Prelims

Libraries and the Global Retreat of Democracy: Confronting Polarization, Misinformation, and Suppression

ISBN: 978-1-83982-597-2, eISBN: 978-1-83982-596-5

ISSN: 0065-2830

Publication date: 4 November 2021

Citation

(2021), "Prelims", Taylor, N.G., Kettnich, K., Gorham, U. and Jaeger, P.T. (Ed.) Libraries and the Global Retreat of Democracy: Confronting Polarization, Misinformation, and Suppression (Advances in Librarianship, Vol. 50), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. i-x. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0065-283020210000050014

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2022 Emerald Publishing Limited


Half Title Page

LIBRARIES AND THE GLOBAL RETREAT OF DEMOCRACY

Series Page

ADVANCES IN LIBRARIANSHIP

Advances in Librarianship Editor

  • Paul T. Jaeger, University of Maryland, Series Editor

  • Bharat Mehra, The University of Alabama, Series Editor

Advances in Librarianship Editorial Board

  • Denise E. Agosto, Drexel University

  • Wade Bishop, University of Tennessee, Knoxville

  • John Buschman, Seton Hall University

  • Michelle Caswell, University of California, Los Angeles

  • Ursula Gorham, University of Maryland

  • Sandra Hughes-Hassell, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  • R. David Lankes, University of South Carolina

  • Don Latham, Florida State University

  • Jerome Offord, Lincoln University of Missouri

  • Ricardo L. Punzalan, University of Michigan

  • Brian Wentz, Shippensburg University

  • Lynn Westbrook, University of Texas

Title Page

ADVANCES IN LIBRARIANSHIP - VOLUME 50

LIBRARIES AND THE GLOBAL RETREAT OF DEMOCRACY: CONFRONTING POLARIZATION, MISINFORMATION, AND SUPPRESSION

EDITED BY

NATALIE GREENE TAYLOR

University of South Florida, USA

KAREN KETTNICH

Clemson University, USA

URSULA GORHAM

University of Maryland, USA

AND

PAUL T. JAEGER

University of Maryland, USA

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Howard House, Wagon Lane, Bingley BD16 1WA, UK

First edition 2022

Copyright © 2022 Emerald Publishing Limited

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ISBN: 978-1-83982-597-2 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-83982-596-5 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-83982-598-9 (Epub)

ISSN: 0065-2830 (Series)

Contents

About the Contributors vii
Introduction: Anticipating 2020 and Beyond: What’s Next for Libraries and Democracy?
Natalie Greene Taylor, Ursula Gorham, Karen Kettnich and Paul T. Jaeger 1
SECTION 1: WHAT IS DEMOCRACY?
Chapter 1: Actually-Existing Democracy and Libraries: A Mapping Exercise
John Buschman 9
Chapter 2: A Right to be Misinformed? Considering Fake News as a Form of Information Poverty
Nicole A. Cooke 45
Chapter 3: Facts (Almost) Never Change Minds: Libraries and the Management of Democracy-Supportive Public Perceptions
Bill Crowley 61
SECTION 2: HOW THE INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT CONTRIBUTES TO AND DETRACTS FROM DEMOCRACY
Chapter 4: Container Collapse and Misinformation: Why Digitization Creates Challenges for Democracy
Christopher Cyr 91
Chapter 5: Fighting Fake News: The Cognitive Factors Impeding Political Information Literacy
Rajesh Singh and Kyle N. Brinster 109
Chapter 6: Information Obstacle Course: Seeking the Right to Asylum at the US–Mexico Border
Amy Dickinson 133
SECTION 3: LIBRARIES AS VIRTUAL AND PHYSICAL SPACES FOR DEMOCRACY
Chapter 7: Beyond Fake News: Learning from Information Literacy Programs in Ukraine
Maria Haigh, Thomas Haigh, Maryna Dorosh and Tetiana Matychak 163
Chapter 8: “Politic Talks” in Academic Libraries of the South to Address a Global Democracy Recession in the United States: An Exploratory Website Analysis
Bharat Mehra and Joseph Winberry 183
Chapter 9: Raking the Forests: Information Literacy, Political Polarization, Fake News, and the Educational Roles of Librarians
Paul T. Jaeger and Natalie Greene Taylor 211
Chapter 10: Libraries of, by, and for the People: Reimagining Strategies to Enhance Democratic Culture within LIS Spaces and Programming
Daniela K. DiGiacomo, Shannon M. Oltmann and Colleen Hall 225
Afterword: Reverse the Retreat: Countering Disinformation and Authoritarianism as the Work of Libraries
Paul T. Jaeger, Karen Kettnich, Ursula Gorham and Natalie Greene Taylor 247
Index 257

About the Contributors

Kyle N. Brinster is a recent Graduate of St John’s University’s dual degree Public History and Library Information Science program, where he earned the Br. Emmett Corry – H.W. Wilson Foundation Social Justice Fellowship (2020), as well as the DLIS Professional Development Scholarship for presenting at Catholic University’s “Bridging the Spectrum” symposia in February 2020. He also holds a BA in History from Lehigh University. He currently works as a Library Assistant with an interest in politics and early American history. He lives in New Jersey with his wife and cat.

