Caroline Syddall: Pacific Library Liaison, Macmillan Brown Library, University of Canterbury
The Pacific Library Liaison is a new position within the Macmillan Brown Library at the University of Canterbury. It is a role that focuses on Pacific staff, students and information resources. Caroline Syddall began this role in early 2022. She tells us about this new role and her library career to date.
All my library work has been in educational or public libraries. I am of English, Scottish and Samoan descent and this background has made me very aware of issues of colonisation and discrimination in the Pacific and Aotearoa. My lived experience, however, is as a Pākehā/Palangi New Zealander and I am aware that this affects how I can connect with both customers and with the collections. In practical terms, it means that at times I seek information and advice from Pasifika experts at the university for decisions that are beyond my cultural knowledge.
WHAT I LIKE ABOUT THIS ROLE
The exciting thing for me about this role is that it includes all the parts of my previous role that gave me the most satisfaction. My two main aims in this role are to help Pasifika students succeed here at the University of Canterbury and to make it easier for everyone to find Pacific information.
I provide research support to the Macmillan Brown Centre for Pacific Studies postgraduate students and any other researchers of the Pacific, work with my collections colleagues to increase the discoverability of Pacific material, contribute to teaching using Pacific resources, and support Pasifika students with their information needs.
A large part of my role, particularly in the first semester, is supporting the University’s Pacific academic leads in their work to promote teaching and learning with relevant Pacific content. For me this involves identifying relevant library resources, purchasing new items and updating our subject guides to make it as easier to find and use Pacific material.
FINDING WAYS TO SUPPORT STUDENTS
As we have two new Pacific PhD students this year who have been unable to come to New Zealand yet because of COVID, I’ve been working with my collections colleagues to find different ways to get them the readings they need. This has been an often-frustrating reminder of the issues around copyright vs access and copyright vs moral rights to works.
Currently, I’m working with our Kaitakawaenga Māori and Research Services Librarian on a project to make the material on our open shelves more appropriate and relevant. For the Pacific material, this involves moving no-longer useful material down into our closed stacks and promoting Pasifika voices within the collections. Our Collections colleagues are supporting this by adding contents lists to the catalogue records of Pacific titles.
The Macmillan Brown Library has an extensive and fascinating Pacific collection from historical to current material. One interesting part of my work is helping researchers and students identify the useful material within the colonial writings that almost exclusively dominate the early material in the collection. This challenge is carried through to current material where Pasifika voices remain under-represented in academic publishing, reflecting wider issues in academia. I consider it an honour to play a small part in bringing Pasifika voices to the fore.