Beyond Habit and Convention: Visual Literacy and the VRC

Special Libraries, Special Challenges is a column dedicated to exploring the unique public services challenges that arise in libraries that specialize in a particular subject, such as law, medicine, business, and so forth. In each column, the author will discuss public service dilemmas and solutions that arise specifically in given subject libraries, while drawing links to how such issues affect librarianship in general. Special or subject-matter librarians interested in authoring a piece for this column are invited to contact Melissa K. Aho at aho@umn.edu.

Amanda Rybin is the Associate Director of the Visual Resources Center in the Department of Art History at the University of Chicago. She holds a BA in Art History and Creative Writing and an MLIS from the University of Denver. Her email is: arybin@uchicago.edu. The University of Chicago VRC may be found at: http://arthistory.uchicago.edu/vrc.