Half Title Page

READING WORKPLACE DYNAMICS

Series page

ADVANCES IN LIBRARIANSHIP

Advances in Librarianship Editor

• Bharat Mehra, The University of Alabama, Series Editor

Advances in Librarianship Editorial Board

• Denise E. Agosto, Drexel University, USA

• Wade Bishop, University of Tennessee Knoxville, USA

• John Buschman, Seton Hall University, USA

• Michelle Caswell, University of California Los Angeles, USA

• Sandra Hughes-Hassell, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA

• Paul T. Jaeger, University of Maryland, USA

• Don Latham, Florida State University, USA

• Jerome Offord, Harvard University, USA

Title Page

ADVANCES IN LIBRARIANSHIP - VOLUME 55

READING WORKPLACE DYNAMICS: A POST-PANDEMIC PROFESSIONAL ETHOS IN PUBLIC LIBRARIES

EDITED BY

VANESSA IRVIN

East Carolina University, USA

AND

BHARAT MEHRA

The University of Alabama, USA

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

Copyright Page

Emerald Publishing Limited

Emerald Publishing, Floor 5, Northspring, 21-23 Wellington Street, Leeds LS1 4DL.

First edition 2024

Editorial matter and selection © 2024 Vanessa Irvin and Bharat Mehra.

Individual chapters © 2024 The authors.

Published under exclusive licence by Emerald Publishing Limited.

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No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without either the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence permitting restricted copying issued in the UK by The Copyright Licensing Agency and in the USA by The Copyright Clearance Center. Any opinions expressed in the chapters are those of the authors. Whilst Emerald makes every effort to ensure the quality and accuracy of its content, Emerald makes no representation implied or otherwise, as to the chapters’ suitability and application and disclaims any warranties, express or implied, to their use.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-83797-071-1 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-83797-070-4 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-83797-072-8 (Epub)

ISSN: 0065-2830 (Series)

Contents

List of Figures and Tables

Figures

Tables

Series Editor’s Introduction

I am delighted to take this opportunity and introduce myself as the Series Editor of Advances in Librarianship since January 2021. In this capacity, I am extending the series’ impact via integrating a critical perspective that spotlights social justice and inclusive praxis from the shadows to become an emerging canon at the very core of who we are and what we value as legit in library and information science (LIS) scholarship and practice. This strategic vision requires destabilizing of entrenched hegemonies within our privileged ranks and external communities to alleviate intersecting political, economic, social, and cultural anxieties and power imbalances we witness today. As we move toward the quarter-century mark, we also need to effectively document such paradigmatic shifts in LIS, serving as a foundation of inspiration upon which, together in our multiple identities and diversities, we can proudly contribute to the building of a meaningful society toward a brighter future for our children to inherit.

New stimulating models reimagining (or extending) the roles for cultural memory institutions (e.g., libraries, museums, archives, schools, etc.) and the field of information are much required to develop symbolic and real infrastructures for moving us forward. We also need to better tell our stories of information activism and community mobilization in the face of overwhelming challenges to human existence, from forces of neoliberal corporatization, political ransacking, media irresponsibility, climate change, environmental degradation, and pandemic dis/misinformation, to name a few. What do the contemporary threats of human extinction and cultural decay mean for LIS professionals, be it scholars, researchers, educators, practitioners, students, and others embedded in a variety of information settings? Not only does it require actions in the “doing” of resistance via information to decenter dysfunctional powerbrokers and their oppressions and entitled privileges. However, disseminating a forward-thinking agenda and narrative beyond our internally focused bastardized institutional bastions is equally important, as we adopt an active stance to promote fairness, justice, equity/equality, change agency, empowerment, community building, and community development.

Advances in Librarianship holds a special place in the hands, hearts, and minds of readers as a key platform to support creative ideas and practices that change and better articulate the vital contributions of libraries and the impact of information on diverse multicultural communities in a global network information society. Moving forward, my aim for the series is to engage our diverse professional communities in critical discourse that enable real transformations to occur. It is important to propel progress in shifting entrenched positionalities in LIS, while making visible content related to the “margins.” Decentering canons and practices toward equity of representation, inclusivity, and progressive change will naturally occur. Intersecting social, cultural, political, and economic upheavals in recent times demand an urgent response from the LIS professions in this regard.

