This is part two in a two-part series of posts summarizing the discussion in the ALCTS e-forum regarding Equity, Diversity and Inclusion. See part 1 here.

You’ll remember that we left off with acquisitions librarians debating whether it was possible to purchase academic journals from a metaphorical farmers market. In addition, there was a significant feeling that Technical Services librarians have little agency over many of their activities: they generally have rules to follow and instructions to implement. However…

Actually, there’s lots of stuff that we can do!

37 languages is a lot of languages! (image from Sarah in Europe on flickr)

…a cataloger at the Cedar Mill Community Library (a public library near Portland Oregon) chimed in with a list of activities that their technical services activities help to promote and assist with EDI in their libraries. The library currently has material in 37 languages (to give a sense of this range, the 37^th most common language for material in Worldcat is Slovak), but this “number fluctuates a bit as immigrant refugee communities move in and out of our area.” In addition to building collections around the changing needs of local residents, the technical services department:

• Adds the vernacular script to as many bib records as possible
• Creates Spanish subject headings for records without them
• Adds local subject headings to assist in locating materials by language
• Stands firm on library policies of equal access to information, especially when LGBTQI materials are challenged by patrons
• Works with vendors to provide better quality bibliographic data
• Relabeled our WL collections to better assist the needs of all users of World Language collections.
• We are always evaluating the needs of both World language collection users and the non-WL -literate library staff who assist them.

On a similarly active note, media librarians talked about the importance of closed captioning within the media collection: not only is it important to ensure that the closed captioning works, but that it is recorded in the catalog record. It’s almost pointless if you have something with closed captioning but nobody knows.

However, each of these suggestions prompted what was phrased as “discussion of the distinction between efficiency and values”, with a coordinator of library instruction from Long Island University recognizing the fact that “we really do have limited time, money, collections, staff, etc., that limit, for example, the amount of local cataloging we can do” and that it’s only through an active leadership decision to focus on these diversity-based activities that (for instance) locally important subject headings can be usefully added.

An example of this was contributed from Pope Pius XII Library: “I’d also make an argument that the vendor-supplied less than full cataloging records may make many items less discoverable and identifiable to those interested in exploring multicultural subjects. One of our more popular books, McGoldrick’s Ethnicity and Family Therapy originally had a record not listing the chapters on the variety of ethnic and racial groups covered. Does a record like that help students researching diversity?”

Indeed– compare the records at the Pious XII library and in ANTPAC. Theirs is distinctly more user-friendly than ours! (I’ve downloaded a new record into ANTPAC, so this screenshot preserves the (perfectly fine) record with less information) A good use of my time? It probably did increase the book’s discoverability…

But… there are more questions than answers

So, there were some significant areas that seemed to get agreement in principle. But each of these responses seemed to prompt more questions, which I quote here. Many of these are really thought provoking…

• Am I doing my best to catalog our materials and teach my students to search in a way that is inclusive, non-ableist, and also leads to further discussion about diversity? Should I be ascribing classification to artists of color based on their race, or is that marginalizing a particular community? If everything goes under “American art,” is that erasing certain identities? And how do I explain how these decisions affect our catalog when I teach my students how to use the library? – Technical Services Librarian, Columbus College of Art & Design
• Amongst the staff at my library, there is interest in DEI, but wanting to be told how to apply DEI to their work – Iowa State University Library
• How do you define diversity and inclusion for your institution? Is a diverse staff different in North Central Idaho vs Ames Iowa vs Cambridge MA vs San Francisco? If it is, how is it different? If it isn’t, why isn’t it, or shouldn’t it, be different?
  • When we say “diverse,” do we mean gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, etc.? Or do we mean, or also mean, something else? Is it possible to have a diverse staff of all white people? Or all black people? Or all straight people? If so, what does that look like?
    • Kim Maxwell, MIT
  • One response to this pointed out that diversity statements/plans reflected two things: the local contexts of the organization, and also the mission and vision of the organization. To illustrate the point, the diversity statements from two universities:
    • Liberty University does not engage in unlawful discrimination or harassment because of race, color, ancestry, religion, age, sex, national origin, pregnancy or childbirth, disability or military veteran status in its educational programs and activities. Liberty University maintains its Christian character and reserves its right to discriminate on the basis of religion to the extent that applicable law respects its right to act in furtherance of its religious objectives.
    • Soka University of America does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, ancestry, national or ethnic origin, citizenship, religious creed, sex or gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, disability, veteran status, status as a disabled veteran, marital status, medical condition, genetic information or any other characteristic protected under applicable federal, state or local law in the administration of its educational policies, admissions policies, scholarships and loan programs, athletic programs, other university-administered programs and activities and university employment and related activities. Sexual harassment and sexual violence are types of sex discrimination. This policy applies to conduct on and off campus and protects students, faculty, staff and others.
  • Which are reflected in their respective mission statements:
    • Promote an understanding of the Western tradition and the diverse elements of American cultural history, especially the importance of the individual in maintaining democratic and free market processes. ; 7. Contribute to a knowledge and understanding of other cultures and of international events.
    • Educational objectives are fostered at the university through the commitment to rigorous academic endeavors, free and open dialogue, and an appreciation for human diversity. Education is an integrating process in which students gain an awareness of the interdependence of themselves, others and the environment.(I’ll let you guess which is which…)

