Future of Libraries
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Censorship and patron privacy in the hyperlinked world
Reflection #2: Does privacy only extend to the patrons who agree with us? This week’s choose your own adventure reading had me excavating the connections between censorship, patron privacy, and the politics of libraries. Folks, it’s a doozy. My explorations were informed by the recent passage of a Colorado law, SB24-216, which aims to help public libraries in my state address the recent rise in materials challenges (Llanes, 2024). Put into place because of the “increasingly hostile political environment,” the bill includes protections from employment retaliation and establishes guidelines for libraries to follow with their request for reconsideration processes (Llanes, 2024). While “library and school policies are made locally,” the widespread…
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Assignment X: The fearless library
The fearless library What would a fearless library look like? How does our fear influence our services and our spaces? Do our libraries cleave to safety so steadfastly that we slow innovation? For this blog post, I looked deeper into the intersections of fear and librarianship. I hope that this small excavation of anxieties allows us to step further out of our silos and towards a spirit of collaborative design with our communities. What are we so afraid of? The idea of fear crept up on me over the past few modules. From Amy Edmonson’s conception of “the fearless organization,” to Michael Stephens’ assessment that librarians are always worried “something…