I am truly honored and privileged to build on the legacy of Paul T. Jaeger, who served as Series Editor of Advances in Librarianship since 2013. His research helped to mobilize LIS in addressing concerns surrounding equity, diversity, and inclusion more substantially beyond past lip-service, also shaping the focus of the book series. I plan to operationalize new directions for single or multi-authored book-length explorations and edited collections by shifting focus on understudied spaces, invisible populations from the margins, and knowledge domains that have been under-researched or under-published in what we consider as high impactful venues in LIS and beyond. Examples might involve a reflective journey that established, or newly emerging LIS scholars, researchers, practitioners, and students critically reflect, assess, evaluate, and propose solutions or actions to change entrenched practices and systemic imbalanced inequities in different library and information-related settings. It might also involve decolonizing LIS publication industries in their biased Euro/Anglo-centricities with the inclusion of content from geographical diversities around the world.

I am reaching out to our multiple audiences for their support toward these goals in spreading the word for proposals to new volumes in the series. Let us find our “collective voice” in the LIS professions to make us all uncomfortable as we continue to “push the buttons,” thereby, becoming stronger in our quest to further social justice and develop our humanity, human dignity, respect, and potential to the fullest.

Bharat Mehra, PhD

Professor & EBSCO Endowed Chair in Social Justice

School of Library and Information Studies

University of Alabama, USA

About the Editors

Vanessa Irvin, MSLS, EdD, is an Associate Professor with the Master of Library Science Program in the College of Education at East Carolina University (USA). She received her Master’s in Library and Information Science from Pennsylvania Western University at Clarion and her Doctorate in Literacy Studies from the University of Pennsylvania. Dr Irvin’s primary areas of expertise include reference services, public librarianship, youth services, and librarian professional development. Irvin is particularly interested in studying the evolution of librarian professional practices under the influence of emerging technologies, having published actively and led multiple research projects in this area. Dr Irvin currently serves as Co-Editor-in-Chief of the open-access peer-reviewed journal, the International Journal of Information, Diversity, & Inclusion (IJIDI).

Bharat Mehra is EBSCO Endowed Chair in Social Justice and Professor in the School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Alabama. His research focuses on diversity and social justice in library and information science and community informatics or the use of information and communication technologies to empower minority and underserved populations to make meaningful changes in their everyday lives. He has applied action research to nurture a just society while collaborating with racial/ethnic groups, international diaspora, sexual minorities, rural communities, low-income families, small businesses, and others, to represent their experiences and perspectives in the design of culturally appropriate community-based information systems and services. Dr Mehra primarily teaches courses on social justice and inclusion advocacy, diversity and inclusive leadership in information organizations, community-engaged scholarship, outreach to diverse populations, public library management, collection management, and grant development for information professionals.

About the Contributors

Daniele Achilles is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Librarianship, the Graduate Program in Social Memory, and the Professional Master’s Degree in Librarianship at the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO). She is Leader of the Research Group Libraries, Memory, and Resistance, CNPq and Leader of the Community of Practice in Public Libraries Extension Program. Achilles received her Bachelor of Library Science – UNIRIO, Master’s and Doctorate in Social Memory – UNIRIO, and Sandwich Doctorate in Information Science at the Universidad de Antioquia, Medellín, Colombia.

Denice Adkins is Professor and Associate Director of the School of Information Science & Learning Technologies, University of Missouri, Co-editor of the Journal of Education for Library & Information Science, and Treasurer for REFORMA (The National Association to Promote Library & Information Services to Latinos and the Spanish-Speaking). Prior to her academic career, Dr Adkins was a public librarian serving diverse communities in the southwestern United States. Her additional past experiences include a Fulbright Scholarship to Honduras and a Fulbright Specialist to India, as well as serving as president of REFORMA, the executive board for ALISE, and councillor-at-large for the American Library Association.

Jenny Bossaller is an Associate Professor at the School of Information Science & Learning Technologies (SISLT) at the University of Missouri at Columbia (MU). Her teaching and research focus broadly encompasses public libraries, information policy, the history of libraries and information, and related social and technological phenomena. She has focused especially on the public’s access to information. She co-developed two IMLS education grants focusing on public library leadership and community and professional immersion (PuLL) another to revitalize the school’s health information and librarianship track (C4CH). She is the author of numerous articles related to libraries and health and is co-author of Introduction to Public Librarianship. She was the recipient of the 2022 ALISE/Connie Van Fleet Award for Research Excellence in Public Library Services to Adults.

