Dorothy Porter: A Black Woman Pioneer in Library and Information Science

Penelope Wright

Conley, Z. (2023). Dorothy Porter: A Black woman pioneer in library and information science. Arkansas Libraries Fall/Winter 2023, 80(3/4), 24-26.

Summary:

Dorothy Porter was born in 1905 in Virginia. She attended Howard University and in 1930 became a librarian there. In 1932 she was Columbia University's first Black student to earn a library science degree. When she began as a librarian, there were two numbers in Dewey that all materials by (or about) Black people went: 326 (slavery) or 325 (colonization). A book of poetry by a Black author would be assigned either 326 or 325, it would not go in 811. Dorothy changed this, putting materials by Black authors in the sections in which they fit best in the wider Dewey system, not just in the two numbers. Porter's system pushed back on racism and challenged the bias of the Dewey system. She was the curator of the Moorland Foundation and amassed a collection of more than 180,000 materials. Her contributions to Black history and literature were immense. She received numerous awards and accolades, including the Frankel Award from the National Endowment for the Humanities. She published many scholarly works and helped set the standard for collections focused on Black lives and culture. Porter's indomitable will and trailblazing nature brought resounding positive change to libraries worldwide. 

Evaluation/Opinion

I read a lot of different articles this semester but this is the one that I kept coming back to, that stuck in my mind the most. Porter challenged the status quo, and shook up the way things "had always been done" because the way things had "always been done" was wrong. I'm glad I learned about her, she was an amazing woman. I'd recommend this article to anyone who wants a quick, informative read about notable librarians, the history of libraries, or overcoming institutional racism. 

The Need for Diversity Audits

 

Amanda Lawrence

Brilliant, B., Guessford, M.R., Snieg, A.L., Jones, J.J., Keeler, T., & Stephenson, P.L. (2002). Assessing diversity in hospital library collections. Medical Reference Services Quarterly. 41(4), 424-438. https://doi.org/10.1080/02763869.2022.2131185

For Project 6 and my additional reading assignment, I chose to focus my research on diversity audits and why they are an important step in all collection management policies. At a minimum, collection development is the act of selecting new materials and weeding out old ones for your students or patrons. However, without specific collection management policies that are inclusive of diversity, equity, and inclusion standards, a library's collection runs the risk of excluding underrepresented people, their voices, and their experiences.

The article above focused on the need for diversity audits in a library hospital. My coursework and experience has primarily been with public libraries, so it was interesting to see how the idea of collection management works in a different setting. Unsurprisingly, a lack of diverse materials seems to be a common thread amongst most libraries; out of the libraries studied, 3% of collections referred to disability, 8% referred to ethnicity, and 0.37% had any cross-cultural references. This is particularly startling in a medical setting, since patients need medical professionals who are sensitive to their diverse needs and who understand how different backgrounds can affect a person's physical or mental health. On a more basic level, diseases present themselves differently on different bodies, so without diverse representation in medical books, patients may go undiagnosed. This article shows the need to conduct diversity audits on hospital collections; even though it is a long, costly, and imperfect system, it is essential for the library and hospital in order to function and provide proper evidence-based care.

Creating and Building Effective Multilingual Library Collections

Shabeena Mathiruban

Hill, J. (2018). Building for Diversity: How Public Libraries Can Create Great  Multilingual Collections. Dalhousie Journal of Interdisciplinary Management, 14. https://doi.org/10.5931/djim.v14i0.7854

This article discusses how to build multilingual collections in public libraries through community consultations, collaborating with other libraries, working with vendors, cataloging and maintaining the collection, marketing, and providing staff training. When creating a multilingual collection, the first step is understanding the demographics of the community which can be obtained from community data found online or from your own research. Next, to understand the needs and interests of the community, libraries can do community consultations with library patrons. Librarians can do studies with patrons through paper surveys or observations to obtain this crucial information. They also need to determine how broad they want to create their multilingual collection by looking at the demographic data, as communities with large immigrant populations may need a more comprehensive multilingual collection. Moreover, hiring bilingual staff that can communicate with library patrons in their non-English language is beneficial. Overall, this article provides numerous ways libraries can create an effective multilingual collection for patrons to meet their information needs.  

