Meeting 15.04.15 Discussion began with getting a feel for what we mean by ‘radical librarianship’ as a few people there had come along feeling unsure about what exactly we hope to achieve and wanted to learn more - explained safe space ideology and also that by ‘radical’ we don’t necessarily also have to mean ‘militant’ Listed potential goals for the group - regular meetings, twitter chats, an event this summer, some kind of publication blog/zine or such to discuss/publicise our ideology in a more cogent way Discussed the connotations of the term ‘radical’ and whether this might put people off - considering ways we can promote the group and dispel negative connotations of name as Twitter character limit doesn’t allow for this level of explanation/detail o How safe do we feel identifying as ‘radical’? o Blog to be established Established interest in what kind of action we can take as a collective - possibility of things like letter writing campaigns and such - further discussion required as group expands Noted that working can often be draining, we discussed our hope to help revive interest and passion for sector in those feeling fatigued Discussed the relative safety of libraries in Oxford and surrounding area possibility of discussion with public libraries, hope to get an idea of how or why libraries are safe and use this information for advocacy purposes o Are library services more valued in more affluent areas despite the fact they’re more needed in less affluent areas? - worth investigating and discussing further o Hoping to get people from public libraries coming along as this will add to discussion - need to look into ways of promoting group around Oxford(shire) Reiterated the purpose of the value of information professionals in the information age - people do not realise the need for us as they think they can find everything they need at home o The idea that google and other such services ‘get to know’ you and narrow searches depending on what it thinks you want/need - this isn't always positive and information professionals we can educate on information literacy so that people aren’t experiencing this restriction o Discuss further - possibility of running information literacy sessions in future? Discussed the ides of value from the perspective that because material value is more tangible it’s hard to promote libraries/librarianship, which holds a more abstract kind of value (ie not obvious financial gain), and is an unfortunate consequence of neoliberal values, marketising libraries or making public libraries into more commercial spaces is perhaps a consequence of this - considering ways in which we can advocate for libraries bearing this in mind as the concern is that those who need free/accessible services will end up in the position of being financially/economically locked out Discussed ideas for meeting o Contact established with RLC SE group regarding a national meeting, our group feel Birmingham is the best location - further discussion/collaboration will hopefully occur between us and SE o Still hope to have a smaller gathering in Oxford as this is something more of our group can feel comfortable committing to - perhaps a day of talks/workshops Took down google email addresses as provisionally we intend to communicate using a google+ community (and are already using drive for sharing documents) but also looking into an alternative as slightly wary of google o Community pages to be established but alternative forms considered for those who do not have google accounts (everyone so far does) Decided monthly meetings was too infrequent at this point if we hope to establish a meeting, as such we hope to meet again toward the end of the month. Meeting date set provisionally for 28th April, but will require finding a keyholder for OARC again. o Look into how to become a keyholder?