Veronica Britto is Chief of the Adult Services and Programs Division at the Free Library of Philadelphia. She administrates programs that aim to increase Digital Inclusion, English Language Learning, Adult Basic Education, Business Education, Workforce Development, and Culinary Literacy in Philadelphia, PA. She also manages the Social Services and Engagement initiatives of the Free Library. In 2004, Veronica received a full scholarship from the US Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to pursue her MSLS from Clarion University. She received her Undergraduate degree in Humanities and Communications from Pennsylvania State University and her Master’s in Library Science from Clarion University of PA. Veronica serves on the governing board of PhillyCAM, a Public-Access Media Center (Philadelphia, PA).

John M. Budd is a Professor Emeritus in the School of Information Science and Learning Technologies of the University of Missouri (USA). He has been active in library and information science (LIS) professional associations for over 30 years, chairing the American Library Association’s (ALA) Library Research Round Table, and serving as president of the Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE) and the LIS honor society, Beta Phi Mu. Budd has been on several committees with the Association of Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) and has published over 100 articles in prominent LIS journals such as Library and Information Science Research, Journal of Documentation, and JASIST. Dr Budd’s publications also include several books, including Knowledge and Knowing in Library and Information Science: A Philosophical Framework (2001), Self-Examination: The Present and Future of Librarianship (2007), and The Library as Forum in the Social Media Age (2022).

Ericka Butler is a School Librarian and Recent Graduate from the University of Missouri Columbia with a Master’s Degree in Library and Information Science. She is an Advocate for reading, literacy, and sharing tips on reading with families. Ericka’s other interests include connecting families to mental health resources, sharing community resources, and helping communities understand the importance of self-care and literacy. Some of her past working experiences include being a Public Library Manager, Mental Health Librarian, and Lead After-school Teacher.

Shalonda Capers is a Womanist communication scholar and Doctoral candidate at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. As a community-engaged scholar, Shalonda operationalizes her positionality as a Womanist boundary spanner, to create and disseminate scholarship that flows from community ←→ academy. By utilizing the four principles of womanism as both a theoretical framework and a methodology, Shalonda is presently engaged in intersectional and intergenerational research aimed at fostering coalitions both within and outside of academia, with a specific emphasis on advancing the discourse surrounding Black motherhood. Alongside her work as a Doctoral candidate, she is currently developing a peer-support model of care for mothers of children diagnosed with cancer through her organization, Golden Moms.

Wilson Castaño is an Associate Professor at the Interamerican School of Library and Information Science at the University of Antioquia, Medellín, Colombia. He works in the technology core for undergraduate students. Castano is pursuing his Doctoral degree in Information Science and Learning Technologies at the University of Missouri (USA). His research interests are information science technologies, digital reading, information literacy, and digital repositories. He received a Master of Digital Communication from the University of Antioquia, Colombia.

Hyerim Cho is an Assistant Professor at the University of Missouri iSchool. She received her PhD in Information Science at the University of Washington, Information School. Her primary research area is information needs and behavior, particularly of popular cultural multimedia information users such as video gamers, anime audiences, and webtoon readers. Some of Dr Cho’s recent research has been funded by the American Library Association (ALA), Reference & User Services Association (RUSA), and the Academy of Korean Studies.

Christine D’Arpa, MSLIS, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the School of Information Sciences at Wayne State University in Detroit. Her research focuses on the history of libraries; the role of the federal government in information provision; and public libraries and community engagement. Her educational training includes an MS and PhD in Library & Information Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Yiran Duan is a PhD Student at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies, USA. She holds an MA degree in Anthropology from Florida State University, USA. Her current research interests are at the intersection of social media influencers and social network analysis. Specifically, she is interested in exploring how influencers use hashtags in social movements.

LaVerne Gray is an Assistant Professor with the iSchool at Syracuse University (USA). Her research uses Critical Race and Black Feminist perspectives to explore information location and value in marginal community spaces. Dr Gray is keenly interested in African-American historical information collectives and archival-evidence analysis.

Eli Guinnee has been the State Librarian of New Mexico since 2018. He was formerly the Director of the Chautauqua-Cattaraugus Library System and Patterson Library in western New York. He is Chair of Education and Engagement for the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. He is a Councilmember of the Connect New Mexico Broadband Council and serves as Chair of Digital Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility. His primary research area is rural libraries and the role of librarians in community systems.

