The power went out during my conversation with Nora Alicia Reyes, Librarian of "Salmon de la Siva" at the National Autonomous University of Managua, Nicaragua.
She used the light on her phone, and so did the other students and I who started going out using their phone lights. It was 5:30 pm and the last lecture at the university ended at 8 o'clock.
There was no alternate generator in the library to compensate for the blackouts, I thought about the underdeveloped conditions that the technology sector still suffers from in the second poorest country in Central America after Haiti.
Difficult conditions
Reyes began working as a librarian at that university since 1988, providing services to students, before joining the College of Information Management to facilitate her work in the library.
Reyes insists that librarians are indispensable, especially in government libraries that do not have sophisticated technologies. Nevertheless, she does not deny that the trend today is towards the use of all that is technical, except that the library does not have much financial support to develop the technologies that Make it easier for students to find their resources and references.
She cited an example that the library has a capacity of 360 students, while the number of students increased to 1500, but with a quick look at the tables spread in the library, you realize that its users count on the fingers of the hand.
"We receive students, answer their questions, and guide them to methods of extracting information and manuscripts, but some of them enter our website before coming to make sure that the book they want to borrow exists," indicating that they provide training from time to time to those who wish to be among the students.
Librarian's job
Until 1995, the major of "librarians" was taught at the University of "Centro Americana", then this specialty was closed due to poor demand, according to Reyes, who said that the study period is 5 years, while job opportunities are very limited.
However, it considers the Department of Information Management of the College of Human Sciences an alternative to the specialization of “Librarians”, as “Graduates can work in the library or archives of any institution or in newspapers, offices and companies.” The department accommodates 50 students each year, and it was opened in 2008. .
And between 1995 and 2008 there was no specialization directly related to librarians, as for her optimism about the survival of the profession despite the limitations of libraries and the availability of databases, it is because the librarian is now a graduate of specialized information management and can facilitate research for students.
The Espamir bookstore is one of the largest libraries in Nicaragua, and it is visited by many, especially from the cultural community, as it participates in publishing books and regularly holds signing ceremonies and literary evenings, and there Al Jazeera Net met with Nestor Lopes Sanchez, a graduate of Spanish literature and one of the librarians, in addition To a colleague who graduated from the same college, where libraries find literature graduates best suited for the job.
Sanchez refused to move from his place, saying that he had to provide information to readers and customers, but he spoke after the library was closed, and appeared to defend his profession, arguing that the profession of librarian was born before the birth of technologies, while technologies support and facilitate the work, but it is impossible to neglect the human factor.
He says, "There is a relationship that arises between the librarian and the reader that cannot occur between him and the deaf devices. The librarian answers your questions and guides you and persuades you and advises you. Technology cannot constitute an alternative. It is true that we are in a time of information flow from the Internet, but the reader prefers to speak with a person Look like him, not with a machine that doesn't have a reflex. "
He justifies his opinion, saying that "the Google Books project, for example, is an application that aims to create a virtual library, and yet it did not achieve the expected result, because the hypothetical results are not like reality."
Challenges
Carmelo Chavaria is a teacher at the university and a linguist who goes to the library from time to time. He did not completely agree with what both Reyes and Sanchez said, as he as a researcher returns a lot to the Internet and gives less time to the library. This is evidenced by the abolition of the College of the Library Trust, and he made his mission Archiving within the College of "Information Management" whose graduates can work in more than one field, not just in the context of libraries.
The first batch of librarians graduated in Nicaragua in 1978 when the department was part of the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Central America (OCA), on the initiative of its founders Noel Lacayo Barreto, the Chilean Nicaraguan and Terio Lopes, while the "Salmon de la Silva" library of the independent university was opened Patriotism in 1983, that is, 4 years after the victory of the (left) Sandinista revolution in 1979.
In 1980, librarians had to face a major challenge by tackling illiteracy that was widespread in Nicaragua, so that more than half of its people could not read and write.
Since that year, the Ministry of Education decided to allocate the day of November 8 of each year to celebrate and honor librarians, in view of the efforts they made in the years of the victory of the first revolution to spread libraries in Nicaragua's cities and towns to get rid of illiteracy.
As for choosing this date, it is because it coincides with the day that the Nicaraguan leader Carlos Fonseca Amador, the founder of the Sandinista movement who was known for his passion for reading, was himself a trustee of the Miguel Ramirez Guyana National Institute library.