider is the ALA's "Read" campaign. I've seen this in almost every library I've gone into, especially in the Young Adults section of the library. People associate with celebrities, or try to at least, so when a patron sees a poster of a celebrity holding their favorite book, that patron might think about, or actually, checking that book out.

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  3. Ah celebrities . . .who I am to judge a society that worships celebrities over literary gods? I suppose any support libraries receive in whatever form it comes in is better than nothing.

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  4. I like the idea of getting up an American chapter of this organization. I think one reason why certain people want to be famous is so that they can have some measure of power. All the better if they want to use that power for the good. Libraries definitely need to do a better job of marketing their value and it seems like this could only help.

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