Medier på andra språk än svenska : En studie om det mångkulturella biblioteket

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this master’s thesis is to investigate how librarians approach to the multicultural collection development and which methods they use in providing library materials in minority languages. The questions to be answered are: which methods the libraries use when purchasing library materials in minority languages, how the respondents experience that the minority user groups needs are met in the library and how the multicultural competence of the staff is used in the libraries. For this purpose the qualitative interviews with 6 librarians in Gothenburg are conducted, mainly from the libraries in the immigrant-dense parts of the city, while the study being concentrated on 6 language groups of library users. The study’s theoretical framework is based on theories of multiculturalism, culture, identity and bilingualism. The results of the study reveal the major problems with purchasing library materials in minority languages: the lack of language proficiency, meagre bookmarkets and publishing in some languages along with copyright problems with sound and video recordings. The lack of language proficiency causes cataloguing problems which is why the respondents hope that in the future the purchasing and the cataloguing are going to be provided centrally. The study also reveals insufficient and sporadic consulting of the user communities for the purpose of collection development and the lack of active measures for employing more multilingual staff. The results indicate the need of more substantial involving the ethnic communities into the library services in order to avoid their cultural alienation and segregation.