Liberatory librarianship

CHICAGO — How does librarianship help people to be free? How is library capacity and expertise used to increase freedom, justice, and community? “Liberatory Librarianship: Stories of Community, Connection, and Justice,” published by ALA Editions in collaboration with Core, unpacks these questions, and many others, to reveal ways that library workers and their institutions are applying skills, knowledge, abilities, professional ethics, and personal commitment to practice liberatory librarianship. These examples will serve as guideposts and inspiration for readers undertaking their own efforts. With a special emphasis on the voices of non-white practitioners, the themes and stories explored in this volume edited by Brian W. Keith, Laurie Taylor, and Shamin Renwick include:

• histories of several liberatory efforts, such as the Digital Library of the Caribbean’s (dLOC) open access repository of Caribbean and circum-Caribbean resources, restorative justice at the UK's SOAS Library, and examples of unsiloing DEI work;
• the work of visionary, liberatory librarians such as Dr. Alma Jordan, Lillian Marrero, Rosa Quintero Mesa, and Judith Rogers;
• innovative programs such as those at Oakland Public Library and Stanford University’s KNOW System Racism Project;
• library instruction for college students with intellectual and developmental disabilities and a liberatory archival training program; and
• the radical and liberatory power of empathy in librarianship for imagining and enacting change.

Keith is a professor and the dean of library services at Eastern Illinois University. He is a past recipient of the SirsiDynix—American Library Association & Allied Professional Association’s Award for Outstanding Achievement in Promoting Salaries and Status for Library Workers, and he was an Association of Research Libraries Leadership Fellow. Taylor is the associate university librarian for collections and discovery at the University of Connecticut Library. In 2018, Laurie was named Caribbean Information Professional of the Year by the Association of Caribbean University, Research and Institutional Libraries. Renwick is a senior librarian II at the School of Education Library, University of the West Indies, St. Augustine Campus, and has served as director of library services at St. George’s University, Grenada. She was awarded the ACURILEANA Star 2007 for research and publication and the ACURILEAN Medal for significant contributions to ACURIL (the Association of Caribbean University, Research and Institutional Libraries).

The former Association for Library Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS), the Library Information Technology Association (LITA), and the Library Leadership and Management Association (LLAMA) are now Core: Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures, a new division of ALA. Its mission is to cultivate and amplify the collective expertise of library workers in core functions through community building, advocacy, and learning.

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