Author: Waseem Afzal

Philip Hider

The ARC Linkage project, ‘Designing for Communities with Communities’, has launched its Toolkit to assist public libraries include a genuine ‘codesign’ element in their future space development projects. The Co-designing Public Library Spaces Toolkit is freely available on the State Library of New South Wales website and provides detailed guidance on how to involve community members in the design, or redesign, of their library spaces. The content of the Toolkit is based on the findings from the Linkage project’s two case studies and covers both the planning and carrying out of workshops specifically for the purposes of codesigning public library spaces.… Continue reading “Codesigning public libraries project launches its Toolkit”

Jane Garner

From 1–3 July 2025, the Charles Sturt University Libraries Research Group proudly hosted the Australasian Public Library Conference. Held online to mark 50 years of Library & Information Studies at CSU, the event brought together researchers, practitioners, and community leaders to explore the changing role of public libraries.

Over three days and six themed sessions, participants shared insights into how libraries are evolving to meet community needs. If you missed a session—or want to revisit the conversations—recordings are now available here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCK1lMuHn4SGiy87A-cyKcQ… Continue reading “Australasian Public Library Conference 2025: Recordings Now Available”

The Libraries Research Group invited the manager, Christine Bolton, and staff of Wagga Wagga City Library over to the group’s meeting on 1 May, which was held on the Wagga campus as well as online for those members not present in Wagga. Christine and her colleagues provided an overview of the latest developments in the Library’s services and discussed with the group various possibilities for further research collaboration. Highlights of the meeting included a guided tour of one of the librarians’ agile library vans, and a chance to pat one of the Library’s robotic cats!… Continue reading “LRG meets with Wagga City Librarians”

Group member: Jane Garner

Project website: https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/librariesandhomelessness/

This three-year project funded by an Australian Research Council DECRA Grant allows me to explore how public libraries can best support people experiencing homelessness or insecure housing. The project has the following aims:

1. To understand the service, resource and environmental needs of the Australian homeless community that could be met by public libraries in our urban, regional, and remote contexts.
2. To understand the attitudes and concerns of public library staff, and non-homeless library users in Australian urban, regional, and remote contexts relating to the homeless community being present in their libraries.

… Continue reading “Public libraries supporting people experiencing homelessness”

Kay Oddone

I’m excited to share that our new research project, funded by the 2024 ALIA Research Grant Award, valued at $10,000, is officially underway. This grant was awarded to our cross-institutional research team, which includes myself, Dr. Lizzie Tait (University of South Australia), and Tabitha Merrell (Charles Sturt University).

Our project is entitled Voices of Change: Harnessing LIS Student Insights to Transform Information Literacy Education with Gen AI and Universal Design for Learning. It aims to explore innovative approaches to reimagining information literacy education by integrating generative AI technologies and Universal Design for Learning principles.… Continue reading “Voices of Change: Harnessing LIS Student Insights to Transform Information Literacy Education with Gen AI and Universal Design for Learning.”

Philip Hider

Cataloguing and classification, or nowadays more commonly referred to as ‘collection access’ or ‘metadata librarianship’, or similar, has been a core activity of library operations for as long as librarianship as a profession has existed, i.e., well over 100 years, yet for a long while now has been perceived as being somewhat on the back foot, especially with collections going increasingly online, and with libraries increasingly prioritising ‘front desk’ services when allocating their limited staff resources. I last surveyed the state of play for the ‘cat & class’ branch of librarianship in Australia a decade ago, and this year thought it was time to update those findings, to identify any continuing or new trends.… Continue reading “Library cataloguing at a crossroads”

A/Prof Mary Carroll

Over the last few months, I have been investigating the  experience of women in librarianship in Australia using the extant literature to see how this experience has been documented. This small project came about in response to a request to contribute to a festschrift in memory of highly regarded US scholar Mary Niles Maack. Maack ‘s areas of expertise were in comparative librarianship, the history of the book, and women’s history.  Her works are both insightful and far reaching laying out templates for future research in these areas.… Continue reading “Australian women librarians: their published history”

Annie Godfrey

Over the last decade a number of new public libraries have been built in NSW, include the eight in the photographs below. Current research by Annie Godfrey and other LRG members is exploring these libraries’ building architecture, which, as the photos show, can vary quite considerably. The project will investigate what this library architecture has in common, how it responds to and supports contemporary library functions, and how it reflects contemporary and historic expectations as to what a library should, or can, be.… Continue reading “Library Architecture Project”

Kay Oddone

It is hard to believe that it has been several months since I attended the ALIA National Conference in Adelaide, held from May 6-9, 2024. Although time has flown, it is still useful to draw a breath and reflect upon my experiences and to share my takeaways, especially as this was the first time I had attended this particular conference. 

With the theme being “Truth and Dare,”, it was clear from the start that this was going to be a thought-provoking learning experience.… Continue reading “Truth and Dare: Highlights from the ALIA Conference 2024”

Anita Dewi

I had opportunity to spend all February this year at the National Library of Australia (NLA) as an Asia Study Grant recipient. I felt so privileged! During the four-week period, I explored the NLA’s Indonesian collections, researching libraries, librarianship, and librarians in Indonesia – the past and present. Most resources I consulted were in Bahasa Indonesia (the Indonesian language), so I found my Indonesian language competence very helpful. The NLA collections on this topic (and I’m sure also beyond) are amazingly comprehensive.… Continue reading “2024 National Library of Australia Asia Study Grant recipient – a reflection”

Philip Hider

The ARC Linkage Project, Designing for Communities with Communities, has come on leaps and bounds since it started in May last year. It’s always going to be a bit challenging to synchronise different library development projects, but our project has been fortunate enough to have some very enthusiastic and committed partners on board, and we’re now in the thick of data collection and the actual co-design. The series of community workshops has already been completed for one of the case studies, and the second series, for another library, is underway.… Continue reading “Co-designing libraries: progress report”

Waseem Afzal

Recently I got an opportunity to attend the 86^th ASIS&T Annual Conference in London. The theme of this year’s conference was ‘Making a Difference: Translating Information Research into Practice, Policy, and Action.’

I kick-started by attending a half day workshop on ‘Social media research: challenges and opportunities.’ This workshop was a combination of paper presentations and a keynote by Prof. Adam Joinson from the University of Bath. The keynote was highly thought provoking and raised many questions about theory, role of theory in social media research, and current online landscape as dominated by Big Data and AI.… Continue reading “Reflections on the Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) Conference 2023”