Special Libraries Association
| Formation | 1909 |
|---|---|
| Headquarters | McLean, Virginia |
| Website | Official website |
Special Libraries Association (SLA) is an international professional association for library and information professionals working in business, government, law, finance, non-profit, and academic organizations and institutions.
The Special Libraries Association was founded in 1909 in the United States by a group of librarians working in specialized settings, led by John Cotton Dana, who served as the first president of SLA from 1909 to 1911. In the years prior to SLA’s founding Dana and other librarians saw an increasing demand for the types of materials that specialized libraries could provide, and recognized that as information professionals working in such settings responded to the demands of their jobs they were creating a new kind of librarianship. Also, many of them were working as professional librarians but largely without the professional support enjoyed by other librarians and professionals. The group sought to address their common problems by banding together. Their goal, as stated in the first issue of Special Libraries, was to “unite in co-operation all small libraries throughout the country; financial, commercial, scientific, industrial; and special departments of state, college and general libraries; and, in fact, all libraries devoted to special purposes and serving a limited clientage.”
The SLA is now an international organization with members in over 75 countries and is organized by 55 regional Chapters. Additionally, the SLA also has a number of Divisions devoted to specific topic areas. Many Divisions also include Sections for sub-specialties. The current Divisions include: Academic; Biomedical & Life Sciences; Business & Finance; Chemistry; Competitive Intelligence; Education; Engineering; Environment & Resource Management; Food, Agriculture & Nutrition; Government Information; Information Technology; Insurance & Employee Benefits; Knowledge Management; Legal; Leadership & Management; Military Libraries; Museums, Arts & Humanities; News; Petroleum & Energy Resources; Pharmaceutical & Health Technology; Physics-Astronomy-Mathematics; Science-Technology; Social Science; Solo Librarians; Taxonomy; and Transportation.
From the time of the founding of the SLA there has been some controversy surrounding the terminology used in the name Special Library Association. At the time of SLAs founding there was an almost immediate backlash against the term special library or special librarian. For some, the term was too specific in that it had been used on a limited basis to that time to define reference collections which were limited or narrow in some way. For others, the term was too broad, focusing on a general type of collection rather than the work that the special librarian does. John Cotton Dana himself acknowledged the inadequacy of the name in the years following SLA’s founding but noted the term was chosen by default as no other term would be as accurate yet encompassing. This debate continues today among organization members and official name changes were considered in 2003 and 2009 but both were eventually voted down by the membership.
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