Rachel Suntop
4 March 2014
LIS502D
Annotated Bibliography
Alire, Camila A. “Diversity and Leadership: The Color of Leadership” Journal of Library
Administration 32, no. 3-4 (2001): 95-109.
This article discusses the need to increase the number of minorities in library leadership,
the types of situations that they are likely to encounter and how to further empower
themselves. The author states that minorities as leaders can often provide positive role
models for other minorities and that they recognize the value of diversity. However, these
leaders often carry more burdens than their Caucasian counterparts. Due to
institutionalized racism, negative stereotypes against minority leaders remain. These
include the notion that they were only hired because of preferential treatment, that they
are only successful in leading other minorities and that they have an inability to
communicate well due to foreign accents. The stakes are often higher for minority leaders
to perform effectively, too. Often, minority leaders find themselves leading in mainly
white organizations and should not let this factor intimidate them. The author offers
plenty of advice for effective leadership among minorities. She includes a list of
leadership qualities, traits and skills. Minority leaders need to be able to face and handle
adversity and should not be ashamed of being ambitious. It is also important for them to
learn to make unpopular decisions in order to gain respect. Mentorship, networking and
ad hoc leadership development are particularly valuable traits. These leaders should also
not discriminate against whites, but rather listen and learn from them. Additionally, the
article discusses the aspects of marginalized leadership for minorities and provides
suggestions for ways to make the best of those situations.
Balderrama, Sandra Rios. “This Trend Called Diversity.” Library Trends 49, no. 1
(2000): 194-214.
This article examines many key issues behind diversity in libraries. It seeks to define
diversity and how to best approach this complex subject. The author emphasizes that
diversity is an ongoing learning process; it cannot be learned in one book or by one set of
guidelines. Generally, people tend to play it safe and remain quiet about these issues
because they are controversial, emotional and difficult to discuss. Despite these
challenges, the need to create frequent dialogue and public discourse about diversity is
very important. Some of the main issues that this article discusses include the recruitment
of students of color to library school and the recruitment, hiring, retention and promotion
of librarians and staff of color. Other issues include working on interpersonal and
communication skills training, creating a workspace that is conducive to and respectful of
diversity and employing effective outreach techniques to diverse communities. Perhaps
the most important issue is how to put these practices to work in the most effective ways.
Elaborating on outreach work, it is important to understand the requirements and to know
that it can be exhausting and challenging. The ability to self-reflect is also valuable. It can
require much courage to question oneself, to question others and to speak up for justice.
It is necessary to identify the work that needs to be done in order for the library to reach
its goals and to examine the obstacles to diversifying the workforce. Additionally,
listening and acknowledgement are critical qualities when communicating about
diversity. The author closes the article by asking a simple question: what are the next
steps?
Hussey, Lisa. “The Diversity Discussion: What are we Saying?” Progressive Librarian
no. 34/35 (2010): 3-10.
In this article, the author poses the following questions: Why, despite the effort,
commitments, discussion and initiatives is diversity still a problem in LIS? What are we
trying to achieve in libraries? What exactly is diversity? The author argues that the term
“diversity” tends to look just at the physical characteristics of the person but ignores his
or her culture, religion, language or worldviews. This is an overly simplistic approach.
The author compares the term “diversity” to “difference.” Again, “difference” is an
ambiguous term that does not address the history of racism and discrimination in the
United States, particularly among libraries and information centers. Diversity is a
complicated issue that not only concerns librarians of color, but also Caucasians. White
culture should not be ignored or minimized, either. In order to identify “difference,” one
must come up with a standard of what is and is not “normal.” This presents a dilemma.
Another key problem is that diversity is being celebrated at a superficial level that implies
that Caucasians are more “normal” or “important” while minimizing the effects of
historical racism. White privilege is an issue that must also be acknowledged. On another
note, the classifications and categories used to identify diversity can be misleading,
limiting or too broad. The author suggests that the types of words and terminology used
to describe race and diversity are important because these communicate much about
people’s attitudes. Those who are in power often approve of this language, which, as a
result, influences the ways in which people think. The article concludes by urging for
continuous dialogue about diversity and the posing of difficult questions. It is important
to look beyond good intentions and vague expectations and identify key issues.