From the article, I liked the idea of doing community consultations to understand the needs and interests of multilingual library patrons. The library system I work at primarily uses demographic data to determine which languages to include in their multilingual collections, however community consultations are usually not conducted. I have seen many multilingual books that are not circulating at my library and have been discarded, because they do not meet the interests of the patrons. I think community consultations can be very beneficial in creating a relevant collection that meets the needs and interests of diverse communities. Moroever, I liked that this article mentions the importance of hiring bilingual library staff as this greatly assists patrons with language barriers. 

Equity in Action: Doing a Diversity Audit

 

Jensen, Karen.  (2018).  Library Journal’s Equity in Action: Doing a Diversity Audit.  https://www.teenlibrariantoolbox.com/2018/10/library-journals-equity-in-action-doing-a-diversity-audit/

 

This web posting is by Karen Jensen who has learned from her own experience of working in libraries, research, and then finally presenting to others what she has learned about diversity in collections and the  process of auditing a library collection to gather data on our collection and to look for weak areas of the collection.  Our first attempt at a diversity audit is likely not going to yield the results that we want or expect.  It may take several tries, and the more research we do about effective audits and working with others who have completed audits successfully will help ease the learning curve and be a more productive use of our limited time.  The experience of those such as Ms. Jensen can save us the trouble and nuisance of re-inventing the wheel, so to speak, and ease us into a process that might feel completely overwhelming, especially to a new librarian.

 A diversity audit helps us to answer the question, “what percentage of my collection is written by something other than the traditionally dominant voice?”   She includes slides from a recent presentation that she gave, and talks about the types of diversity to consider, how we can accomplish an effective diversity audit, collecting and analyzing our data.  How we can organize our audit in “chunks”  rather than tackling the entire collection at once to avoid becoming overwhelmed.  She also shares other resources that are helpful in learning more about diversity in library collections as well as how to complete a successful audit. 

 

 

 

 Chapman, E. L., & Birdi, B. (2016). “It’s Woefully Inadequate”: Collections of LGBTQ* Fiction for Teens in English Public Library Services. Journal of Research on Libraries & Young Adults, 7(1), 1–29.

Summary:

This article highlights a study conducted in the UK that investigates how accessible and available LGBTQ+ fiction is to teens in British libraries. Using a mix methods approach they compared library holdings and collections to a list of LGBTQ+ resources and titles they created and collected to see how  much of that list was present and in what formats. Sadly the reported findings suggested that very few libraries had a strong collection of up to date and positive LGBTQ+ fiction available for young readers. Research suggested there were significant gaps and much needed room for improvement across most of the library branches they surveyed. The MLIS staff who were interviewed were often shocked and disappointed that so little relevant titles and resources were available.

Evaluation: 

Though the results of the study proved disappointing because of the clear lack of titles available to LGBTQ+ youth and teens the study was very successful in exposing a gap in the collection. The results of the study were distributed to the branches they conducted their research at and the staff were able to see their lack of collection and start to address it. The staff also were given access to the list created be the researchers so they could build and grow their collection of LGBTQ+ materials that are genuinely wanted by LGBTQ+ teens. 

Does My Collection Reflect My Community? Diversity in the School Library

Panelists Sylvie Shaffer, PreK-8 Librarian, Capitol Hill Day School (DC)  (@sylvie_shaffer‏) Matthew Winner, Elementary School Librarian, Howard County Public Schools (MD) (@MatthewWinner, @ChildrensBkPod)

This Future Ready Librarians’ webinar takes a long hard look at the authors or curators of the literature in our children’s school library collections. This topic and inspection can inform our selection of diverse books in our communities. Their data features statistics about books received (3,500) and census estimates from 2015.  For example, in 2017 White Americans (61% of the population) were the authors of 85% of the total number of books published.  This leaves very few new books written or shared with the children’s book center (or school libraries) by marginalized, or other authors. Moreover, the books published historically have not been written by individuals from non-white communities.  The panelists further include important topics such as what is diversity, and what is the importance of diverse books in a homogenous population.  The popular topic of books as windows and books as mirrors is presented as more than just a connection to literature for the reader but as a literary journey, meaning “transform human experience”. To get started tips for analyzing classroom libraries and workbooks are presented. Simple audits are done by students in the classroom or with a scholastic book fair. The flyer provides real-time data and anyone can take on the challenge. Additional resources for staying engaged and informed about new titles and new authors representing various backgrounds include asking specifically for diverse books from publishing companies, reading blogs, joining diverse books campaigns, creating Symbloos with schools, reviewing electronic collections, making Padlets and so on.

