{"id":133927,"date":"2023-09-15T00:01:38","date_gmt":"2023-09-15T04:01:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/?p=133927"},"modified":"2023-09-14T18:49:54","modified_gmt":"2023-09-14T22:49:54","slug":"librarians-focus-on-the-individual-leads-to-white-savior-narratives-scholars-argue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/librarians-focus-on-the-individual-leads-to-white-savior-narratives-scholars-argue\/","title":{"rendered":"Librarians\u2019 focus on the individual leads to \u2018white savior narratives,\u2019 scholars argue"},"content":{"rendered":"

Critic warns of socialist ideas being pushed on libraries, alienating patrons<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Social justice advocacy in library education programs focus too much on the individual and not enough on group activism, leading to \u201cwhite savior narratives,\u201d three university librarians wrote in a new paper<\/a> published by Western University.<\/p>\n

In \u201cActing \u2018As If\u2019: Critical Pedagogy, Empowerment, and Labor,\u201d librarians Rafia Mirza, Karen Nicholson and Maura Seale found fault with the way students studying to be librarians are taught to promote social justice.<\/p>\n

While librarians should engage in political activism, the current emphasis on individual action is oppressive, they wrote in the analysis published by the Ontario, Canada-based university.<\/p>\n

The \u201coveremphasis on the agency and ability of an abstract charismatic teacher works instead to reinscribe neoliberal logics and white savior narratives in libraries, working against solidarity and collaboration,\u201d they continued.<\/p>\n

The College Fix<\/em> reached out twice via email to Mirza at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, Nicholson at Western University, and Seale at the University of Michigan.<\/p>\n

None responded to the requests for comment over the last month to speak on how they have implemented their ideas and what they believe is the biggest obstacle to achieving their goal.<\/p>\n

The authors focused on the education method \u201ccritical library pedagogy,\u201d which the American Library Association describes<\/a> as \u201cinclusive and reflective teaching\u201d centered around \u201csocial justice.\u201d It asks librarians to \u201cevaluate their social, political and economic standing\u201d and question how \u201csocietal norms\u201d perpetuate \u201cinjustices,\u201d according to the association.<\/p>\n

The problem with critical library pedagogy is that it \u201cemphasizes individual agency\u201d and \u201cenhances, rather than diminishes, the role of the instructor,\u201d the authors wrote.<\/p>\n

This emphasis on the individual leads to library instructors acting \u201coutside of social groups, thereby sidestepping engagement with systemic oppressive structures such as racism, sexism, classism, and homophobia,\u201d they continued.<\/p>\n

Emphasizing the individual also results in librarians \u201cdoing more with less, understaffing, competition, and burnout\u201d \u2013 problems that work \u201cagainst collective action, solidarity and equity,\u201d according to the article.<\/p>\n

The authors said library education programs should emphasize group \u201clabor\u201d instead to achieve social justice and equity.<\/p>\n

They also urged librarian instructors to acknowledge \u201cteaching as caring work, as immaterial affective labor, and to critically examine discourses of critical pedagogy and critical library pedagogy, particularly their understandings of agency and empowerment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked to weigh in on the trio\u2019s argument, another librarian, Jodi Shaw<\/a>, said the authors\u2019 socialist ideas could hurt libraries and the people who use them.<\/p>\n

Shaw, a former faculty member at Smith College in Massachusetts, resigned in 2021 after exposing its divisive racial ideology.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I see it, one of the biggest obstacles these authors face is they risk alienating their patrons,\u201d Shaw told The College Fix<\/em> via email. \u201cAnd once the patrons leave, the field of librarianship leaves with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even though the authors find fault with the current social justice teachings, Shaw said they agree with the goal of dismantling \u201cwhite supremacy\u201d and bringing libraries and their patrons \u201cin line with socialist ends. This is a betrayal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shaw said the authors seem to view themselves as \u201csaviors of the world,\u201d but they \u201cregard their patrons not as living, breathing human beings that they serve, but political objects to be leveraged as they ride the rocket ship of critical theory into academic stardom.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked about the role of a librarian, Shaw said the profession centers around serving the public.<\/p>\n

Librarians must be able to \u201cengage, connect and relate with a wide variety of students,\u201d she told The Fix<\/em>. \u201cPolitical activism \u2014by its very nature\u2014 is exclusionary and divisive. It shouldn\u2019t be hard to understand why political activism severely compromises the ability of the librarian to do his or her job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shaw said she believes the profession, especially among librarians in higher education, recently has fallen prey to political activism.<\/p>\n

As a result, she said librarians who adopt this thinking are alienating and excluding the very people they purport to serve \u2013 \u201cor, in this case, to save, from horrible things like individual empowerment and capitalism.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAs with many professions that have fallen prey to the compost bin of \u2018critical theory,\u2019 if more librarians don\u2019t speak up, they will soon find themselves out of a job,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

MORE: Marxist American Library Association chief: \u2018Libraries need to be sites of socialist organizing\u2019<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

IMAGE: Nick Fewings\/Unsplash<\/p>\n

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