John Buschman came to Seton Hall University as the Dean of University Libraries in July 2012. He was previously an Associate University Librarian for Scholarly Resources and Services at Georgetown University and prior to that he was at Rider University for 19 years. He is the author or editor of six books – most recently Libraries, Classrooms, and the Interests of Democracy (2012) as well as the award-winning Dismantling the Public Sphere (2003). He is originally from Indiana and received his Undergraduate and Library degrees from Ball State University, an MA in American Studies from St Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, and his Doctorate from Georgetown University.

Nicole A. Cooke is the Augusta Baker Endowed Chair and an Associate Professor at the University of South Carolina. Her research and teaching interests include human information behavior, critical cultural information studies, and diversity and social justice in librarianship. She was the 2019 ALISE Excellence in Teaching Award recipient, and she has edited and authored several books, including Information Services to Diverse Populations and Fake News and Alternative Facts: Information Literacy in a Post-truth Era.

Bill Crowley worked in New York, Alabama, Indiana, and Ohio libraries in positions ranging from Clerk to Public Relations Consultant, Library Cooperative Administrator, and Deputy State Librarian. He chaired a state’s legislative committee and served as a Federal Relations Coordinator. He authored fifty-plus articles and chapters in the library science, information science, and higher education literatures, and two books, Spanning the Theory-Practice Divide in Library and Information Science, and Renewing Professional Librarianship: A Fundamental Rethinking, a Beta Phi Mu Monograph. He also edited Defending Professionalism: A Resource for Librarians, Information Specialists, Knowledge Managers, and Archivists. His BA is in History (Hunter College), MS in Library Service (Columbia University), MA in English (Ohio State University), and PhD in Higher Education (Ohio University). Familiarity with multiple disciplines takes Bill’s research beyond the information silo. Presently, he is a Professor with Dominican University’s School of Information Studies.

Christopher Cyr is an Associate Research Scientist at OCLC. He holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Colorado, and a BA in Political Science and History from the Ohio State University. Prior to his time at OCLC, he was an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Eastern Kentucky University, and an ABD Fellow at the One Earth Future Foundation. His research interests include information seeking behavior and the impact of the library in the local community, and he has published in journals such as Library & Information Science Research, First Monday, and Social Politics.

Amy Dickinson is a Public Services Librarian in Montrose, Colorado, and holds an MLIS from the University of Maryland, College Park. Prior to working as a Librarian, she worked for over 15 years as an educator in western Massachusetts; Yuty, Paraguay; and Washington, DC. Her interests include public libraries, social justice, and public policy.

Daniela K. DiGiacomo is an Assistant Professor of Library and Information Science in the School of Information Science at the University of Kentucky. Dr DiGiacomo’s program of research focuses on how to design formal and informal learning settings in ways that support and extend young people’s lived experiences, interests, and expertise. As a Learning Scientist trained in the sociocultural tradition, Dr DiGiacomo is particularly interested in how to design equitable teaching and learning relationships between adults and young people across various lines of difference.

Maryna Dorosh is a Media Literacy Expert and Media Trainer. She focuses on media literacy integration into educational materials and on designing and holding trainings for educators. She works at IREX in Ukraine on the project “Learn to Discern in Education.” She has a Master’s degree in Journalism from the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Prior to joining IREX, she worked as an Editor of the Ukrainian website MediaSapiens and was the Co-creator of Media Driver (an online media literacy manual for teenagers).

Ursula Gorham is a Senior Lecturer and the Director of the Master of Library and Information Science program in the College of Information Studies at the University of Maryland, College Park. She is admitted to practice law in Maryland; her research and teaching reflect her interest in legal and policy issues related to information access. Her research has appeared in Government Information Quarterly and Law Library Journal, among other venues, and her fourth book – Understanding Human Information Behavior: When, How, and Why People Interact with Information (written with Beth St Jean and Elizabeth Bonsignore) was recently published in April 2021.

