Dismantling the Public Sphere: Situating and Sustaining Librarianship in the Age of the New Public Philosophy (review)

Abstract

public library could be widely supported. The ruling junta, infl uenced by ideas of liberty and democracy, saw education and a public library as positive social ends. Parada argues persuasively that Bernardino Rivadavia edited and added legal provisions to the library’s draft rules, authored by canon and bibliophile Luis José Chorroarín. For several years there were lengthy discussions in the local newspapers about the hours that the “public library” was to maintain. Morning hours were hardly convenient to those who worked during the day. Indeed, the library’s hours were not “liberalized” until well into the nineteenth century. By then the Biblioteca Pública had been transformed into the Biblioteca Nacional. The third document in this book is Juan Luis de Aguirre y Tejada’s “Idea liberal económica sobre el fomento de la biblioteca de ésta capital,” which was serialized in issues of El Grito del Sud (Buenos Aires) in 1812. Parada considers this article the fi rst contribution in Argentine bibliography to the study of libraries. Aguirre was born in Salta in 1753 but grew up and worked as an attorney in Córdoba. Parada analyzes the philosophical and intellectual underpinnings of the work. He notes, moreover, that there is a curious, extensive discussion by Aguirre on the need for local production of paper and an expansion of printing as well as a need to conserve paper items, which are subject to mold and insect damage. Aguirre not only recognized the interdependence of library development and book production but also saw, almost presciently, that book conservation is within the sphere of library work. Parada has linked together three interesting works on the early development of libraries in Argentina. The author provides historical background on each of the works and their authors, addressing wide-ranging themes of eighteenthand nineteenthcentury intellectual history in Europe and the Americas. He offers an exhaustive critical review of the texts and presents a sure-footed delineation of the particular value of the works to Argentine library development. This worthwhile book demonstrates that the whole can indeed be greater than the sum of the individual parts.