New edition of Cassell and Hiremath’s keystone reference services text

CHICAGO — Designed to complement every introductory library reference course, the new third edition of “Reference and Information Services: An Introduction,” by Kay Ann Cassell and Uma Hiremath, published by ALA Neal-Schuman, is the ideal text for students and librarians looking to expand their reference knowledge, teaching failsafe methods for identifying important materials by matching specific types of questions to the best available sources, regardless of format. Guided by a national advisory board of educators and practitioners, including Eileen Abels, Anita Ondrusek, Marie L. Radford and Steven Tash, this text expertly keeps up with new technologies and practices while remaining grounded in the basics of reference work. Chapters on fundamental concepts, major reference sources and special topics in reference provide a solid foundation, plus fresh insight on current issues, including:

• New chapters on ethics, readers’ advisory and reference services for children and young adults;
• Website development and maintenance;
• RSS feeds;
• Social networking;
• Delivering reference services across multiple platforms.

Cassell has worked in academic libraries and public libraries as a reference librarian and as a library director. She is a past president of the Reference and User Services Association (RUSA), editor of the journal Collection Building and is author of numerous articles and books on collection development and reference service. Formerly the associate director of collections and services for the Branch Libraries of the New York Public Library, where she was in charge of collection development and age-level services for the Branch Libraries, she is now a lecturer and director of the MLIS Program in the School of Communication, Information and Library Studies at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey.



Hiremath is executive director at the Ames (Mass.) Free Library. She was assistant director at the Thayer (Mass.) Public Library; head of reference at the West Orange (N.J.) Public Library; and Supervising Librarian at the New York Public Library, where she worked for five years.

ALA Store purchases fund advocacy, awareness and accreditation programs for library professionals worldwide. Founded in 1976 by Patricia Glass Schuman and John Vincent Neal, ALA Neal-Schuman, now an imprint of ALA Publishing, publishes professional books for librarians, archivists, and knowledge managers. Contact us at (800) 545-2433 ext. 5418 or editionsmarketing@ala.org. Instructors interested in adopting this textbook can request an exam copy through the Neal-Schuman website or by emailing textbook.consultant@neal-schuman.com.

Related Links

"Reference and Information Services: An Introduction"

"Fundamentals of Managing Reference Collections"

"Fundamentals of Reference"