Reflection: These are practical tips and suggestions for the librarian to consider.  Perhaps the collections policy needs to include a checklist, or better yet, the electronic analysis needs to highlight or give prizes to the schools that take the time to transform their collections to meet the standards we are seeking.  While I think it is important to reverse the trend and provide authentic literature from people representing all cultures and lifestyles, I do not want to have a diverse collection that doe not appeal to my young patrons. A further topic could be how to promote the titles once they are acquired.

"The Uncomfortable Truth about Children's Books" - from Mother Jones Magazine - Sept. 2016

Christopher Fluetsch

Slater, D. (2016, September 9). The uncomfortable truth about children’s books. Mother Jones. Retrieved from http://www.motherjones.com/media/2016/08/diversity-childrens-books-slavery-twitter

    I started reading Mother Jones magazine back in high school, partly for the articles, but mostly because if you were in high school in Lodi, CA, in the late-80’s, reading Mother Jones was the second-most rebellious thing you could do, right after coming out, and was a lot less likely to get you beaten up on a regular basis. Plus, it always felt like an adventure to drive to the one magazine store in south Stockton that stocked Mother Jones, right next to the latest issue of Pravda.

I never really considered that 3 decades later I’d still be reading it. It just goes to show that you never can tell where literacy will take you.

This article is a well-written overview of some of the problems facing librarians, parents and others in creating a diverse collection of children’s literature. It discusses the business of publishing, the negative feedback loop created when multicultural books are published but don’t sell, leading to few such books, leading to non-white potential readers ignoring books that are available and so forth. It also touches on some of the recent controversies in children’s publishing, including the withdrawal from sale of A Birthday Cake for George Washington.

An important aspect of the article for library science students is the section that looks at gatekeeping. We are gatekeepers, whether we like it or not, and the decisions we make affect what our students read. Keeping this in mind through the entire process, from collection development to in-library marketing, will help us better serve our clients.

Including books that represent and appeal to a diverse patron population is an important challenge for librarians of all types. I find this is particularly true in my elementary school library. I try to select a wide array of books, and I try to encourage students to read outside their own personal comfort zones, but locating and acquiring a variety of such books is difficult. The article does not offer any major solutions, but it does a good job offering an overview of some of the problems.

Using Outreach Efforts to Acquire Documentation

Christina Perris
INFO 266
Fall 2015

Using Outreach Efforts to Acquire Documentation

Hughes-Watkins, Lae'l. (2014). Filling in the gaps: Using outreach efforts to acquire documentation on the black campus movement, 1965-1972. Archival Issues: Journal of the Midwest Archives Conference, 36(1), 27-42.

This journal article focuses on the Department of Special Collections and Archives at Kent State University’s efforts to develop their collection of documentation on the Black Campus Movement, 1965-1972.  The archivist opens by presenting a brief history of the black campus movement: first, on broad, national scale; then, in the context of how it was on the campus of Kent State.  The archivist discusses the efforts she undertook to assess the deficiency in the department’s collections through a survey of the holdings, and then how she creates a collection development plan to address these shortcomings.  The archivist goes on to explain how she reviewed the outreach strategy and brought it into alignment with the new collection development plan.  She then explains how she went on the acquiring the collection focused on the black campus movement and black student life.

This article is an probably one of the most ambitious, thorough and detailed accounts of what it truly takes to acquire a representative collection – whether it is specifically targeted to a special collection department, a special collections department with an archive or an archive alone – in your repository.  Whether you work in an academic library of a state-run university with a special collections department or a local historical society’s community-based archive, it might be advisable to be somewhat versed in the history of the United States educational system as it relates to state-run universities (at least, the “major events” in the system, such as the passage of Civil Rights legislation, students rights movements, etc.) or the basic history of the community.  Knowing the history – preferably from unbiased, academic sources – will allow to assess where “gaps” in the existing collection lie.  Once you identify these gaps, as the author did, you can then determine how to “remedy” them and present a more complete – and therefore, accurate – representation of the history of the institution or community.