Commons Knowledge (a library for rare books yet to be written)

Submission to the Friends of Fondren Library Graduate Research Awards, 2010This thesis is a typological investigation of the library - specifically examining how digitizing information informs design. The agency of the book, which has historically been the protagonist of library design, is being radically transformed by the migration to the digital. An analysis of this shift reveals opportunities where new and provocative juxtapositions can be sought within this ancient and well-known building type. This library seeks to respond formally to the current condition of the book, which, as it is translated to the electronic, is divided into three phases: the absent, the common, and the unique. The absent is an acknowledgement that information is now produced in a wide variety of media whose representation can no longer be accommodated by the book alone, the common is an affirmation that the mechanically reproducible book is still legitimate, and in fact can be radically recast using existing technologies, and finally the unique is an understanding of how to treat objects resistant to digitization. Conceptually, the ambition of the library is to provide increased access to materials available online, while also providing opportunities to access that which cannot be easily reproduced. It stages a relationship between the two, and in the process tries to strengthen its position as an agency of cultur