Response to COVID-19 Pandemic: Where Do Public Libraries Stand?

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to identify how public libraries used Twitter in the initial months after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Content analysis was performed on a dataset of 9,450 tweets published by 38 public libraries in New York City between December 2019 and April 2020. The study showed that 85.5% of the tweets published by NYC public libraries were related to regular library communications, such as announcements of library service updates, book recommendations, suggested readings and activities, celebrations of specific occasions or individuals, and notices of upcoming events. Meanwhile, 14.5% of the tweets published from January/April 2020 were directly and explicitly related to COVID-19. NYC public libraries posted details of the remote library services available during the closure, as well as comforting and socially supportive messages, and provided information about the financial, health, and food-related support available to the community. The findings suggest that during the pandemic, NYC public libraries mostly continued to conduct business as usual and, in doing so, may have brought a valuable feeling of normalcy to the communities they serve during those problematic and strained days.

KEYWORDS:

• Public libraries
• New York public libraries
• disasters
• COVID-19
• social media
• Twitter

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Bibi M. Alajmi

Bibi M. Alajmi holds a Ph.D. from Rutgers University, NJ. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Information Studies Department at Kuwait University. She teaches undergraduate courses related to information literacy, social media, and multimedia. She also teaches graduate courses related to academic information services, knowledge management, management of information organizations, and social informatics. Dr. Alajmi’s research foci are knowledge management, LIS education, information management, and social informatics.

Dalal Albudaiwi

Dalal Albudaiwi holds a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee in Information Policy and Ethics. Her research interests include information policy, ethics, libraries and information center policies, cybercrime, and information security. Dr. Albudaiwi is a faculty member in the Information Studies Department, College of Social Sciences, at Kuwait University.