Zines and the Library

Abstract

Zines, loosely defined as self-published magazines, provide a cultural insight to the time in which they are published, making them a genre that libraries may want to consider collecting. Due to their ephemeral nature, however, they create collecting, cataloging, and preserving challenges to libraries. Few libraries across the country have met these challenges and maintain zine collections. Although no two libraries met the challenges in the same way, their unique approaches to zine collections may inspire other librarians to investigate the appropriateness and feasibility of zine collections.