The meaning of the public library in people's everyday life: Some preliminary results from a qualitative study

Traditional quantitative user surveys are being challenged by qualitative everyday life studies focusing not only on use and motivations for use but also on the various contexts that surround the actual use. In her article, Duvold criticizes the "information paradigm" in user studies for being theoretically insufficient. Instead, she argues that the concept of knowledge is better for understanding the meaning of library use for the user. Based on observations and interviews, she emphasizes that the use of public libraries is often connected to serious existential projects in life - studies, work, search for roots and identity and so forth.