Hi Elizabeth -
It is possible, but I know my current library would never do it - we don't have
enough patrons who are interested to warrant purchasing those items, which are
generally not inexpensive. At one library I worked for, the foreign language
materials budget was based on census data. And I believe the % had to be
pretty
high - it's been several years, so I could be wrong; but I believe that our
threshold was 10% of our population served had to speak a particular language
for us to be able to allocate funds towards materials in that language. We had
a diverse population there, so we had Spanish, Polish, Russian, and Korean
materials. And still had complaints about the various languages not
represented. I'm not talking about the language-learning materials, but about
books, magazines, and videos published in those languages. I don't remember
that we had foreign language audio books there, but I could be wrong. I would
imagine that the price was prohibitive. I can certainly appreciate your
frustration, and they are probably difficult to find even through interlibrary
loan - but I think most libraries have difficulty spending so much money on
materials very few patrons would use.
Sheila
________________________________
From: Elizabeth Sheldon <elizab...@kinolorber.com>
Reply-To: <videolib@lists.berkeley.edu>
Date: Fri, 3 Jun 2011 13:46:32 -0400
To: <videolib@lists.berkeley.edu>
Subject: Re: [Videolib] Foreign language materials
I have begged our local library to buy foreign audio books for refreshing my
nascent French, German and Russian comprehension skills but my pleas have
fallen
on deaf ears. Is it not possible in the U.S. to order from Amazon in France or
Germany and have these resources available to patrons?
Best,
Elizabeth
Elizabeth Sheldon
Vice President
Kino Lorber, Inc.
333 W. 39th St., Suite 503
New York, NY 10018
(212) 629-6880
www.kiolorber.edu
VIDEOLIB is intended to encourage the broad and lively discussion of issues
relating to the selection, evaluation, acquisition,bibliographic control,
preservation, and use of current and evolving video formats in libraries and
related institutions. It is hoped that the list will serve as an effective
working tool for video librarians, as well as a channel of communication
between
libraries,educational institutions, and video producers and distributors.
VIDEOLIB is intended to encourage the broad and lively discussion of issues
relating to the selection, evaluation, acquisition,bibliographic control,
preservation, and use of current and evolving video formats in libraries and
related institutions. It is hoped that the list will serve as an effective
working tool for video librarians, as well as a channel of communication
between libraries,educational institutions, and video producers and
distributors.
