Finding common ground: An analysis of librarians’ expressed attitudes towards faculty

Information literacy listservs provide opportunities to discuss a range of instruction-related issues. One common theme is librarian-faculty relationships, including positive interactions and complaints. Content analysis is used to investigate librarians' discussions of faculty in BI-L/ILI-L postings from 1995 to 2002. By isolating and anonymizing postings reflecting librarian-faculty relationships and examining these through the authors' experiences as trained librarians and full-time faculty, the paper explores: (1) how librarians frame faculty relationships; and (2) librarians' perceptions of faculty attitudes. The paper concludes with suggestions for transcending unsatisfactory experiences with faculty to forge relationships that benefit those individuals both groups must reach–students.