Despite antidiscrimination legislation and affirmative action, faculty of color1 remain significantly underrepresented in higher education. When present, they often occupy less prestigious positions and have less than optimal conditions for service in terms of workload and pay (Allen, Epps, Guillory, Suh, & Bonous-Hammarth, 2000; Allen et al., 2002; Astin, Antonio, Cress, & Astin, 1997; Blackwell, 1981; Villalpando & Delgado Bernal, 2002).
Despite the presence of programs such as ALA’s Spectrum Scholarship and the ARL Initiative to Recruit a Diverse Workforce, library and information science (LIS) has not been successful in increasing the number of racial/ethnic minorities in the profession, especially in academic libraries.
This paper traces the published literature on whiteness in libraries, identifying major themes in that literature, and then highlights the importance of decentering whiteness for moving the information professions forward. Engaging a dialogic ethnographic methodology, this paper was borne of conversations between librarians of color who worked in the same predominantly white library. The salient themes from those dialogues were the many ways that adherence to whiteness in libraries has had deleterious affective and career implications for librarians of color.
Academic libraries operate under the assumption that there is one “right candidate” for a multi-layered position and that a search committee, a group of individuals formed with the purpose of assisting a responsible administrator in the recruiting and screening of candidates for a posted academic position, is the fairest and most equitable approach to hiring academic librarians. That assumption is running up against the fact that libraries and academic libraries in particular have an acknowledged a problem with recruiting and retaining librarians of color.
Smart community is a term that has been recently used to characterize efforts to transform communities and make them more sustainable, efficient, transparent, and where citizen participation is the norm. Information technologies are many times seen as enablers of these potential changes. In smart communities, the role of public libraries is key. This poster analyzes current practices in public libraries and identifies the expertise, knowledge, and background that help them contribute to citizen engagement in smart community initiatives.
The Texas State Library's multicounty bookmobile program and its earlier "traveling libraries" program had similar missions: to reach rural Texans deprived of proper library service. In both programs librarians faced inadequate funding and the daunting task of sending books over the vast distances of the Lone Star State. Ultimately, Texas's traveling libraries and bookmobiles introduced the pleasure of reading to families in the state's isolated farms and ranches and garnered support for today's county libraries.
Purpose The purpose of the study is to present three models of organising library services for the homeless. The work experience of Zagreb City Libraries in each of the models provides a better insight into the challenges of each model and into the ways of overcoming them. Furthermore, it may indicate to others what to expect during the implementation of such models. Design/methodology/approach The study presents first‐hand real‐life experiences in organising the project for the homeless and its programs.
Purpose This study aims to focus on a qualitative and quantitative assessment of how homeless people in the USA use libraries. Libraries, especially in urban areas, have a complicated relationship with homeless patrons. It is easy to assume that homeless populations use libraries as a safe place to avoid the elements or to sleep. This paper considers the other ways that people without permanent housing are using libraries, how they perceive libraries, and what their specific information needs might be.
Among public institutions, the library has great potential for helping the poor and disenfranchised. For many, the library is the only refuge for information, literacy, entertainment, language skills, employment help, free computer use and even safety and shelter. Experts Glen and Leslie Holt, with decades of service to inner city communities between them, challenge librarians to do more for poor people.
Our paper presents a proposition for the new approach to the role of library in a sustainable city. An in-depth literary review on smart library concept is presented along the comparative insight into contemporary smart city and sustainable city literature. Based on these findings a proposition is depicted for smart and sustainable library as a central public institution of a sustainable smart city. Several library services of the new generation based on cutting edge technologies and user participation are proposed.
