Circulating Ideas is a podcast from host Steve Thomas, a librarian from Gwinnett County Public Library – located just outside Atlanta in the US. From the website: ‘Circulating Ideas facilitates conversations with the innovative people and ideas inspiring libraries to grow and thrive in the 21st century’.
The podcast began in June 2011 and recently posted its 191st episode in September 2020. This is quite an achievement in library podcasting. It offers the option for listeners to contribute financially to the series, but the podcast episodes, however, are free to all to access.
Steve posted that his interest in producing this podcast was as a result of his curiosity in ‘how the profession is making its way into the future’ and to ‘get the word out of what we’re doing as a profession to remain relevant … getting our ideas out there in the world, circulating them like we circulate our collections’. He does that by interviewing librarians (and others) about what they are doing to push the profession forward.
His guests include many Library Journal Movers and Shakers, library conference keynote speakers and authors, innovators and leaders in many areas of librarianship, mainly from the US. If you regularly read in the library professional literature, the list of guests in this podcast reads like a Who’s Who.
The episodes run between 20 and 40 minutes on average, depending on the interviewee. Show notes include detailed biographical information and links to relevant websites and published works.
Steve is a funny and engaging interviewer and asks interesting questions that as a listener I would be wanting to ask myself. He steers the interviews well, giving the guest more enough time to clearly respond and is an encouraging listener.
He has a broad range of interests in developments in libraries and although he has a public library background, his guests come from a full range of library types, as well as related professions, including special guests Cory Doctorow and Eric Hellman & Andromeda Yelton from Unglue.it. Some of his guests have done multiple sessions, with new interesting content revealed in subsequent interviews.
This is a great find in the area of library-related podcasts and I look forward to exploring more. I encourage you to do the same and as you do so, you should expect to be inspired and challenged by the ideas and experiences of these colleagues in our amazing profession.