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AIB. Attività in ambito IFLA
The Italian provincial library belongs to a territorial entity which entails several localities, it is considered a government library and corresponds to the departmental libraries in Spain, France and the Latin American countries, to the Bundesbibliotheken in the German speaking countries and to the cantonal libraries in Switzerland. Its specificity refers to the attention it offers to the local funds in relation to the history, literature, art and traditions of the region.
Due to its characteristics and to the fact that it offers a public service without distinction of social, culture, religion or race, the provincial libraries are placed on the border line between public libraries and specialized libraries. They are also established in their territory as the transmitters of the local historic memory and are an active instrument for the development of civics and citizenship.
The Italian provincial library having arised from the above municipal territorial entity may be considered to belong to the category of Government Libraries. In countries like France and some in Latin America this category corresponds to the departmental libraries, in Austria and German speaking countries it corresponds to the Bundesbibliothek and in Switzerland to the cantonal libraries.
In Italy the definition of provincial library refers to the proprietor and not to the territory which offers the service, although this territory is the minimum coverage it should have. The Consorcios, which are incorporated into this category, include the province among their members.
The Italian provincial libraries are 42 of the 104 provinces which make the country, therefore this typology of library is present in one third of the Italian provinces and half of these are historic.
Due to the limited number of libraries and the little relationship amongst them, up to a few years ago they were incorporated to the communal or municipal libraries. But, after the first meeting of provincial libraries held in Pescara in 1997, these libraries were recognized in the scientific community as library typology. Since then the meeting of provincial libraries is held annually in Pescara. In 2004 the 8th Congress will deal with the topic of the local section as a place for preservation and spreading of the historical memory, with the joint participation of the provincial libraries and the archives pertaining to the state.
Due to the function they carry out and the documents that the provincial libraries have these can be incorporated to public libraries since they offer an open service without distinction of social, race nor religion and with an unlimited service complying with the internal bylaws.
The most relevant difference found in the bylaws is the limit established for home loaning and the schedule of attention to the public. Regarding the loaning service, a service which only very few libraries limit to the employees of the territorial entity, there is the lending to only those citizens who live in the territory to which the library is assigned to, up to those libraries which have a service extended to all the Italian citizens or foreign residents no matter where they live. In spite of this, the most common regulation for home loaning is the one that is ruled by the belonging to a territory on different levels (residence, place of study and work). As to schedules, the Italian provincial libraries have an average of 45 to 50 hours per week of service to the public.
The provincial library in almost its totality, has a medium to big size, which corresponds to a bibliographical collection of between 100,000 to 300,000 volumes, with an area of direct influence over the province and indirect influence over the region. Its operating coverage is determined both by the quality as by the quantity of its funds - over which the local history patrimony has primacy ' due to the origin of its users, and to the presence of specialized cultural institutes in the territory such as the universities, the conservatory, the academies, among others.
The main characteristic of the provincial libraries is the priority they must give to the history, literature and local art funds. This priority does not refer only to the preservation of the documents of the past, but to the dedication to the increase of these funds with special strategies to recover these funds in its territory which is reinforced with the fact that the provincial library extends its radius of influence over a bigger territory than the municipal libraries. These libraries therefore not only recuperate documentary materials of the capital and the province but they frequently recuperate patrimonies of all the region due to the bond they have with the territory such as area of common interests, traditions, dialects, culture.
As an example, in Abruzzo, a region located in the central-south part of Italy, each of the four provincial libraries which make up the region have a Section of Abruzzo and not a specific section of the province to which each belong. These libraries -- connected by their mission since the 50's by a collective regional catalogue -- are also committed to a common project for the digital cataloging of the local newspapers which each has.
Due to this specificity the provincial libraries, placed as public libraries, are put in a border line position between the public library and the specialized library. In fact, the documents they lend for reading and reference are enriched with the official documents of the entity to which they belong and to those sent by other entities of lesser degree such as the town hall, the mountain communities, etc. Almost all have the right to the legal deposit, receiving a copy of the printed publications in the perimeter of the province. It can be affirmed then that due to its characteristic and to its function, the provincial libraries carry out in their territory the same function that the national libraries have in the country.
