BrownTown converses with public librarian and creator of the Infollectuals Discussion Series, Kristyn Caragher. She expands our knowledge of public access to and exchange of information, liberatory-minded programming, strategies to challenge the status quo in her field, and the ever-present intersection of libraries and social justice.
GUEST
Kristyn Caragher is a public librarian and a two-time graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's School of Information Sciences. She is the creator of Infollectuals, a discussion series that focuses on pressing societal issues and their relationship to libraries and social justice.
OVERVIEW
BrownTown and Kristyn discuss the role public libraries, other institutions, and the people that populate them play in providing community access to information and resources. Enter Infollectuals: Kristyn’s discussion series and graduate/professional work that started it furthers this dialogue by challenging her field through programming and workshops, asking (and answering) the question, what does white anti-racist librarianship look like? How can those with privilege who also serve as gatekeepers to publicly funded resources use them more responsibly and intentionally under an anti-oppressive, liberatory framework? Kristyn also brings up the tension in the current “free speech” debate particularly between libraries and hate groups in regard to physical space for programming. The group also shifts the site from institutions to the digital sphere noting Safiya Umoja Noble’s book Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism.
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You can learn more about Kristyn's work at KristynCaragher.com. Follow Kristyn and Infollectuals on Twitter!
Read her contributions in Topographies of Whiteness: Mapping Whiteness in Library and Information Science.
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CREDITS: Intro/outro music by Fiendsh. Audio engineered by Genta Tamashiro.
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