Folkbiblioteket - ett rum för socialt arbete? En kvalitativ studie om platsens betydelse för socialt arbete
(2022) SOPA63 20212School of Social Work
- Abstract
- The aim of this study was to examine how a change in public space is reflected in the everyday work and routines of the public library and to see what role social work has in this new environment. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the manager who made the decision to hire a social worker at the library as well as with the, as of writing, only library based social worker in Sweden. Observations also took place in the public library which employs this social worker. The results were analyzed through Oldenburg’s theory about Third Place from the 1980’s and Littman’s theory about Collapsed Place, published in 2021. It was concluded that the public library studied hired a social worker to meet the changing nature of the public... (More)
- The aim of this study was to examine how a change in public space is reflected in the everyday work and routines of the public library and to see what role social work has in this new environment. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the manager who made the decision to hire a social worker at the library as well as with the, as of writing, only library based social worker in Sweden. Observations also took place in the public library which employs this social worker. The results were analyzed through Oldenburg’s theory about Third Place from the 1980’s and Littman’s theory about Collapsed Place, published in 2021. It was concluded that the public library studied hired a social worker to meet the changing nature of the public library’s function in their community. The library is described as a third place, however, it is also stated that for some people the library may function as a first or second place. Using one space to fulfill the needs of other spaces is what Littman describes as a collapsed place. A seemingly homeless person was observed using the library as a first place in which they felt safe enough to rest. An elderly person used the library as a second place as they were observed coming to the library every day and using it to structure the endless hours of their day. Several socially vulnerable groups were identified in the library space, such as people with addiction and mental illness as well as homeless people and lonely elderly people. The social worker has three missions in the public library, an outreaching mission, an educating mission, and a networking mission. In the future it would be interesting to develop a cooperation between universities and their local public libraries to explore this new field further from a Swedish perspective. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9071600
- author
- Jörgensen, Moa LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- SOPA63 20212
- year
- 2022
- type
- M2 - Bachelor Degree
- subject
- keywords
- social work, public library, public space, third place, collapsed place
- language
- Swedish
- id
- 9071600
- date added to LUP
- 2022-01-17 11:00:00
- date last changed
- 2022-01-17 11:00:00
@misc{9071600,
abstract = {{The aim of this study was to examine how a change in public space is reflected in the everyday work and routines of the public library and to see what role social work has in this new environment. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the manager who made the decision to hire a social worker at the library as well as with the, as of writing, only library based social worker in Sweden. Observations also took place in the public library which employs this social worker. The results were analyzed through Oldenburg’s theory about Third Place from the 1980’s and Littman’s theory about Collapsed Place, published in 2021. It was concluded that the public library studied hired a social worker to meet the changing nature of the public library’s function in their community. The library is described as a third place, however, it is also stated that for some people the library may function as a first or second place. Using one space to fulfill the needs of other spaces is what Littman describes as a collapsed place. A seemingly homeless person was observed using the library as a first place in which they felt safe enough to rest. An elderly person used the library as a second place as they were observed coming to the library every day and using it to structure the endless hours of their day. Several socially vulnerable groups were identified in the library space, such as people with addiction and mental illness as well as homeless people and lonely elderly people. The social worker has three missions in the public library, an outreaching mission, an educating mission, and a networking mission. In the future it would be interesting to develop a cooperation between universities and their local public libraries to explore this new field further from a Swedish perspective.}},
author = {{Jörgensen, Moa}},
language = {{swe}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Folkbiblioteket - ett rum för socialt arbete? En kvalitativ studie om platsens betydelse för socialt arbete}},
year = {{2022}},
}