The documents they possess and the information they offer constitute the channel between the library and the province for the transmission of the local historic memory and are an active instrument of civic and citizenship development. In addition to this, in various provincial libraries the citizens may have access to information on the administrative activity of the entity, as the provincial administration sends the most significant proceedings of its management to the library, such as budget, development plans, programs, studies, etc.
The interest of the provincial libraries on the patrimony of the local traditions can be seen as well in the compiling of the specialized catalogues. Point of reference of the historical memory of the territory, the library collects not only the documents -- books, but also recovers brochures, manuscripts, magazines, posters, photographs, and scores which constitute the deepest humus of the local culture.
An even bigger testimony of the bond of the provincial library to the preservation and spreading of local patrimony is the fact that some also keep in their interior the historical record of the provincial administration. This record, together with the bibliographical funds and the magazines of the library constitute a fundamental component for research and studies, essential for reconstructing the past of the province.
The section on preservation has a first degree importance due to its specificity but the main task of the provincial library is to offer access to the universe of the different disciplines. Therefore, if the updating of the sections must be guided mainly to the knowledge of the literary- historic- humanistic- legal the definition of policies for acquisition of collections is determined both by the composition of the potential users as by the particularities of the territories it serves.
As to automatization, the provincial libraries have a parallel development and maybe with a bit of anticipation, to the town hall libraries, and are almost all registered in the SBN net (National Librarian Service), service pertaining to the state managed by the Central Institute of Unique Catalog (ICCU), to which 2,000 other italian libraries unite. This service which extends to all the national territory -- which adjusts to the different typologies of libraries -- by means of participative cataloging, offers in its central index almost 8,000,000 bibliographical index cards corresponding to 17,000,000 locations of documents present in the different libraries, which may be consulted by internet.
The particularities which characterize the provincial libraries do not constitute an exclusive typology of the Italian libraries. These, in fact, have an objective reference in other horizons in Europe and Latin America.
Austria is a country divided into nine Bundeslander (administrative division which corresponds to a province or region) and each one has a Landesbibliothek. In six of these libraries the Bundesbibliothek has been established. In Viena the town hall library has the function of the provincial library, while in Tirol and in Salzburg this function has been given to the university library.
The main function of the Landesbibliothek is the recuperation, preservation and administration of the local funds and its appraisal, process which is carried out by means of the elaboration and publication of specialized catalogs. As was indicated in the Italian provincial libraries, the Landsbibliothek, in addition to the volumes published in its territory and the works of authors born in the region, gathers documents of local interest such as posters, geographic and topographic maps, scores and illustrated postcards. These libraries therefore represent the instrument with which the Bundesland offers its citizens means to preserve and enrich the sense of belonging.
On the other hand, each Landesbibliothek specializes in the recuperating of a specific aspect. This is how the Wiener Stadt und Landesbibliothek has a very rich collection of posters, theater programs and musical sources of Vienese authors, the provincial library of St. Polten in lower Austria has a collection which is inventoried and catalogued of more than 100,000 illustrated postcards and the library of Graz de Stiria has more than 3,000 ex-libris from the 16th century to date.
The Austrian Landesbibliothek enjoys the right of legal deposit of what is printed in the province. This is their basis not only for the elaboration of the catalog of the local funds but also for the elaboration of the national Austrian bibliography which includes the bibliographies of the Austrian Lander.
In the end, as to the systematization of these libraries, the general catalogs converge to only OPAC (Online Public Access Catalogue) and are transferring their information to electronic bases.
