What’s so bad about books?

I’ll admit it - I’m a bookworm. Worse still, I have this dreadful habit of buying books and then not reading them, so that my work space, and in fact, my house, is a daily affront to the failure of my good intentions. Today there’s been a little bit in the news about this development in the public library system. Not many of the media seemed interested in this story - Radio 4’s Today programme and The Guardian covered it, but not many others as far as I can see from a quick surf. That said, it wasn’t clear to me how the new scheme will differ from inter-library loans and how you are supposed to know what books are available elsewhere in the country. The basic upshot is, you will be able to borrow a book from any library in the country. As I said though, reports are a bit short on the detail.

But anyway - here’s a plug for the local library service. As a student, do try to use it. If you can work ahead and order books you’ll find its a great way of saving money (unlike me). And increasingly, libraries are being refurbished with good computers and services, and lots of stuff as well as books - DVDs, CDs and so on.

Then again - as this article on the BBC Magazine explains, there’s a fascinating sociology of books isn’t there? There are all sorts of interesting class and other social divisions (e.g. age, girls books, guys books). Not just in terms of a broad, ‘who reads’ and ‘who doesn’t read’, but in all the fascinating divisions in terms of what people do read - how we make the distinctions between ‘high culture’ and ‘popular culture’ for example. And of course, reading is a great marker of cultural capital. So if you’re doing culture and identity there are a lot of interesting questions you can pose by thinking about books - and they are worth considering, even if a lot of examples used by teachers might be to do with music, television, or drama.

For the record, my own bookshelves groan under the weight of too many sociology books, books on politics, and economics. I am trying to read some of them - honestly, I really am. And sociology teacher or not, I do try to read some fiction for pleasure. What does my reading say about me - ‘low brow poseur’ no doubt - I like David Lodge, Scottish Tory boy Alexander McCall Smith (strange and sad I know, but he does calm me down), and I’ve even been known to read cheap thrillers - they’re much easier than social theory.

As it said on a free book mark I once got from a public library in Los Angeles - ‘Expand your mind - read a book’.