Identity
Reflection on the DailyImage2011 challenge
Jan 29th
Well, I piked out of the challenge sometime in September (for good reason) and managed to put in three images in December to round off the year.
Free-wheeling it
The Daily Image 2011 challenge – it was a challenge and I am glad I took part in it, thank you Kathryn for initiating and inviting me to join. The premise of the challenge is simple:
- Take a photo that has you or part of you in it, every day for one year
- Upload it to Flickr
- Tag it with “dailyimage2011″
- Add it to the group “Daily Image 2011“
- Optional extra: post to twitter with hashtag #dailyimage2011
I followed a number of colleagues based in Australia, started following them on twitter and met some of them in Perth in September when I presented at the ALIA 2011 Lib Tech Conference. I’d like to think that I’ve made friends with a couple of them too.
As Kathryn mentioned when she sent out the invitations to join in the challenge, she had tried it in 2009 and found that she was,
really confronted by the choices I had to make about how I presented myself. Did I always want to show myself as a healthy, cheery sort of person? How much of the ugly and everyday was I prepared to show?
- http://www.flickr.com/groups/dailyimage2011/
I managed to come up with 195 photos myself. Out of 365 days in the year that’s more than half of the year in photos – woop! I think that was alright for my first try and finding out I was pregnant three quarters of the way through!
I had quite a bit of fun doing it and found that yes, I did want to portray myself as a little manic and full of energy and life.
I found getting further into it that I was opening up a bit. I let people know that one of my favourite pastimes is sleeping and I think that I am very much like my cat. I even took a photo of myself crying – it was February the 22nd, the day of the major Christchurch earthquake where 180+ people died. I also found that I had to make a conscious decision not to identify my workplace in any photos.
Well here they are – My Daily Images of 2011 – Enjoy!
A few colleagues have started again for 2012 and I said I’d like to join in, so keep an eye out on the right-hand side for another flickr widget of that set.
Thanks guys, it was fun.
The time crunch
Jan 29th
Some of you may know that I am expecting my first child in the near future. I will be taking some time out to devote myself fully to this important role of raising a small human being.
Over the past few years I have been heavily involved in my own personal professional development, and generally trying to contribute positively towards the profession in New Zealand and moving us forward. I thoroughly enjoy where I am at the moment in my career, and the collaborations and relationships that I have established and continue to nurture. I also revel in my day-to-day experiences and learnings from my volunteer roles with LIANZA, and my role at my place of employment.
However, I’m nearly at a cross-roads, and it’s crunch time. Something, sooner or later will have to give.
(Mums, Dads – does it? Will it?)
Over the past 6 months or so, my musings here have definitely subsided with the occasional squirt of a thought making it to “publish”, along with tweets and other miscellaneous tools for social interaction, including the odd coffee or yumcha lunch date.
It’s getting to the crunch time and I’m a wee bit nervous.
Years later, I’m probably going to look back over this and think, aahhh those were the days, when I worried about retaining my professional identity while raising some kiddiewinkles. Well yeah, I can’t wait for that day when I look back. But right now I have to look forward into wholly unfamiliar territory. People tell me your world changes.
Don’t get me wrong, I will make it clear now, that I am really looking forward to this new journey in my life. I’m excited about that new world. 
I have read, talked, asked, enquired, read, chatted, laughed and mused about what it will be like post-children. I am now getting to wonder what it is like specifically as a “new-generation” Librarian, who aspires to be LIANZA president one day and possibly even an LJ Mover and Shaker.
What spurred me to draft this post was reading Bobbi Newman’s (LibrarianbyDay) tweet for a request to an article about how Movers and Shakers were treated after getting the award. Someone found it and Bobbi said she’d seriously like to see a follow-up article.
This is what I learned from reading that article:
Time is the most valuable possession. If you don’t have time, then you can’t do these things.
I am very much looking forward to this new phase in my life and I look forward to the journey and where it will take me.
I will find time to explore, experiment and think.
Institutionalised
Nov 11th
What’s the definition of this?
As a prominent volunteer for the Library and Information Association of New Zealand Aotearoa as editor of it’s fortnightly newsletter for it’s membership, a small part of me bleeds each time I see a new tool, service or technology being advertised to give you the most up to date news on developments in learning, education, literacy, libraries, whathaveyou.
I bleed.
Why do I bleed?
Because I feel that something that I spend a lot of my spare time working for is being done elsewhere, and I feel my efforts are futile.
No one individual or institution can hold or share all the information there is to share that is of relevance to any one industry.
Why do we continue to work where we do then, in libraries, the archetype institution of collections of various things?
Are we working for the same cause?
Or are we institutionalized, oblivious to the futility of our efforts?
note: I last edited this on August 22, 2011, possibly started the draft earlier than that even. I appear to be cynical and depressed, which is not my usual self. Just thought I’d publish this to let you know that I do have my down days. It’s a pity that I’ve recently attended two conferences and one symposium and haven’t managed to write something positive about those.
Flicking the switch
Jul 7th
I find myself advocating a lot for LIANZA, for sharing information wider than your work circles, and generally for sharing. I’ve written about collaboration in my role as Editor for LIANZA’s fortnightly newsletter Librarylife: Te Rau Ora, now in my 7th or 8th month in that role. I say ‘that’ role, but it’s really ‘this’ role. I never drop it. I never take my advocating hat off and will continue to share information with people and push people to do more, even in my ‘spare’ time.
In that sense, I’m running a fine line between my professional identity and my personal identity. It gets very blurry and I’m sure others experience this too and come across the same dual/multiple identity ponderance.
Do you the reader, ever find yourself advocating in your off-time? Do you have off-time? What about those late night chats on Twitter where someone poses a thinly veiled reference query and you jump at the chance to flex your searching skills outside of work hours??
Oh I know you’ve done it before. I have.
I am such a geek. But geeks do love to collaborate and advocate with their peers. And they utilise any opportunity.
If we ever meet, online or in real life, please don’t shy away from the opportunity to create something magical and share our learnings with the wider community, even if it is outside of work hours.
xx
Below are photographic examples of my personal and professional identity. Tell me which is which
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- Credit: Chris Coad Photography
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- Credit: Chris Coad Photography
Hana is on the internets. again.
May 24th
Just a little something I have done on the side…
(I did not write it, I was interviewed for it)
One day I am going to have to evaluate my presence on the web and whether or not I should (should’ve – past tense) go about it in a different, slightly more thoughtful and professional way.
In the meantime, isn’t this lovely?
Does this make you want to start studying library and information science and get more involved in the profession?
You say: