Reference Services Review: Volume 50 Issue 1

Editorial: “Yes, We are […] actively working against racism”

Sarah Barbara Watstein, Elizabeth M. Johns

Guest editorial: Anti-racist scholarship and practice in library and information science

Mark A. Puente, Jim Hahn

Library response to Black Liberation Collective: a review of student calls for change and implications for anti-racist initiatives in academic libraries

Amy Faye Bocko, LuMarie Guth, Micha Broadnax

In September 2015 protests erupted at the University of Missouri following a series of racist incidents on campus and culminating in the resignation of the university president in…

“You can't read your way out of racism”: creating anti-racist action out of education in an academic library

Monica Figueroa, Kristan Shawgo

Under the transformational leadership of the University Librarian, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries shifted from having an education- and…

Beyond El Arrebato: the seven stages of Conocimiento as instruments for radical reflection and the unlearning of white supremacy culture

Sheila García Mazari

To be actively antiracist requires an internal reckoning, what Chicana activist and scholar Gloria E. Anzaldúa referred to as “el arrebato.” Used to describe the first of seven…

Toward belonging and mutual hospitality: decentering whiteness in the “new normal”

Africa Hands

The postquarantine reopening of public libraries presents an opportunity for resetting the way libraries welcome patrons. Unfortunately, vestiges of inhospitable, white…

Whiteness from the top down: systemic change as antiracist action in LIS

Alyssa Jennings, Kristine Kinzer

The purpose of the paper is two-fold. The first is to inform the readers of the racist origins of libraries in America. Readers will learn about historic instances of systemic…

Analysis of anti-racism, equity, inclusion and social justice initiatives in library and information science literature

Emily P. Jones, Nandita S. Mani, Rebecca B. Carlson, Carolyn G. Welker, Michelle Cawley, Fei Yu

The objective of this study is to establish the current state of library and information science (LIS) scholarship pertaining to anti-racism, equity, inclusion and social justice…

Beyond the police: libraries as locations of carceral care

Teresa Helena Moreno

The purpose of this paper is to make visible the connections libraries have to carceral systems and how library workers replicate carceral behavior through care.

Radical re-imagination: centering a BIPOC library workforce in an asset-based autoethnography

Janis J. Shearer, Ben B. Chiewphasa

Academic BIPOC librarians oftentime struggle to envision themselves and navigate in White-dominant spaces due to deficit thinking. To better understand how DEIA efforts can…

Not a token! A discussion on racial capitalism and its impact on academic librarians and libraries

Silvia Vong

The purpose of this article is to introduce the concept of racial capitalism in the context of academic libraries.

Situating LIS pedagogy and curriculum in diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility, and anti-racism: a reflection on process

Jade G. Winn, Melissa L. Miller, Caroline Muglia, Christopher Stewart, Ruth Wallach

A working group of Masters in Management of Library and Information Science (MMLIS) Librarian Faculty was formed to address diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility and…