Prison library
A prison library is an institution integrated into the penal institution. It mainly serves the purposes of entertainment and further education for prisoners as well as their self-awareness. Almost every correctional facility in Germany has a prison library, but the exact number is not known.
Classification in the library system
In terms of the Libraries '93 structure paper , the prison library is to be counted among the libraries of function level 1 due to its special user group. It represents a special form of public libraries providing basic services for general information needs. In the case of this special form, library work with specially developed services is aimed at the group of prisoners who are disadvantaged in many ways due to their imprisonment.
Legal basis
The offer of a prison library is mainly set out in Article 64 of the Nelson Mandela Rules drawn up by the United Nations :
Every prison has to set up a library that is available to all categories of prisoners and that has a sufficient selection of entertainment literature and non-fiction books; prisoners are to be encouraged to make extensive use of it.
Rule 14 ("The prisoners must be able to regularly read newspapers, magazines or special institutional publications [...] that have been approved or checked by the administration, be able to find out about the most important events of the day.") And other rules regarding the right to education, information, reading material, leisure activities and the creation of an environment - v. a. regarding the lighting conditions in which reading can be performed. In terms of fundamental rights, this is also based on Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations , which states that access to information must be possible “regardless of borders”.
The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions also drew up guidelines for prison libraries for the first time in 1992 , which detailed implementation recommendations, e.g. for the laws of individual countries. As of 2005, this includes 94 recommendations.
The legal bases in Germany are § 2 and § 67 of the federally applicable penal enforcement law (StVollzG). The former states that the prisoner should learn as part of his custodial sentence to lead his future life without crime so that the general public is protected from further criminal acts. Furthermore, the prisoner should be given the opportunity to occupy himself sensibly in his free time. This type of recreational activities also includes the use of a library within the meaning of Section 67 of the StVollzG.
In addition, Article 5, Paragraph 1 of the Basic Law (GG) plays an important role. This includes that everyone - including inmates in prisons - has the right
- to learn freely from generally accessible sources,
whereas in the case of the detainees, the legal framework conditions must be taken into account.
assignment
The mandate to offer the prisoner the possibility of meaningful leisure activity includes the following points, among others:
- Through the use of various media, the prisoner should be able to distract himself from his deprivation of liberty and the boredom or loneliness that can easily arise from it and should have the opportunity to devote himself intensively to his own thoughts and feelings.
- Furthermore, by offering suitable media, he can be given the chance to find out more about life outside the prison walls, to deal with more specific topics of his choice or to expand his language skills.
- The task of the libraries to impart information and media literacy is important in the area of prison libraries insofar as the prisoners should not lose touch with the modern media.
history
Prison libraries played a role in Germany as early as the 19th century. At that time, the inventory was aimed at teaching the prisoner and distracting him from loneliness and boredom. The books, separated according to denomination, came mainly from the religious and instructive as well as from the edifying area. Entertainment literature and above all crime novels , as well as the classics by Schiller and Goethe were forbidden. These prison libraries were mostly looked after by pastors or teachers who had the task of improving the prisoners in moral terms. For this purpose, the books were distributed individually to the prisoners so that everyone received the book that was “suitable” for them.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the Association of German Prison Officers decided to include a selection of the previously banned classics as well as novels and writings for young people in the holdings of the prison libraries. These should serve as counterparts to the religious books. Furthermore, librarians were requested to look after the prison libraries so that they would sort out “unsuitable” books from the inventory from an educational point of view. At the same time, the books for the prisoners should be selected individually by the librarians. The focus was on works with a religious and moral content, as these aspects played a major role in the prison system. A little later, it was decided not to force religious literature on the prisoners. It was only offered in addition to other books.
After the First World War, there was too little and mostly worthless literature in the prisoner's libraries. The intellectual advancement of the prisoners was not possible due to the lack of scientific and entertaining books, which often served as an argument for the frequent mutinies and other incidents. However, warnings were given against crime novels, romance novels or other inferior literature, as this would endanger the education for critical thinking.
From 1933 onwards, the penal system was also influenced by National Socialism . It was now the task of the prison libraries to acquire and dispose of National Socialist books that did not correspond to this ideology. From 1940 only books with racist, anti-Semitic and fascist content were included in the inventory in order to influence and educate the prisoners in the National Socialist sense. After 1945 these books were again removed from the library holdings.
Up to this point in time, throughout the history of the prison libraries, there was a claim to be primarily active in educational matters and with the aim of improving the prisoners. With the end of National Socialism, this idea was given up, and the libraries should in future orientate themselves towards the interests of the prisoners. In accordance with the 1961 service and enforcement regulations, the holdings should be presented in open access, if possible, and empirical values from the public libraries are used for orientation .
In 1981, on the initiative of the German Library Institute in Berlin, the project "Library work in prisons" began. The aim was to investigate the dubious state of library work in prisons and to make suggestions for solving problems. With interviews in twelve prisons, among other things, the reading behavior of prisoners and the use of the library were to be evaluated and guidelines for library work in prisons were to be drawn up.
In 1986, the project group presented an expert opinion with guidelines that still serve today as a guide in the field of library work in prisons and provide important information on the organization of a prison library.
In 2007 the library of the Münster correctional facility was awarded the “ Library of the Year ” prize, worth 30,000 euros . This was understood in the press as an acknowledgment of the prison library system as a whole, as well as an indication of its importance.
organization
The library design in a prison library should correspond to the design in another public library. On the type of use while ago which are open access library and magazine library distinguished. If possible, the open access library should be preferred because the prisoner can choose the literature directly on the shelf and does not have to order it in the magazine. For safety reasons, however, this type of installation cannot always be implemented, as continuous supervision between the rows of shelves can hardly be guaranteed for personnel reasons. In many prison libraries, for this reason, the inmates are brought to the prison cell with literature. This, of course, presupposes the possibility of being able to express specific order requests with the help of a catalog or book lists - as a rule, this is now part of the service provided by these libraries.
