YaleSchmale

2006 August 30
tags: , , , ,

Yale Shmale

I’m a fan of anything that cleverly pokes fun at the current administration - but this advertisment for Lakehead University is more than just that. The URL, yaleschmale.com has no apparent agenda or affiliation and the opening page shows only a stylized George W followed by the words:

Graduating from an Ivy League university doesn’t necessarily mean you’re smart. If you agree click here.

Bringing you to another page with two large invitations to win gadgets and a third with a link to the University. That link brings you to Lakehead’s student portal.

I find it fascinating that the university is marketing themselves first by participating in the social internet’s tendency for distributing such things; the social current, if you will. And then a contest, normally reserved for corporate marketing, to attract students. If universities are doing this, why can’t libraries?

2 Comments leave one →
2006 August 30
herzogbr permalink

That is interesting - and effective, too, I bet (perhaps more so because it is a Canadian college, and thus doesn’t need to worry too much about offending their republican student base or their tuition-paying parents).

But since libraries are the last bastion of democracy, we need to be careful about ridiculing any single portion of our constituents. We need to be welcoming to all, which is contradicted if we offend a particular group (though I have heard of one library who hangs a sign reading something like “if we don’t have at least one book here that offends you, let us know so we can do our jobs better”).

In my experience, libraries are such slaves to neutrality that decorating for Christmas or St. Patrick’s Day is not allowed, for fear of making non-Christians feel unwelcome. Even promoting black authors during Black History Month gets a second thought because it might be construed as racist, or reverse-racist.

Thus far, it seems libraries have let the will of the amalgamated Patron be our rudder when it comes to the institution itself having a personality or opinion. But perhaps it is our place to step up and use humor (clever and intelligently-crafted humor, of course) in our dealings with the public. That way, people might not see us as stuffy and intimidating, but more casual and current. And that’s a good thing, right?

But in this specific case, let’s also not forget that this is a single business that is employing a focused marketing campaign. Getting the entire field of librarianship to relax however many years of tradition is something else entirely. But we can try.

2006 October 20
Remaining Relevant » Blog Archive » Hermaphrodykes permalink

[...] It’s not exactly a typo, but I think Brian has a great point about being aware of our image and what we, as professionals representing an institution, present to the world. An offhand comment about a book or politics or religion, a joke, a low-cut shirt, a comment about another patron, etc - any and all of that is noticed by patrons all the time, and could very dramatically affect their library use, or at least from which library staff they feel comfortable seeking help. [...]

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