Joe Kohlburn is a Doctoral candidate, Librarian, and Activist. Joe’s current research interests include activist media ecologies, news journalism, information use among self-identified activists, and communities of care for intra-institutional and organizational reform. Joe is also interested in video game and new media studies, and how games and media can impact user wellbeing. Joe works closely with intellectual freedom advocates and activists in Missouri and nationally. He is past chair of the Missouri Library Association’s Intellectual Freedom Committee, and currently still serves as a regular member. Joe advocates for the rights of readers, librarians, teachers, and parents to have access to a diverse collection of materials in their local libraries, and for the rights of historically marginalized communities to see their experiences and identities reflected in institutional and local collections.

Noah Lenstra, MLIS, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Library & Information Science and an Affiliated Faculty Member in the Gerontology program at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, where he founded Let’s Move in Libraries in 2016. He has served as the Principal Investigator of multiple federal and state government programs focused on the diffusion of innovation of new models of public library work as community work, including HEAL (Healthy Eating and Active Living) at the Library via Co-Developed Programming and South Carolina Public Libraries & Health: Needs and Opportunities. He earned an MS and PhD in Library & Information Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Professional memberships include the Public Library Association and the Association for Rural and Small Libraries: Within the latter, he is a co-chair of the Association’s Partnerships Committee.

Claudia Martinez is a retired Public Librarian who devoted her career to the Free Library of Philadelphia from 1983 to 2012 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. Claudia earned her Master’s in Library Science from Drexel University in 1990. She worked with the Free Library first as a page, then as a paraprofessional library assistant, then as a librarian, then as a branch manager, and then as a regional administrator. Martinez has served at all levels of public library service within an extensive municipal library system in an urban setting. Thus, Claudia comes with a wealth of professional knowledge, experience, and wisdom that helps us to appreciate public librarianship as a vital contributor to the healing of society post-COVID.

Rae-Anne Montague is an Associate Professor and Library and Information Science (LIS) Program Coordinator at Chicago State University. Dr Montague is a former teacher and school librarian who has written several articles on LGBTQIA+ library services in addition to coediting Queer Library Alliance (Litwin Books, 2017). She is past chair of the American Library Association (ALA) Rainbow Round Table (RRT); and a co-founder and former co-chair of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) LGBTQ+ Users Special Interest Group. Her scholarly interests include inquiry, learning communities, and social justice.

Nanci Oddone achieved full professorship in 2021 and is currently Head of the Department of Librarianship and Deputy Coordinator of the Graduate Program in Librarianship at the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO). She received her PhD from the Graduate Program in Information Science at the Brazilian Institute for Information in Science and Technology (IBICT), in association with the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) in 2004. She was a Visiting Academic at Kent Law School, University of Kent, at Canterbury, UK, from 2008 to 2009. Her research interests include scholarly communication, open science and open access, books, and e-books.

Renata Oliveira is a Master’s student in the Graduate Program in Library Science (PPGB-UNIRIO). Member of the Libraries, Memory and Resistance Research Group. She is a teacher at the Rio de Janeiro State Department of Education (SEEDUC-RJ). Oliveira graduated in Library Science from the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO) and graduated in Literature from the State University of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ).

Beth Patin is an Assistant Professor at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies. Dr Beth’s research agenda focuses on the equity of information in two research streams: crisis informatics and cultural competence. She is the Co-founder of the Library Information Investigative Team research group. Currently, she is working on projects about epistemicide and the intersection of disability and race in youth literature. Additionally, she is a member of the Advisory Board of the Laura Bush Foundation for America’s Libraries.

Nicole Peritore, PhD, CHES®, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Community Health and Behavioral Sciences at Augusta University in Georgia (US). She is also the Program Director for the BS in Health Promotion program there. Dr Peritore teaches classes such as Introduction to Nutrition, Public and Community Health, Health Literacy and Health Promotion Program Planning, Design, and Evaluation. Her publications include work with creating health policies, promoting the importance of working with community partners, and exploring ways that communities can improve their health through food and physical activity opportunities. Peritore has worked to help organizations realize the significance of coalition building for sustaining successes brought upon communities through grant funding. Peritore’s current research is focused on community-based health, focusing on the evaluation and sustainment of programming.

Kathleen Pickering is the Director of the Belen Public Library and Harvey House Museum. She has a PhD in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and is Professor Emeritus at Colorado State University. Her teaching and research centered on indigenous self-determination and participatory community and economic development approaches.

