Timothy Senapatiratne, PhD, MLIS

Reference Librarian, Bethel University, St. Paul, Minnesota

Describe your career as a librarian and where you work.

I work as a research and instruction librarian at Bethel University, which is located in St. Paul, Minnesota, where I have been for about fifteen years. Until very recently, my main liaison work was with our seminary students, but in recent months I have transitioned to working with some of our health science programs. I am one of those academics whose route to librarianship was via a PhD (planning on teaching) and later getting my MLIS degree. My current professional research interests are on how researchers do their work and the types of resources they use.

Share something about yourself not related to librarianship.

I love to garden in our short Minnesota summers (when I am not driving my four children to their various activities). Cicero was definitely correct when he wrote: “If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.”

How does your faith inspire or fit in with your work?

While a graduate student at Marquette University (Milwaukee, WI), I was exposed to the idea that “all truth is God’s truth and that the pursuit of truth, wherever it leads us, is a pursuit of the divine.” For me, librarianship in itself is not only a small part of that pursuit for truth, but it is the facilitation of that pursuit for every person who comes into our libraries.

When and why did you get involved in the CLA?

I hate to admit it, but I do not exactly remember how or when I was asked to review a book for CLW. It has been several years now of fairly consistent reviewing of books, something I really enjoy doing. More recently (just the last couple months) I have been asked to work on the editorial committee for the journal. So far it has been a very rewarding experience.

As a new member, what do you hope to bring to, and get out of the CLA?

Librarianship has changed so much even in the relatively short time that I have been a librarian. While at times these changes can feel like a threat to our profession, I believe that librarians are and continue to be some of the most creative professionals in any field. This creativity is multiplied exponentially when we work together to solve problems. I believe that the CLA is a deep well of creativity and I hope to add to that with my work.

What do you hope for the future of the CLA?

Professional librarianship continues to lack the diversity that makes us strong as a community. I hope that as a community we can work intentionally to become a more diverse community. I believe that intentionally working towards diversity will not only strengthen our profession, but will continue to help us to be a relevant profession into the distant future.