From "Do Pinoys read at all?" by Queena Lee-Chua (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 25 November 2007):
Early this year, the NBDB commissioned the Social Weather Stations to do a second Readership Survey (the first was done in 2003)... First, the bad news. Generally, the survey shows that reading has slightly declined in our nation...I will be there when the 2007 Readership Survey results are presented to the public on November 28. Aside from the fact that I'd like to know more about the results, I think I'd like to ask why it is that the recommendations name practically all the people in the life cycle of the book (e.g., authors, publishers, educators), but mentions only the role of libraries and not librarians.
Perhaps more readers prefer to read media other than print, such as the Net. Perhaps others turn to other types of entertainment, such as TV. Perhaps the cost of books has become prohibitive for most of us.
The survey does not analyze the reasons why, but the research team offers some recommendations. "The challenge is for booksellers and publishers, printers and paper and ink manufacturers, to make more books affordable. The government can facilitate this, as well as the financing of technology upgrades to make operations more efficient and economical."
"Authors are also challenged to write more books, not just to entertain, but also to inform, to teach the readers skills or to convey to them practical knowledge. Community libraries [should encourage] adults and out-of-school youth to like to read books; and educators, to teach students to read longer materials, such as books."
Does this imply that libraries can encourage reading even without the involvement of librarians? Maybe it was a Freudian slip. Maybe there are, in fact, just too many invisible librarians =)
