Bernier, Anthony

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San Jose State UniversitySJSU ScholarWorksFaculty Publications School of Information2-1-2000Young adults, rituals, and library spaceAnthony BernierSan Jose State University, anthony.bernier@sjsu.eduFollow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/slis_pubPart of the Library and Information Science CommonsThis Article is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Information at SJSU ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in FacultyPublications by an authorized administrator of SJSU ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact scholarworks@sjsu.edu.Recommended CitationAnthony Bernier. "Young adults, rituals, and library space" Voice of Youth Advocates (2000): 391.11/9/12 EBSCOhostweb.ebscohost.com/ehost/deliv ery ?sid=c43b2d89-3226-4a66-b43e-5294a3582f 51%40sessionmgr11…Title:Alternate Title:Authors:Source:Physical Description:Document Type:Subjects:ISSN:Accession Number:Database:Record: 1Young adults, libraries, and ritual space.high school students' time capsule at a branch of LAPLBernier, AnthonyVoice of Youth Advocates; February 2000, Vol. 22 Issue 6, p391-391,1pIllustrationArticleLos Angeles Public Library; Libraries & young adults -- California01604201502842108Library Literature & Information Science Full Text (H.W. Wilson)Young Adults, Libraries, and Ritual SpaceAUTHOR:Anthony BernierTITLE:Young Adults, Libraries, and Ritual SpaceSOURCE:Voice of Youth Advocates 22 no6 391 F 2000The magazine publisher is the copyright holder of this article and it is reproduced with permission.Further reproduction of this article in violation of the copyright is prohibited.    Editor's Note: This unique perspective on what a library space can represent for teenagers is anunusual use of our YA Spaces spot in this first VOYA issue of the millennium. It reports a project thatcaptures time. May it spark your own ideas about how to make young adults an integral part of yourlibrary. To submit your splendid YA library spaces, request our YA Spaces questionnaire throughvoya@voya.com, fax (301) 459-2118, or phone toll-free (888) 4 VOYA 97.    Jerry, Bill, and I were fourteen when we punctured our right thumbs and rubbed our bloods together. Inthat smelly, old, abandoned garage-cum-clubhouse, we became larger than our individual selves. Webecame immortal brothers. But we were also mixing with a long legacy of youth rituals. From notstepping on the cracks (to "save our mothers' backs") through the more problematic fraternity andsorority hazings, young people have continually invented ritual to order their universe and to make itmore their own. Libraries could learn something here.    At the end of the school year, my branch of the Los Angeles Public Library staged our own ritual: weembedded Central High School's time capsule project in the building itself, vowing to return ten yearshence to recover the treasure and to see how we had weathered.    For many youth in this neighborhood, and perhaps for other youth as well, thinking ten years into thefuture is a bizarre abstration. These are the kids of America's abandoned urban agenda, the "cutbackkids" under constant police helicopter surveillance, the kids of our post-after-school playground inner-cities with few other legal enrichment activities. This experiment in ritual forced a future vision of11/9/12 EBSCOhost2/3web.ebscohost.com/ehost/deliv ery ?sid=c43b2d89-3226-4a66-b43e-5294a3582f 51%40sessionmgr11…themselves, a future even with spouses and children.    Central High exists as a Los Angeles Unified School District "Options" school. Established toaccommodate the soaring aspirations of returning World War I veterans, Options programs now provideschool-aged parents, together with working and at-risk teens, innovative, comprehensive, andindividualized study curriculums leading to high school diplomas. For these Options students, however,the diploma comes with a tradeoff: a diploma in exchange for access to a school library, a speech club,a yearbook. In other words, Central High students earn their diplomas at the sacrifice of common rites ofpassage.    Working closely with Central High students and their talented teacher, Patricia Butler, we developedthe "time capsule" concept. The heuristic process of making all the associated choices proved mostfruitful: what to keep in, what to leave out, how to identify meaningful items for ten years into the future,how would the students' future children understand (they are to be part of the "reunion" as well). Whenthese debates subsided and the final selections were made, students wrote brief essays exploring eachitem's respective cultural or anthropological significance. The essays were then excerpted, reduced byphotocopier, and attached to the appropriate items: fashion designer tags from pants, shirts, andjackets; U.S. currency reduced to the size of a credit card; somebody's pager; photographs of familycars; poetry samples; a special brand of sunglasses; an issue of T.V. Guide with highlighted favoriteprograms; an inscribed belt buckle; the cover of Gary Soto's Chato's Kitchen (Putnam's, 1995)--thepicture book illustrated by Susan Guevara that I read to them to demonstrate the importance of readingto children--and a library card. Many items were students' personal property, reflecting how they came tocare about the idea of a time capsule and its embodiment of community.    The insightful essays obliged them to contextualize common material culture. "A pager is one of thosethings all teens want," wrote Stephanie. "With a pager, you can get hold of your honey or friendswherever they're at. It's good in case of emergencies.... But teenagers want pagers basically for thelook."    Beyond the prioritizing of significant material culture, beyond the challenging critical thinking andwriting and rhetorical skills required of this time capsule project, the ceremony and ritual still loomslarge. On the final day, after everything was labeled and stowed, we tied the capsule up with nylon yarnas students said goodbye to a defining moment in their lives. Together with our library's clerk, LupeLainez, who offered to stand watch over the capsule (or pass the guardian role on to her successor), wesealed up the treasure in a false wall compartment of the library. Two students have promised tomaintain a class address list to insure that everyone gets invited back that spring in the decade of 2000,when we will unearth the capsule and revisit who we were ten years ago.    I have been fortunate to attend many new library building openings in my career. I have listened to thepoliticians, the clergy, the teachers, and the library administrators talk over the heads of the childrenassembled there for the photo opportunity--and to symbolize the light that libraries hold. The youngpeople must sit and listen to lectures on how to respect and cherish. But rarely does any part of theceremony--the ritual--actually include youth culture.    In completing the time capsule ritual, and for at least the next ten years, the students of Central Highwill connect to this library in ways that our overdue notices have not managed to accomplish. They willsee themselves, their pasts, and their futures tied to this space by something thicker than a taxpayer'sburden--something closer to blood.ADDED MATERIAL    Anthony Bernier is Young Adult Specialist Librarian at the Echo Park Branch of the Los Angeles PublicLibrary. He is also a doctoral candidate in history at the University of California, Irvine, and is editing abook on spatial equity for teens in libraries.    PHOTO CREDIT: Anthony BernierSource: Voice of Youth Advocates, February 2000, Vol. 22 Issue 6, p391, 1pItem: 502842108

Young adults, rituals, and library space

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Young adults, rituals, and library space

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