to think undergraduates shouldn't be routinely given reader cards for the British Library?

[OTheHugeManatee]

Yes, I know that it's one of the UK's only copyright libraries. Yes, I know it's a public resource. Yes I know, accessibility, widening availability, yadda yadda. Yes, I'm probably being a mardy old trout.

But since they changed the rules to allow undergraduates to get BL reader cards, it's become overrun with entitled adolescents. Half the time you can't even get a seat.

I'm a mature student, doing postgrad study part-time at some distance from my institution, and I don't have a university library to work in. I have very small windows of time between work and other commitments when I can do library research for essays. The BL is pretty much the only resource within reasonable travelling distance from me where I can access the books I need and work quietly for a few hours. So when I turn up at the BL and find it swarming with people who could be somewhere else, and that it's impossible to get a seat, it pisses me off.

It's one thing if they are doing a special research project on material which is only available at the BL. But for ordinary undergrad stuff, why? Universities have their own libraries FFS. Can't these whippersnappers go and chew gum and flirt in those?

Get their earlier, or buy the books second hand on eBay.

They are just as entitled as you are.

Sorry but you are being unreasonable.

I want to know how the cleaners deal with the paternoster.

I also want to know if anyone's thought of putting sushi in it...

@ Bugger

I was SO tempted to reply, 'Can I suggest that you read the IMPORTANT INFORMATION that I have already sent you?'

But then I lost the will to live...

My fave is when they are trying to be all 'formal' and call me 'Ms Peasant' or even 'Mrs Peasant'. I reply, in my pompous lecturer manner, 'It's Dr P to you, muthafucka!'

Maybe there could be a compromise where they don't automatically ban all undergraduates, but to be allowed they have to state why they need to use the resources and maybe have a note from their tutor?

They should be able to use their own university libraries, I never had any problem doing this as an undergrad and even as a PhD student I rarely need to visit an actual library as I use online journals. Fortunately I have my own office space so no need to sit in the libarary, but most university libraries have quiet and/or silent study areas for undergraduates to use.

fabby, that is very funny.

You buy me the out-of-print books that cost 300 quid a pop on amazon, please? While the undergrads read their 7.99 biographies of Chaucer.

Schroder I love that one too so usual.
My favorite is Real Gabinete Portugues De Leitura Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. The colours of the book spines are stunning against the dark wood.

Never mind a world cruise I think I'm going to travel the world and see their library now what to do with the kids I wonder mmm could just let them loose in the BL I suppose. It would only take a few months to find them by that point I'd be back from my travels and with all those baby students wuth their bubble gum and phones they'd be fairly quite.

woodlands, that's not quite how it words, if I've got this right.

The BL is a copyright library, which is required to hold a copy of any book published in the UK. The Bodleian and the Cambridge UL (don't know about the others) are also copyright libraries, which can choose to have a copy of any book published in the UK.

Obviously, none are required to have copies of stuff published elsewhere, so what you need might be in any one of them.

Bugger, at calling you Ms/Mrs! Isn't it a bit obvious that's likely to piss you off?

I was always told if you weren't sure, go for 'Prof' as it'll flatter even if it's incorrect.

OhBuggerandArse

I suspect we go to the same university. 5th floor been given over to postgrad students (well half of it anyway)???

LRD, that was Revolting, not me. I just complain about syntax, and capital letters.

Girly, no - we don't have a fifth floor. See, they're all at it.

Not everyone can get there earlier. Those of us who don't work in universities based in London have to travel on off-peak trains. Research allowances are minimal these days, so we end up meeting the costs of research, travel, etc. out of our own pockets (£140 from Coventry to London, in my case, if I were to get there when the BL opens) It's not uncommon to get there and find that all the seats are taken if you get an off-peak train.

Some of the London universities seem to be passing the buck and routinely directing their UG students to the BL.

LRD - no my understanding is that all copyright libraries required to keep everything (though can be difficult to actually get everything sent by publishers but that's true of all of them)

OK. Guilty of not reading past first page.

When I was an undergrad, back in the dim and distant, we only got taken to the BL for our final year, so that we could get all the papers we needed for our final dissertation/project. Prior to that we had to make do with our own library (which wasn't that bad).

But it was a long time ago and I do feel your pain...

YANBU. It's supposed to be a library of last resort.

Norkily, there are major differences in how much the different libraries acquire material from abroad, too - BL, Bodleian, CUL good, Aber OK, NLS not so great, in my experience.

LRD, that makes sense. i know we have to send 5 copies of each book we publish to the legal deposit agency.

all this, and yet HEFCE want to stop all funding for senate house library? the argument being that the bl is just up the road so it's not needed - yeah right!

I did very much appreciate the ticket to the Bodleian I got when working at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford though, that was lovely! And very useful when doing my masters...

Ha, just read back - seen Revolting's email contact from student - took me back!! They really aren't taught to think at all these days, are they?!

How much more can you précis a book list, pray? I had to send out booklists with links to where to purchase the bloody things! (usually Amazon but not always) Because it's, like, so hard to find them...

Oh sweet Jesus Woodlands. They want to close YET another effing library in London because the BL is just up the road? They know perfectly blimming well how many blimming students there are in blimming London! They know perfectly blimming well how many seats there are in the British blimming Library! The maths doesn't add up! What is wrong with them?

NorwegianMoon, you don't actually use the BL, do you? You can only photocopy in a little room presided over by a dragon lady, and the photocopier is right next to said dragon lady. So no, you can't flout the law in the BL. Elsewhere, maybe; BL, no. So STFU.

Must show DH this thread. He managed to grab a couple of hours at the end of a work day to go to the BL yesterday (we live four hours from London so he needs to snatch research time as and when he is in London for other reasons) and came home complaining about exactly the same thing! And the queue for the cloakroom!
FWIW, he is doing a part time MA at Exeter, but there is a lot of stuff he needs for his dissertation that can only be found at specific London libraries, including the BL. Same goes for the book I am researching atm. Many of the documents we need may not be photocopied, you can take notes (with a pencil) and that is all.

Norwegianmoon - you were asking if it was a joke about ug's not taking books out of the UL in Cambridge? Not a joke, but most undergraduate requirements were (theoretically) served by subject libraries or college libraries, at which ugs would have borrowing privileges. The UL was I suppose considered to be the grand old unwieldy sledgehammer not suited for basic undergraduate nut cracking. In the way that the OP wishes the BL still were. I can imagine my dad bollocking me for "ruining the temper" of his sledgehammer for cracking a nut, or something, but it's not quite the right figure of speech, is it, because a sledgehammer is a great weighty blunt instrument, but a copyright library is a great weighty finely honed subtle and delicate instrument.

fraid so. www.ull.ac.uk/news/hefcereview.shtml.

"HEFCE want to stop all funding for senate house library?"

ARE YOU SERIOUS???!!!

While our library has just cancelled subscriptions for the absolute basic journals and online textbooks in our discipline on the grounds that our students can use Senate House library. . .

Sorry, haven't read rest of thread yet but just had to at:

"surely their universities receive funding for their libraries based on undergraduate numbers, amongst other criteria?"

Oh, yes, you'd think the funding agencies and indeed universities would choose to prioritise books in this way, wouldn't you?