Jean Rene is a community-focused librarian who believes in providing transformative services to the local community. He is responsible for Programming and Outreach at the Central Library, Queens Public Library. He is also an Adjunct Assistant Professor at York College, CUNY. Dr Rene is passionate about the role libraries play in enriching the lives of immigrant communities.

Deise Sabbag is a Professor at the University of São Paulo, Faculty of Philosophy, Sciences and Letters of Ribeirão Preto (USP) and the Postgraduate Program in Information Science at the Universidade Estadual Paulista – UNESP, Marília. She is a leader of the ECOAR Research Group – Contemporary Studies in Information Organization, Analysis, and Retrieval. Sabbag received her PhD in Information Science from UNESP – Marília.

Valerie Taylor-Samuel is the Assistant Chief of the Youth Services and Programs Division for the Free Library of Philadelphia. During her 20-year tenure with the Free Library, she has worked in various positions as a Librarian, but always with an interest in teen services and overall youth programming. She currently oversees the management of a number of the Free Library’s city-wide programs, including out-of-school time programs: the Literacy Enrichment Afterschool Program (LEAP), the Summer of Wonder summer learning program, Playful Learning Kits, Middle Grade programming, Teen Reading Lounge, and Read Baby Read. She serves on the Free Library’s One Book, One Philadelphia committee and co-chairs the Summer of Wonder learning program committees. Valerie received a BA in English from the Pennsylvania State University, and an MSLS from Clarion University, with an emphasis on Public Librarianship.

Kaurri C. Williams-Cockfield has 30+ years of progressively responsible work experience in both US and international library settings including public, academic, school, and corporate institutions. She holds both a BS in Library Science and an MLIS in Information Science from the University of Southern Mississippi. From 2003 to 2021, she served as a Public Library Director in Tennessee taking a two-year break to serve as the Director of Library Services for the Cayman Islands Government. She retired from public library service in 2021 and is currently an Adjunct Instructor for the School of Information Sciences at the University of Tennessee Knoxville where she teaches public library management and adult services (since 2011). In 2022, she taught collection management for the University of Alabama School of Information Science. She is currently a PhD Student at the University of Alabama. Her published research has focused on how public library programming impacts community social justice issues and how public libraries impact the development of sustainable communities.

Joseph Winberry is an Assistant Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s School of Information and Library Science. His research currently emphasizes critical library practice and impact, especially in relation to societal aging. Dr Winberry’s service activities include serving as the co-convener of the Association for Library and Information Science Education’s (ALISE) Historical Perspectives Special Interest Group and as the founding co-chair of the Aging Rainbow Coalition which is a new initiative which emerged from his dissertation to meet the aging services information needs of LGBT+ older adults in East Tennessee.

Foreword

John M. Budd, PhD

Reading Workplace Dynamics: A Post-Professional Ethos in Public Libraries is very timely, to say the least. All complex organizations, including libraries, are under considerable stress, with pandemic changes (some of which appear to be permanent), wage and price pressures, budgetary constraints, and personnel issues looming large. These matters are putting pressure on organizations to be responsive to changes on many fronts. The essays in this book address a number of pressures and changes in thoughtful and productive ways. This Foreword will not attempt to summarize the chapters but rather will form a kind of prelude, noting three particular challenges: the effects of the pandemic on libraries, managing the libraries – especially public libraries – in complicated times, and ethics for libraries as complex organizations. The three issues will be taken in turn and will, I hope, provide an entrée into the rest of the book. The chapters will deal with particulars; this Foreword is intended to approach the matter of the workplace in general terms. For one thing, we all must realize that the times are rife with matters demanding attention. As Howard Gardner and Shulman (2005) put it:

The hallmark of all professions, even beyond the prototypical practices of each, is the ubiquitous condition of uncertainty, novelty, and unpredictability that characterizes professional work. … This means that professional practice is frequently pursued at or beyond the margins of previously learned performances. (p. 15)

The present work, Reading Workplace Dynamics: A Post-pandemic Professional Ethos in Public Libraries, is an effort to address this challenging present and future.

Conclusion

The preceding hints at what is in store for the reader of the essays in this volume. Theoretical and practical issues will be discussed; matters of principle and fact will be addressed. Some of the foregoing will be elaborated upon, and the breadth and depth of the coverage of workplace topics will enlighten all readers. The authors are exceedingly well-qualified to delve into their respective chapters. This volume will greatly interest professional librarians and can be used in educational settings as readings in coursework for master’s programs. What has gone before in this Foreword is only a taste of what will come.