Implementing a Film Series for Community Engagement

Abstract

In its efforts to engage more fully with the general campus and create a stronger bond with students and faculty, the LSU Libraries decided to initiate a film series.  The committee that formed to create this series conceived of it as a way to raise the profile of the library on the LSU campus, particularly with students, to provide the opportunity for greater collaboration with discipline faculty, and to enhance the library’s educational role, as well as to highlight the quality of some excellent and overlooked documentaries.  This paper will review the experiences of the LSU Libraries with its film series, which has been running to this point for two years.  The authors will investigate the “nuts and bolts†of an academic library initiating a film series, some of the pitfalls and opportunities such a series entails, and how those pitfalls can be managed and opportunities capitalized upon, as well as touching on some theoretical issues related to these matters, such as collaboration between libraries and faculty, the academic library as place, and “engagement†vs. “outreach.â€Â