Josey, E.J. “Diversity in Libraries.” Virginia Libraries 48, no. 1 (2002).
In an address given to the Chesterfield County Public Library in Chesterfield, Virginia,
E.J. Josey argues that the country is still very divided and that segregation and racism
persist. He does believe that most blatant racism is gone, but that institutionalized racism
is still rampant, and that includes institutions such as libraries. Libraries have the
responsibility to identify the manifestations of racism, to outline a distinctive set of plans
in which to work from to improve the situation and use active approaches to work on
these problems. Cultural diversity is an issue largely ignored by libraries. It tends to be
neglected because of the attitude that it has a “low impact on organizational life” and the
belief that racism is a thing of the past and we are now a post-racial society. There have
been intense attacks by critics directed toward multicultural education, and the author
cites Arthur Schlesinger as an example. Despite these obstacles, libraries should not be
discouraged to continue their commitment to working with ethnic diversity issues,
particularly by using a team approach to leadership. In fact, the term “managing
diversity” has now become a buzzword, especially now that white males are beginning to
become a minority in the workforce.
Josey, E.J. “Diversity: Political and Societal Barriers.” Journal of Library Administration
27, no. 1-2 (1999): 191-202.
The lack of minorities in ALA accredited programs presents a dilemma. To compound
this void of cultural diversity in libraries, there is a lack of dialogue. The author argues
that there is an assumption that these issues are not important to library organization,
particularly due to the belief that we live in a post-racial society. Despite this, racism
continues to permeate all of American society in many ways, especially in the form of
institutionalized racism. One of the causes of this lack of diversity has to do with the
decline of affirmative action. The author outlines a brief history of affirmative action in
the presidential office. Starting with Ronald Reagan, efforts have been made to kill off
affirmative action programs. This decline continued in the Bush and Clinton
administrations (this article was written before the George W Bush and Barack Obama
presidencies). He does give credit to President Clinton for opening up a discussion about
race at the University of California in 1997. Despite this progressive move, James Byrd Jr
was brutally murdered in Texas by white supremacists less than one year later. In order to
help lessen the evil of racism, Josey suggests that providing education and leadership to
minorities is crucial. This includes the continued recruitment and encouragement of
minorities into the library field.
Lipsitz, George. “Libraries and Memories: Beyond White Privilege 101.” Progressive
Librarian no. 32 (2008): 3-9.
The author states in this article that race and racism are matters of interests as well as
attitudes. He believes that the argument of dividing humanity into different races is
misleading and unfair. Instead of blatant racism, racism tends to be much more indirect
and institutionalized. He argues that people of color are not so much disadvantaged as
they are taken advantage of. The odds are against them with the ways that libraries are
designed. The ways in which libraries collect materials and make their collections
available play an important role in people’s knowledge and ignorance. Further, the author
argues that society keeps people uninformed and that can come with a cost. Because of
the lack of access and opportunities to people of color, this can lead to health
consequences. Being on the receiving end of racism has the capability of causing severe
stress that can aggravate heart disease and mental anguish. On the aspect of whiteness, he
states that it is not so much a color, but rather a condition. Caucasians are generally
unaware of the privileges that they carry, as illustrated in this quote: “whiteness is the
most subsidized identity in our society; the most powerful identity politics are those that
protect the value of whiteness.” On a side-note, this article is limited to the discussion of
whites and blacks; it did not specifically mention other ethnic groups.
Love, Emily. “Building Bridges: Cultivating Partnerships Between Libraries and
Minority Student Services.” Education Libraries 30, no. 1 (2007): 13-19.
This article explores the array of possibilities that exist for librarians to reach out and
better serve minority students, particularly through the collaboration with multicultural
student centers. There are several challenges that this presents. First, there is a real lack of
multicultural library outreach as it is a relatively unknown area. Minority students are
more likely to face challenges than Caucasians with social, educational, institutional,
financial and technological barriers, compounded by a higher rate of dropping out of
college. Additionally, minority students feel particularly intimidated or nervous when
approaching academic libraries and librarians. In order for these problems to improve, the
author recommends several steps to help librarians with outreach to diverse populations.
The benefits of multicultural outreach are many and can lead to the increase of minority
students who visit the library and are more likely approach librarians for assistance. It can
also lead to the enrichment of student learning, create trust and allied partners across
campus and enrich lifelong critical thinking skills. Additionally, it helps to give the
university a better reputation. This particular article was written at the University of
Illinois and emphasizes the many different cultural resources available for students here.
