Monday, May 26, 2008

For Sex, See Librarian

Wisconsin State Journal [Madison]
18 April 1971, Section 5, p. 1.

Main Streets and Side Roads

By Steven E. Hopkins
Of The State Journal Staff

Passing the Buck

The Chicago Tribune reports that readers looking for books in one Chicago library's card catalog dealing with sex will find a card that reads as follows: "Sex, See librarian." -- George Pauslon, Reedsburg Times-Press.

Star-News [Pasadena, CA]
2 August 1972, p. C-1.

More or Less Personal

by Ray McConnell

THE GENTLE APPROACH: In The Grapevine, publication of the Pasadena Public Library Staff Association, Margaret Meyer reports that the subject heading in the catalog of a library (not here) read: "SEX, see librarian." When this caused comment, it was changed to read: "SEX, for SEX ask at desk." [...]

L. B. Woods, "For Sex: See Librarian." Library Journal, vol. 103, issue 15 (1 Sept. 1978), p. 1561.

The title of this article was found on a catalog card entry in a library in Washington. It indicates the lengths to which some librarians will go to increase circulation; or couched in educational lingo, to what lengths they will go to make the library relevant to the needs of a changing society.

If you are of the "old school," you might interpret the entry correctly to mean that access to materials dealing with sex is restricted. [...]

Martha Cornog and Timothy Perper, "For Sex, See Librarian: An Introduction." In Martha Cornog, ed., Libraries, Erotica, and Pornography (Phoenix, AZ: The Oryx Press, 1991), p. 5.

In another cartoon, published in Playboy, a voluptuous young woman behind the circulation desk is approached by an eager young man who ventures, "Under 'Sex,' the card catalog says, 'See Librarian' " (Doug Sneyd, October, 1982, p. 105).

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