Physical infrastructure and view about christian theological librarianship in Nepal

Abstract

Christian theological library and librarianship is a branch of special library. The profession of Christian theological librarianship has been started with the development of Christian theological education based on Biblical faith. This study attempts to deal with physical infrastructure of library and view about theological librarianship, under AGSTNP theological library consortium in Nepal. Asia Graduate School of Theology is a consortium of eight Christian theological colleges to equip church leaders and believers in Nepal. They have their own library and librarian. Among special library, Christian theological library is one, having special collection and its users. The Christian theological library and librarianship is a new topic of study in the context of Nepal due to its distinct nature and absence of study in the area of Christian theological librarianship. This study aims; 1) to study the physical infrastructure of Christian theological library and II) view about the Christian theological librarianship based on qualification, skill and perception. For this study, few national and many international researches, studies, articles, journals etc. were viewed. Qualitative research methods such as observation, and in-depth interviews were used for this study. The study finds that Christian theological colleges have similar kind of library infrastructures on the basis of library service, library spaces, reading areas, collections, types of materials, library cataloguing rules etc. Regarding the view about Christian theological librarianship, there is a practice of hiring own graduate students believing that theological students can understand the theological terms and subject, so it is easy to understand the need of users and understand the vision and mission of parent institution so that they can work together spiritually. Professional qualification and skill for theological librarian is less demand due to lack of theological library professionals, their attitude towards the profession, lack of standard criteria for librarianship and budget. The study concludes with some suggestions that can be useful in the area of special as well as theological libraries in Nepal.