Sunday, February 09, 2020

Wokers of the world, unite

As of this writing, I have not worked as a librarian in any paid capacity for just over two years. This was after working as one almost continuously for 14 years. It would seem that I am out of the loop. Suddenly, it has occurred to some of my more progressive peers that librarianship is "oppressive." As this screen grab from Twitter shows, a special interest group is forming to develop a practice for anti-oppressive librarianship. Presumably, library schools will pick up on this trend, and incorporate such concerns into their curriculum.

That librarianship could be oppressive in any way, shape or form is news to me.
Then again, what would I know? I only worked as one almost continuously for 14 years. As well as a consistent customer focus, my work was strongly informed by a desire to help to empower people through education and lifelong learning, technology skills, literacy in all its forms, research and critical thinking skills. I was also consistently neutral. Was I inadvertently an oppressor? Who was I oppressing? I fail to see that.

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