In Spain the provincial administration provides the library service cooperating with the creation and maintenance of the service. Due to the diversity of the different regions, on this occasion reference will be made only to Cataluña. In this region, the province of Barcelona has established a net with 160 public libraries through the library service of the Deputation with the objective of creating citizens-readers, spreading the culture of reading, of information and of permanent development. Due to this reality, the Deputation which theoretically should have a reference role, in fact fulfills a function of being almost an internal library of the territorial entity.
In other contexts in Spain the provincial library undertakes characteristics similar to provincial libraries in Italy and Austria. Continuing with the experience in Cataluña, the provincial library in Tarragona, while keeping its characteristics of a public library, offers its users a particularly rich collection of local funds.
In France they have the departmental de prêt libraries (BDP) in accordance to the administrative subdivision of the country. These are part of the general council of the department and have among their main functions to provide books and different types of documentary materials (magazines, CD ROM, videocassettes, etc.) to the libraries of the smaller town halls which have a population of less than 10,000 inhabitants. They as well guarantee the training of personnel for these libraries, which are mainly volunteers, they establish a relationship of partners with the school, guarantee the fostering of reading, and offer technical and financial support to the communes which need to modernize their libraries. The role of the BDP is therefore to organize the municipal libraries in its department, having among its functions that of being the central library of services which is not open for public reading but which delegates this task to the smaller libraries and to the library facilities present in the territory.
The French departmental libraries acquire their current appearance in 1986 when the central library for loaning, which arises immediately after the postwar, is transferred from the central state to the department. They are 97 in all and are represented by their own professional association, they have a collection of catalogs on line and receive a strong support from the net of libraries which are interrelated by the library buses.
Switzerland is a confederation of cantons whose dimension and function may be in a big extent incorporated to the provincial Italian libraries, except for the fact that the cultural affairs are an exclusive prerogative of the canton since there is no Ministry of Culture in Switzerland. Each Canton has its own library. Since in Switzerland the university is cantonal, except for the polytechnic, the university libraries have the function of canton libraries. In cantons where there is no university, the public canton library has been established.
The canton libraries, as an expression of the local community, have the task of compiling, preserving and making the documentation of the history, culture and canton traditions accessible to the users. A function which is not simple, since in Switzerland the law for legal deposit does not exist, except in some cantons of the Roman Switzerland.
Among the funtions of the cantonal libraries which are not universities, is the consolidating of the interlibraries net for a better circulation of the funds of the municipal libraries, while the cantonal universities keep being the scientific libraries and in charge of the preservation of local patrimony.
In reference to Latin America, in Colombia there is also a regulation so that the departmental libraries be the entities responsible of gathering, preserving and spreading the historic memory of their territory, having as well the benefits of the legal deposit. These libraries offer the service to the public to guarantee access to information and to reading and at the same time must be in charge of the conformation of the local section, as they are designated as patrimonial libraries.
Similar to the French system, they are also in charge of the coordination and dynamics of the net of libraries of the department which conforms with the municipal libraries. This coordination refers specially to the formation of librarians and to the development of programs for the encouragement of reading habits and fostering of reading. As an example of the recuperation of the local patrimony of this typology of libraries in Colombia, the activity carried out in Cali in the Valle del Cauca Departmental Library for the formation of the film and photography File made with the participation of the legacy of the citizens, is representative. People go to the library with their documentary material to be digitalized and it becomes a legacy for the community, without the persons who have contributed having to lose their personal patrimony. This strategy has permitted the creation of a fund of more than 20,000 photographs, which have been listed and made accessible thru Internet.
To conclude, up to a short time ago, as was mentioned at the beginning of this article, this typology of libraries was not clearly linked in the national systems of libraries nor was there a clear mandate of their function. On the contrary, today these aspects are common and clear in the typology of the provincial libraries be it in their designation which corresponds to other names in other latitudes or continents, as well as for their functions of preserving and constructing the local historic legacy and for being considered as mediators in the development of citizenship.
Copyright AIB 2004-07,
ultimo aggiornamento 2004-07-11
a cura di Andrea Marchitelli
URL: <https://www.aib.it/aib/cen/ifla/sgl1.htm>