Overview

Over the past decade, the Cary Memorial Library has seen a significant increase in demand for materials in languages other than English. The library is currently collecting the following languages for adults: Bengali, Chinese, French, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Korean, Marathi, Portuguese, Russian, Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu, and Turkish and is making plans to add collections in Japanese. The Youth Services Department collects several additional languages. As community demographics and interests shift, there may be need for additional languages in the future.

Types of Materials Included in World Language Collections

The purpose of Cary Library’s World Language Collections is to provide popular reading materials to those interested in reading in languages other than English. The contents of each language collection may vary according to community interests and the availability of materials, but will focus on the following:

  • Classics in their original languages

  • Modern writers of popular materials writing in their native language

  • Select American/European writers translated into other languages

  • Select historical or cultural materials

  • Audio/Visual materials and periodicals (if sufficient funding is available)

The World Language collections are not intended to be comprehensive or archival, and will not include academic or technical titles.

Because the library is unlikely to have staff with proficiency in all of these languages, and to ensure that our World Language Collections are relevant and responsive to our community, the library staff partners with community members and cultural groups to develop some World Language Collections.

Library staff will make the final decisions on what materials to collect and retain in accordance with the Library’s Collection Development Policy.

Procurement of Materials

The Library purchases World Language materials through vendors who can supply catalog records which meet the standards of the Minuteman Library Network. The Library will work with known vendors and community partners to identify appropriate titles and will procure them directly from the vendor. 

NOTE: The library can only accept a very LIMITED number of donations of titles in languages other than English because of the expense and difficulty of procuring online catalog records for these items. For this reason, donations of World Language materials must be discussed with library staff prior to the materials being delivered to the library. 

All World Language materials donated become the property of Cary Library. Donated items that are not added to the library’s collections may be sold, transferred to other libraries, donated to other nonprofit organizations, or recycled.

Evaluation of Collections

The Library will use circulation data to guide future selections for World Language collections. Items that are not popular and do not circulate will be withdrawn from library collections according to the Collection Maintenance portion of the Collection Development Policy. Items removed from World Language collections may be offered for sale to the community through the Friends of the Library Bookstore.

Reconsideration of Library Materials

The library carefully investigates and considers suggestions from patrons for the removal or reclassification of any material in the library collection.  Users may request this reconsideration by completing the Request for Reconsideration of Library Materials form.  This completed form is reviewed by the appropriate professional library staff.  Incomplete requests will not be considered. A written response is sent to the patron generally within six weeks.  The Request for Reconsideration of Library Materials form, and the written response to it, become part of the public record.  In case of disagreement, a user may appeal a selection decision to the Assistant Director/Director, and finally to the Board of Library Trustees.

 

Last Updated — 1/8/2020