Another service is the possibility of participating in the libraries' loan system - this is also widely used. Exchange collections are also available to obtain external literature. These holdings are made available to the prison library by a public library, for example, for a limited period of time and then exchanged.
Payers
The cost bearers of the prison libraries in Germany are the justice administrations of the respective federal states. The budget available to the libraries is divided into material and personnel costs. The most important factor in material costs is the acquisition budget from which the media are acquired. In addition, costs for administrative materials, for information technology and, if necessary, for room renovations are to be counted as material costs.
The library work in the penal system
In most federal states, library work is carried out without specialist library staff. A professional, qualified exchange is hardly possible. In Germany there are around five full-time qualified librarians in the federal states of Bremen , Hamburg and North Rhine-Westphalia who work in the prison libraries and who guide and support the staff who look after the libraries in their sideline work. These are mostly teachers, social workers, pastors or employees of the general prison service. Suitable inmates of the respective institutions are used for everyday library work.
Those who work in or look after a prison library are largely on their own. Technical support from the local city library or a library specialist is often advisable, but not always possible due to a lack of resources. The possibility of a professional exchange exists through the amalgamation of the prison libraries in the German Library Association (DBV) .
Special features of library work
Due to the special target group in a prison library, the employees there are often confronted with different problems than in a city library, for example. It is important to integrate the library work into the strictly regulated everyday life and to make the media accessible to inmates who are often inexperienced in reading. It is not uncommon for a counseling session to develop into a personal conversation between the prisoner and the library staff. The latter should be able to deal with prisoners, address their problems and advise them accordingly on the selection of literature.
The guidelines of the German Library Institute name a number of requirements that library staff should bring along for meaningful work in this special field of work. This includes personal requirements such as a high degree of solidarity, resilience, flexibility and the ability to deal with conflict. In addition, it is necessary that the employee has knowledge of the organizational structure of the penal system in Germany and is also familiar with the rules and, above all, the safety precautions in the penal institution.
Other particularities must be observed in prison for women, in youth prison, in dealing with foreigners, with drug addicts and in pre-trial detention. It is important to offer a wide range of suitable literature for these special groups. In the women's prison this includes, for example, books on educational issues or women's novels, and in the juvenile prison, literature on education and training is of great importance. Sufficient literature in their mother tongue plays an important role for foreign inmates. The drug addicts should be offered information on the problem of addiction. For the inmates of the pre-trial detention, legal literature is in the foreground, as these prisoners are still pending court proceedings and can thus prepare for them.
Specialist agencies
In North Rhine-Westphalia, prison libraries have been set up in the correctional facilities in Münster and Cologne. From there, two librarians coordinate the nationwide library work in the penal system and offer support in the development of the libraries. The tasks include budget planning, support for building up the inventory , the organization of advanced training courses for the staff of a prison library, the planning and establishment of new library rooms, and also supporting the institutions in measures to promote reading.
In Hamburg, the prison libraries department is part of the Hamburg public library and is therefore financed by the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg . The specialist unit is responsible for the care and advice of the eight prisons in Hamburg. In addition to access to the entire media of the prison libraries, the prisoners also have the opportunity to use almost the entire inventory of the Hamburg public library.
Merger
The prison libraries in Germany, which are run full-time by qualified librarians, have the opportunity to join the German Library Association e. V. (DBV) to merge. Together with the patient libraries and the works libraries , they are assigned to Section 8. Within Section 8 there is the prison library working group , which was founded in 1995 by the five full-time librarians working in the prison system at the time. Members of this working group are the prison library departments in Cologne and Münster, the penal institution in Bremen and the penal institution libraries in Hamburg. The purpose of this working group is to exchange experiences about changes in the organization of prison libraries.
footnote
- ↑ a b c Lisa Krolak: Books behind bars - What prison libraries can do . Ed .: UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning. UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning, Hamburg 2020, ISBN 978-92-820-5000-2 , p. 59 ( unesco.de [PDF; accessed on August 2, 2020] American English: Books beyond bars: The transformative potential of prison libraries . Hamburg 2019. Translated by Raimund Fischer).
- ↑ Press release, press review, laudation u. a. ( Memento from January 2, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
literature
- Daniela Tap: Guidelines for prison libraries in NRW. Development of a draft taking into account the existing IFLA and DBI guidelines as well as the library model of the Gelsenkirchen prison . Cologne 1999, Dipl.-Arb.
- Uta Deichmann: The prison libraries in North Rhine-Westphalia . Cologne 1995, Dipl.-Arb.
- Library work in correctional facilities . German Library Institute (Ed.). Berlin 1986. (DBI materials; 54), ISBN 3-87068-854-8
- Gerhard Peschers: Prison Libraries as Contemporary Witnesses: A journey through the history of the prison libraries since 1850 . In: Book accompanying the exhibition Ketten-Kerker-Knast: On the history of the penal system in Westphalia / ed. by Maria Perrefort. Gustav-Lübcke-Museum, Hamm 2000, pp. 123-141, ISBN 3-9806491-2-1
- Gerhard Peschers (1. Chairman), Förderverein Gefangenbüchereien eV (Ed.): Books open worlds. Media offers for people in custody in Germany and internationally . de Gruyter, Berlin / Boston 2013, 417 pages, ISBN 978-3-11-030865-5 , e- ISBN 978-3-11-030871-6 , ISSN 2191-3587
