The Alice Springs Public Library is a free

public library A public library is a library that is accessible by the general public and is usually funded from public sources, such as taxes. It is operated by librarians and library paraprofessionals, who are also Civil service, civil servants. There are ...

service in

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

. While the library provides traditional library services to the community of

Alice Springs Alice Springs ( aer, Mparntwe) is the third-largest town in the Northern Territory of Australia. Known as Stuart until 31 August 1933, the name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William Whitfield Mills after Alice, Lady Todd (''née'' Al ...

, it also supplies a unique distance service to the remote people of

Central Australia Central Australia, also sometimes referred to as the Red Centre, is an inexactly defined region associated with the geographic centre of Australia. In its narrowest sense it describes a region that is limited to the town of Alice Springs and i ...

. While officially named the

Nevil Shute Nevil Shute Norway (17 January 189912 January 1960) was an English novelist and aeronautical engineer who spent his later years in Australia. He used his full name in his engineering career and Nevil Shute as his pen name, in order to protect h ...

Memorial Library, the name is little used.

Location

The physical library is on the corner of Leichhardt and Gregory Terraces, Alice Springs. However, remote users can also access the library collection via th
Online Catalogue
This catalogue provides access to not only the Alice Springs library service, but also the collections of all public libraries in the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (commonly abbreviated as NT; formally the Northern Territory of Australia) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. The Northern Territory ...

Alice Springs Collection

The Alice Springs Collection is a collection of materials which relate to the historical, scientific and cultural heritage of Central Australia. This is a reference collection and items are not available for loan. They can be viewed in the Library during regular opening hours. All items in the collection are not for loan. The Alice Springs Collection also has a significant digital collection and holds editions of the

Centralian Advocate The ''Centralian Advocate'' is an Australian regional online newspaper based at Alice Springs, Northern Territory. The ''Centralian Advocate'' is part of News Corp Australia, and serves under the ''Northern Territory News'' banner, containing hea ...

, from 1947-2015, in PDF format and over 6000 images, most of which are from the Central Australian Historical Images Collection, on an intranet system available on computers inside the collection room.

Akaltye Antheme - Giving Knowledge

The Akaltye-Antheme (pronounced 'aculcha andum') collection, a collection of materials produced for and by the

Aboriginal Aborigine, aborigine or aboriginal may refer to: *Aborigines (mythology), in Roman mythology * Indigenous peoples, general term for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area *One of several groups of indigenous peoples, see ...

people of Central Australia, is alongside the Alice Springs Collection, one of the major special collections at the library. Meaning 'giving knowledge' in

Arrernte Arrernte (also spelt Aranda, etc.) is a descriptor related to a group of Aboriginal Australian peoples from Central Australia. It may refer to: * Arrernte (area), land controlled by the Arrernte Council (?) * Arrernte people, Aboriginal Australi ...

, Akaltye-Antheme offers visitors to the library an insight into contemporary Indigenous issues and culture and is designed for browsing. All items in the collection are not for loan. A sub-set of the collection is the Local Languages Collection which consists of early reader texts and books for adults in more than 8 different Central Australian languages. This collection was recently awarded first prize in the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA) Library Stars competition. This acknowledged the unique nature of this collection, which contains material not held by any other library or archive service. Whereas other Australian library services are attempting to provide library services to the Indigenous people of Australia, this collection is part of an effort by past librarians which has been so successful that up to 80% of those using the library at any given moment may be Aboriginal.

References

External links

Alice Springs Public Library Official siteAlice Springs Town CouncilOnline Library CatalogueNorthern Territory Library
{{Authority control Public libraries in Australia Libraries in the Northern Territory Alice Springs