F&M College Library

F&M Zine Library

                                                            

Intro

ZINE: Pronounced zeen (and rhymes with lean and mean…)

Derivative of magazine or fanzine

Zines are “…noncommercial, nonprofessional, small-circulation magazines which their creators produce, publish and distribute themselves.”  (Stephen Duncombe, Notes from Underground:  Zines and the Politics of Alternative Culture)

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The F&M Zine Library at Franklin & Marshall College Library is a Browsing Collection.  That means the zines are available in the Browsing Section by the Reference Room for the three R’s:  reading, relaxing, and research.  It also means that readers can’t check them out to take them home, but really, what’s better than grabbing a coffee and a zine, settling into a comfy chair, putting your feet up, and enjoying a great read?

F&M bought its first zines—an 18-piece collection called “Instant Zine Archive”—in  March 2012 in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.  Those zines and all acquired since are highly relevant to the college’s interdisciplinary curriculum.  Since 2012 students, faculty, and staff at F&M have made and read zines, studied and discussed them, and written about them.  Books about zines have been added to the library’s general collection to support zines as primary sources.

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To see what’s in the collection make an Advanced Search at library.fandm.edu for Subject=Zines | Format=Book | Location=Franklin & Marshall College.

Library staff who work with the collection use the guidelines in the Zine Librarians Code of Ethics Zine, as a tool for “acquiring, managing, preserving, and making accessible zines in a library setting…,” which may mean privileging zinesters’ rights over library rules.

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Featured zine

89.1 FM WFNM:  Louder than your mother!!

by Su Spina '17

Zines S656w 2015

A brief history of zines in the West...