Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Date of this Version
4-11-2021
Abstract
This paper aims to examine how library in a tourism village is able to help local residents to survive in the pandemic era as well as to progress to edu-tourism attraction. Since 2016, Kampung Wisata Lawas Maspati (Old Tourism Village of Maspati) has been one of featured destinations in Surabaya. The COVID-19 pandemic then brought tremendous undesirable impacts on the village. This community-based tourism village has experienced plunging number of visitors, which greatly impacted the community. To attain the research goal, qualitative research design was used in this study. In-depth interview was conducted with the residents and administrators of the tourism village. Results suggest that despite the low number of visitors, administrators and people in Kampung Lawas Maspati have made a breakthrough by reactivating the library self-subsistently or with their own resources. This library ultimately became one of tourism village’s strategies to survive. Many locals used the library as a public space to seek information or share information to each other. An interesting aspect was the internet connection facility added to the library soon transformed it to a ‘school’ for children and helped people with their information searching. Furthermore, the library in Kampung Wisata Lawas Maspati is more directed to and accentuates the educational elements known as edu-tourism.