Maria Haigh is an Associate Professor of Information Studies at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee and Comenius Visiting Professor at Siegen University. She has a PhD in Information Systems from Drexel University. Her research looks at the intersection of information institutions and practices with national identity. In recent years, it has increasingly focused on fake news and disinformation.

Thomas Haigh is a Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee and Comenius Visiting Professor at Siegen University. His PhD is in History and Sociology of Science, from the University of Pennsylvania. He is also trained in Computer Science and specializes in the History of Information Technology. He is the lead author of ENIAC in Action: Making and Remaking the Modern Computer (MIT 2016) and A New History of Modern Computing (MIT 2021), as well as the editor of Histories of Computing (Harvard 2011) and Exploring the Early Digital (Springer 2019).

Colleen Hall began her career in libraries as a Clerk, shelving books and serving the public. From inside this lens, she has been fortunate to work as a Children’s Librarian, a School Librarian and as the Manager of Outreach, all positions involving service to the community, especially to youth and underserved populations. She currently serves as the Assistant Director of the Boyle County Public Library in Central Kentucky.

Paul T. Jaeger, PhD, MLS, JD, MEd, is a Professor of the College of Information Studies at the University of Maryland. He studies the impacts of law and policy on information access, accessibility, and literacy, with a primary focus on human rights and civil rights. He is the author of more than 190 journal articles and book chapters, as well as 20 books. He is the Co-Editor of the Library Quarterly and Co-Chair of the Disability Summit. In 2014, he received the Library Journal/ALISE Excellence in Teaching Award.

Karen Kettnich is the Managing Editor of The Library Quarterly and Lecturer in English at Clemson University. During more than a decade with Library Quarterly and previously with the Folger Shakespeare Library, she has paired work in and about libraries with her work in literary, cultural, and performance studies. In addition to her work with Library Quarterly, her research has been published in the edited volume The Age of Nashe: Print Culture, Elizabethan London, and Definitions of Authorship, and in journals including Shakespeare and Early Theatre.

Tetiana Matychak is a Fact-Checker and Media Trainer with seven years of experience, and she has 17 years of experience in her work as as an Online Journalist and Editor. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Philosophy and a Master’s degree in Journalism. She was a Co-founder and Editor-in-chief (2014–2015) of the website Stopfake.org. She is a co-author of a book Words and Wars: Ukraine Facing Kremlin Propaganda. In addition, she was involved in a project to integrate fact-checking into the school curriculum for 8th and 9th grades. She is currently working with Internews Ukraine on projects that monitor and fact-check disinformation in Ukraine.

Bharat Mehra is EBSCO Endowed Chair in Social Justice and a Professor in the School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Alabama. His research examines issues of diversity and social justice in library and information science and community informatics, or the use of information and communication technologies to empower minority and underserved populations to make meaningful changes in their everyday lives. He has applied action research while collaborating with racial/ethnic groups, international diasporic communities, sexual minorities, rural communities, low-income families, small businesses, and others to represent their experiences and perspectives in the design of community-based information systems and services.

Shannon M. Oltmann is an Associate Professor in the School of Information Science at the University of Kentucky. She obtained her PhD from Indiana University. Her research interests include information ethics, censorship, intellectual freedom, information policy, public libraries, privacy, and qualitative research methods. She is the Editor of the Journal of Intellectual Freedom and Privacy and the Associate Editor for Library Quarterly. She recently published a book, Practicing Intellectual Freedom in Libraries.

Rajesh Singh, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the Division of Library and Information Science at St John’s University in New York. He has previously worked at Emporia State University and the University of British Columbia. His current research interests revolve around cultural intelligence, knowledge management, and information behavior. He teaches courses in cultural competence, marketing and advocacy, knowledge management, project management, and related management areas.

Natalie Greene Taylor, PhD, MLS, is an Associate Professor and Program Coordinator of the Master of Library and Information Science (MLIS) program at the School of Information of the University of South Florida. Her research focuses on youth information literacy, information intermediaries, and information policy as it affects youth information access. She has published articles in over two dozen scholarly journals, her research has appeared in American Libraries and other professional journals, and she has co-authored four books. She is the Co-Editor of Library Quarterly.

Joseph Winberry is a PhD Student at the University of Tennessee’s College of Communication and Information. His research interests in community informatics, information practices, and social justice explore how people use information and technology to produce social change. His scholarship has been published in The International Journal of Information, Diversity, and Inclusion; The Journal of Documentation; The Journal of Librarianship and Information Science; and The Library Quarterly among other venues. He has received funding and awards from the Association for Library and Information Science Education, the American Library Association’s Social Responsibility Roundtable, and the Association for Information Science and Technology.