Press: “Libraries in Pursuit of Enlightenment”

“What is the ultimate goal of American libraries? That question has persistently nagged at me since library school, and I’ve become convinced the answer for 21st century libraries lies in the 18th century intellectual and cultural movement known as the Enlightenment. Indeed, a universal library universally accessible—like the recently proposed National Digital Public Library—would be the culmination of Enlightenment in the domain of information and the apotheosis of American libraries. But to realize the potential of such a project, librarians and our professional organizations must lobby for genuine copyright reform in order to preserve the public good libraries serve.”

From Wayne Bivens-Tatum’s article on LibraryJournal.com, “Libraries in Pursuit of Enlightenment”