The 54th Annual Preconference of the
Rare Books and Manuscripts Section
of the Association of College and Research Libraries,
a division of the American Library Association
Libraries house performance: within our collections, we have innumerable performance and performing arts materials sought by researchers whose interests are straightforward or subtle. Bibliographers examine play octavos. Choreographers seek out historical dance notation to adapt for their next performance. Historians of music shuffle through collections to examine musical manuscripts.
Others investigate collections that document the history of magical performance, the nature of gender as performance, or even the laboratory as performer within a network of actors. Our libraries are inundated with the documentation of performing arts and traces of the performance of activities.
Libraries support performance: libraries themselves are a center for performance. Teaching can be theatrical or even a historical recreation, while every modern administrator is interested in documenting the performance of processes and activities. We perform our duties using outreach on the radio, by measuring how effective our collection development is going, or even performing roles within a parent organization. Without performance, a library is simply a horde of artifacts, devoid of meaning and purpose.
Libraries embody performance: a book is the trace of ink from printing house practices; a manuscript is the trace of a pen scratching across paper. When we digitize something--a process that is a performance of its own--the content is transmitted over a series of networks, machines, systems, and space; ultimately, the signal reaches a researcher's computer and the transistors lurch into action, commanding the pixels of the screen to sparkle with a facsimile of the original material. On the screen we have a performance of distributed networks and technological standards, reproducing a performance of productive effort, documenting a historical performance of a people. In a certain way, a performance of a performance of a performance. Truly, performance is core to libraries in many ways.
"The time has come," Minerva sang,
"to talk of many things:
of theater--and dance--and music arts--
of laboratories and rings--
and why a book has yet a trace--
and if these things have wings."