Have you looked in the mirror lately?

Helen Twelvetrees, Rutland Gates, Bellevue Hill, Sydney, early 1936 (Flickr – State Library of New South Wales)

As well as all the considerations about what we do as technical service librarians, there was some discussion about who ‘we’ are. The idea that library schools are not producing graduates that represent a cross-section of the country (or indeed, the people we serve in libraries) is not a new one, but one that is important to note. What we can do about this, however, is a bit less clear. Some ideas included:

• For instance, we’ve had plenty of conversations (and actionable decisions) on how to diversify our applicant pool for jobs but we have failed to have a discussion on dealing with the retention/inclusion piece for staffing. – Head of online organization and management, Western Carolina University
• The MLS is inherently a barrier of class for a lot of people – and scholarships/grants to attend library school don’t come easy. Strictly requiring a MLS/MLIS from your job recruitment can leave out a lot of candidates who haven’t had the financial opportunity to enroll and complete the degree but have professional experience in libraries. I think Mary’s point about hiring and mentoring them or giving them opportunities to enroll in an MLS program while working is a good one. A lot of people are first-generation graduate students, and that doesn’t always come easily. If we had the resources to do this, we may not have such a lack of diversity in our library hiring pools. – Columbus College of Art & Design

Finally, what’s the point?

I found all of this discussion to be really interesting. As a practitioner in this field, I enjoy what I do. But I’ve often rolled my eyes when people talk about the role that cataloging has in promoting diversity. It has always seemed counter to the two big trends in cataloging that have ruled my career thus far: attempting to achieve consistency and following the rules; while trying to be more efficient, quicker, and in general to achieve more throughput. But of course, these do not necessarily preclude making sure that we sensitively deal with material that contains offensive material, that we highlight material relating to diversity within our content, and that we pay attention to the constituencies we serve at our institutions while we’re determining our priorities.

As much as I wish it didn’t exist, the New Christian Crusade Church is both a historical and contemporary organization. It is of our world, and documents relating to it should be both preserved and made available for study. By making them available to UCI’s academic community, we can help to create a better understanding of how this ideology was formed, the circumstances that allowed it to flourish, and how it has evolved to its current state. Maintaining an awareness of, and commitment to, diversity within the library is important in helping to ensure this happens. This discussion helped to elucidate the important role that library technical services has in these activities.

I will finish with a bit of introspection from Kim Maxwell, the E-Resources Management Librarian at MIT, who wondered:

Do I think it would be possible to have this culture without these [diversity] statements? Well, I think you could, and we did for decades have a diverse culture without acknowledging or celebrating it as publicly as we perhaps do now. The task forces and statements and reports and committees all serve to strengthen what the admissions office and human resources have tried to build. They are what make people want to stay and contribute to our community, to build something better, together, I think. That’s how I see it manifested within the Libraries, certainly.