“Hypothetical reality” is a term I've come up with to describe a lot of the assignments we're asked to do at library school. Unlike an undergrad English program (for example) where you're given an assignment, you do the research and then write a paper in a pretty straight forward manner, something entirely different often happens at library school.
Because it's a professional program, you end up being given assignments that are some weird blend of the real world and the fictional. Right from day one in 503 where you're told to “describe your answers for these questions as if you are a working reference librarian” (even though you may have never spent a day working in the library before), you're asked to enter this hypothetical reality mode. For the most part, it makes sense and can even be fun (I spent a bunch of my weekend working on a floor plan for a hypothetical special library) but again, you're entering that netherworld between the real and not real where it's sometimes hard to find a balance.
It struck me today again when a group were presenting in public libraries and one of the group members stopped in the middle of the presentation, said “outside of the conceit that we're librarians presenting to the board of LPL, can I ask you a question about…?”
I'm not saying this is a good thing or a bad thing – for the most part, I think it's a good thing but it can be frustrating when you write something in your hypothetical role and get back a comment like “This would never happen in a real library.” Oh. Uhm, I'm not a real librarian yet so I didn't know that.
To bring it back to 503, I have to admit that my confusion and frustration about dealing with hypothetical reality boiled over a bit when I wrote my final reference question (of five in a row we had to do at the end of term, like clockwork every Monday), as a surreal narrative where a grouchy old lady showed up in my apartment in the middle of the night (half of that sentence was hypothetical, half was reality – I leave it to you to figure which was which.)
She asked me a reference question and then, as I answered it, various other random elements appeared including a crazed Scotsman from the other optional reference question that week, Mr. Miyagi, and one of the worst cliches you can use in writing.
Here it is. The little ranty aside at the beginning was in reference to the previous week's RQ where I'd given the right answer but because I hadn't described it very well, had lots nearly half my marks for the question (although to be fair, the professor did bump my mark on appeal.)
Oh, and I knew it was a bit of a risk handing this thing in – either the prof was going to really hate it or maybe get a bit of a laugh after having to read twenty-odd reports that would all basically say the same thing. Luckily, they apparently weren't bothered by me having some fun with the conventions and I ended up getting an 85% for my answer.
(Another thought – does it bug anybody that I use “they” when its a singular antecedent (ie. “professor”)? Frankly, I don't know if it was my female prof or the male TA who marked this RQ and anyhow, I'm not a huge fan of the “he or she” or “he/she” or even just picking one and sticking with it options. I *did* get killed on a different assignment I got back today though because of this. Ooops. Me know grammer gud. Edit: Shea pointed out another horrible one that people sometimes use – “s/he”. Yuck!)
PS – welcome to everybody from Ask MetaFilter who found this site after my recent comments about the job market for librarians in Canada. Hope you find something of value here if you're a librarian (or even if you're not) and keep coming back!
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