Love, Emily. “Generation Next: Recruiting Minority Students to Librarianship.”
Reference Services Review 38, no. 3 (2010): 482-492.
The author points out that there are extremely low numbers of minority students in LIS
programs and gives suggestions as to how to improve this. The need for more minority
students as librarians is increasingly important as the overall population shifts and
Caucasians become the minority. One of the core problems has to do with the lack of
inspiration that minority students feel to pursue this profession. Often if they do not see
themselves represented, they do not see the importance of being librarians or staff. The
author also states that libraries need to make more of an effort to shed old stereotypes of
librarians, as these are not appealing to young students, and, in particular, minorities.
Another issue has to do with the lack of knowledge about what librarians actually do. In
order to make librarianship more appealing to minority students, the author suggests that
librarians need to initiate better proactive recruitment strategies. These strategies include
communicating with students, offering support and mentorship and effectively marketing
the profession. One particularly effective way is for cultural centers to offer brief
programs about librarianship, demonstrating the scope of the profession along with
information about salaries, benefits and scholarships. Additionally, the article argues that
direct personal connections including mentoring and job shadowing prove to be more
appealing to students than pamphlets and videos.
Mestre, Lori S. “Librarians Working with Diverse Populations: What Impact Does
Cultural Competency Training Have on their Efforts?” Journal of Academic
Librarianship 36, no. 6 (2010): 479-488.
This research study analyzes the challenges that librarians must face due to a lack of, or
limited amount of, cultural competency or diversity training. A “cultural competency” is
defined as an individual’s ability to successfully interact with and among others whose
values, behaviors and environments are different than one’s own. It also emphasizes the
need to recognize various learning and communication differences in others. To be
culturally competent requires the empowerment of individuals to get further involved
with multicultural issues and to keep the bigger picture in mind. To gauge whether the
interviewed librarians had this training, a series of questions were asked. The main
question was “what diversity training do librarians receive prior to entering their position
and is that training sufficient for becoming culturally competent?” The answer, for the
most part, was no. Because of the lack of training, almost all of the librarians struggled in
their positions when faced with people of different cultures. One of the problems is due to
the lack of library schools offering classes in these subjects. Multicultural librarianship is
a generally ignored subject. It would be wise to offer more multicultural librarianship
studies for several reasons, especially due to the fact that Caucasians will become the
minority in this country in a few decades. Educating all future librarians to become
culturally competent while enrolled in LIS school should be a priority. The author
concludes that it is important to acknowledge one’s own lack of knowledge about other
cultures but remain open and willing to work with people of different cultures besides
your own.
St.Lifer, Evan, and Corinne Nelson. “Unequal opportunities: Race does matter. (Cover
story).” Library Journal 122, no. 18 (1997): 42-46.
Simply put, this article argues that the needs for librarians of color are not being met. One
of the problems is that libraries tend to ignore issues with ethnic diversity because they
are controversial and difficult to talk about. This is also due to a deep discrepancy
between the ways that librarians of different races disagree about whether white librarians
are given better career opportunities. Depending on their race, librarians tend to look at
the profession through very different lenses and have diverse perspectives. Another
problem has to do with the lack of progress that has been made with increasing the
numbers of minorities enrolling in LIS schools. To help with this problem, the author
suggests that schools should use more racial sensitivity in regards to admission standards.
For example, standardized tests tend to be biased toward native-English speakers. Hiring
practices often remain that were drafted long before affirmative action and diversity
training took place. Minority librarians are faced with a number of challenges. Because
there is a lack of them in this field, the author feels that it is more difficult for them to
move up into positions of greater meaning and influence. There are also situations where
token minorities are put into every committee and meeting possible so that the
institutions can appear to be more progressive to outsiders. These minority librarians
often feel like they have more to “prove” to both represent their race in a positive manner
and to exceed expectations that many whites have of them. Some people of color,
particularly black males, are seen as “threatening” to society and that often discourages
them from becoming librarians. Lastly, the author points out that the treatment of
minorities is particularly ironic in libraries since they employee so many women, who
also suffer from discrimination and lower paying positions.