Aksaray Provincial Public Library’s Effort to Keep the Collection Updated

KEMAL ONUR ATALAY

(AKSARAY)- Aksaray Provincial Public Library Director Çağatay Van said, “We are trying to keep our collection as new as possible. We are at a disadvantage in this regard, and we are experiencing a problem in this sense because it is not possible to keep the study areas separate from the collection usage areas of the general reader due to the structure of our building.”

While hand-written books, newspapers, magazines, letters, decrees, charters, plates, hilye, calligraphy and similar works of artistic, historical and content value, were sent to the Regional Manuscripts and Printed Works Libraries in Aksaray Provincial Public Library, which was established in 1926, Turkish sources were sent to the Regional Manuscripts and Printed Works Libraries. It still continues to be in the library. Giving information about the library, Aksaray Provincial Public Library Director Çağatay Van said:

“Aksaray Provincial Public Library service building is one of the rare buildings located at the same address, where it has served the same purpose since the day it was founded in Turkey, from the early periods of the Republic until today. Our building was established in 1924 to bring out the new citizens of the young republic, to raise them with civic consciousness.” Its construction started in 1924 as a means of providing education, and its construction was completed and put into service in 1926. While the Aksaray Provincial Public Library building, which was put into service with various elements in later periods, has been serving Aksaray as the Provincial Public Library for a long time.

“THERE ARE 39 THOUSAND 97 BOOKS IN OUR LIBRARY”

We have 239 thousand 97 books. Currently, in our library, there were not books written by hand until about 10 years ago, but Ottoman works published between the 24th and 28th years, until the alphabet reform. Later, with the circular of our ministry, these were collected from libraries all over Turkey to Regional Manuscripts and Printed Works Libraries. Currently, we only have Turkish sources. Since we make statistics according to the service understanding provided by the society and the library, let me talk about our general statistics for the end of 2023; We have 26 thousand 474 members. We lent books to 32 thousand 317 readers and the total number of readers reached 82 thousand 108 total readers.

“BOOKS ON AKSARAY HISTORY ARE BEING EVALUATED”

In the case of Aksaray, we evaluate the books from the history of Aksaray in a small section that we define as the City Library. We evaluate the work done on Aksaray. Books that we will define as general Turkish history and Turkish history are also at the service of the readers on our general history shelves under 900 subject headings. First of all, we try to keep the collection up to date as much as we can. The more current books and reader demands in the book collection, the faster the flow in the lending service. We pay careful attention to this issue. We request the latest books or the books requested by the readers from our general directorate through small surveys we conduct among the readers or the notifications they make. We try to keep our collection as new as possible. This is one of the most important reasons. We are at a disadvantage in this regard because it is not possible to keep the study areas separate from the collection usage areas of the general reader as we would like due to the structure of our building and the insufficient function of the building. A better building, a better qualified settlement will allow us to have a higher flow of readers. Despite this, I can say that, with the advantage of being located in the city center, we are generally quite satisfied with both our number of readers and the number of loans.”