As inovações tecnológicas e suas implicações sobre o processo de trabalho dos bibliotecários: estudo de caso no Sistema de Bibliotecas da PUC Minas

Abstract

Focuses on the changes that have taken place within the working process in libraries, due to technological developments. The objective of this research is to analyze not only these changes, but also the way librarians have faced and dealt with them. This objective has been established under the assumption that this transformation observed within the librarian field, as a consequence of a fast computerization, affects the librarian profile, in what concerns his/her working conditions, and also aspects of the job itself, such as work control, qualification, intensity and subjectivity of the job. The subject chosen for this research was the Library System from PUC Minas. Librarians from the Campus located at Coração Eucarístico constituted the group of informers. Interviews and documental research on secondary sources were carried out, along with field observation, providing data for the systematization of the results. Literary review dealt with matters related to the working process in libraries and its general characteristics. Some theoretical questions are presented, concerning the effects of technological developments on qualification, work control and intensity, technological unemployment, and workers' subjectivity. There has been an attempt to update university libraries' histories and to assay the process of automatization of these libraries, based on Reynold's work (1989). Conclusions are based on the analysis of statistic data, as well as on observation and interviews, and point out the following aspects: the process of automatization of PUC Minas' library has changed and qualified some tasks, while unqualifying others. There has been an increase on the demand of staff qualification, but, at the same time, some tasks have been unqualified, such as subject classification and analysis. Automatization has enabled library management to have a better control over librarians' works and has helped developing a working conscience and responsibility of the employees. Labor has been considered intense, due to the amount of work, which has increased with the institution's development. Users' demand and machine speed have also been pointed out on the interviews as a cause for the intensification of the working routine. The number of functions in the library's work hasn't reduced. Dismissals during the research period were due to wage policies of the institution. It has been observed that there was fear and lack of confidence throughout the automatization process, as a result of the ignorance concerning new working tools, but these difficulties were solved along the process.