Ultima Hora

¿Estás listo para la hora de los AC/DC? 🔥 ¿Puerto Madero se Convirtió en un Bajo Nivel de Protección… Houston, tenemos un problema: ¿AC/DC sigue tocando sin Stevie? 🤡 🎉 ¿BTS Vienen a México o Solo Fingen la Gira? 🚩 ¿Se Cobran Tarifa por Vuelos Fantasma?

Hoy En Perspectiva

In the Library with the Lead Pipe

In the Library with the Lead Pipe Noticias

Puzzlement and Praxis in the Academic Library: Critically Reimagining Collection Practices with S…

Puzzlement and Praxis in the Academic Library: Critically Reimagining Collection Practices with Students

In Brief
This article mobilizes critical librarianship and critical/decolonial pedagogical strategies for disrupting and reconceiving collection practices in academic libraries. The authors—an academic librarian and a curriculum/pedagogy professor—argue that librarians can contend with the political tensions that underlie their collection management practices by actively questioning—or puzzling—with students and opening up library collections to students. The authors (a) highlight how undergraduate students were invited to engage with their library’s collection management
practices, (b) discuss examples of student-curated collections from a recent initiative, and (c) consider how the initiative informs current and future possibilities for student involvement in library work and knowledge management. In opening up the library collections to students, this work decenters the librarian-as-expert paradigm while also illustrating both the challenges and possibilities of demystifying and shifting our approach to information science.
By
Sarah Keener
and
Cee Carter
Introduction: Storying our Everyday Puzzlements
Figure 1
Several Student-Curated Featured Collections on the Library Shelf
When writing this article, Sarah Keener (she/her) was the library director for a small, rural college in the northeast. She’s had one foot in education and academia and the other in outdoor and hands-on trades for the entirety of her working life. This duality influences her interdisciplinary and expeditionary approach to the academic library, an approach that has also been shaped by the years she spent as a middle school teacher, school librarian, craft educator and student, and coach. As a white educator in a remote area that is socioeconomically diverse but predominantly white, the persistent sense of discomfort and uncertainty she confronts in this role arises largely from her inevitable participation in oppressive practices and colonial systems, and from the uneven power dynamics that seem inherent to being a teacher of any kind. This question, to paraphrase Maluski and Bruce (2022), has become central to her work and mission in education:
What is my role in dismantling oppressive practices?
Cee Carter is a fifth-generation Black woman educator and an Assistant Professor at the University of Vermont. Her previous work as a middle school educator and non-profit educational leader exposed the larger political economy of race that facilitates educational investments for reform. That is, how race is leveraged for policy intervention and profit in public education. In response, her scholarly work aims to shift normative curricular and pedagogical practices (Sykes, 2011)—asking more of how we construct and pursue our conceptions of justice in the era of neoliberal public education reform (Carter, 2024). A question that animates her educational inquiry is:
Ho…

In the Library with the Lead Pipe Noticias

Towards a Librarianship of the Future: Fostering Cultural Adaptation to Climate Change

Towards a Librarianship of the Future: Fostering Cultural Adaptation to Climate Change

In Brief
The field of library science is paying increasing attention to anthropogenic climate change by exploring best practices for mitigating damage from environmental disasters and participating in climate action. This work is valuable, but it does not necessarily take on the cultural dimensions of climate adaptation. How are unquestioned ideas about time and decay supporting the carbon-heavy preservation of archival materials? How can libraries promote interspecies kinship, consider the legacy of industrial colonialism, and acknowledge the emotional impact of environmental destruction? To approach these questions, this article introduces thinkers from the environmental humanities and Anthropocene scholarship and applies their work to the field of library science. It explores alternatives to linear concepts of time, affective materiality of archival objects, palliative death ethics, and Indigenous perspectives of climate change as the legacy of industrial colonialism. The article concludes by suggesting ways that institutions can promote cultural adaptation to climate change.
By
Nora Zahn
Introduction
Novelist Ursula K. Le Guin begins her 1985 epic,
Always Coming Home,
with a brief chapter titled “Towards an Archaeology of the Future.”
1
The most likely intention is not to promote new standards to modernize the field of archaeology (“towards an archaeology
for
the future”), nor is it to envision or influence what archaeological practice may look like decades or centuries from now (“towards a
future archaeology”
). Rather, the book is a fictional ethnography of a people living in what we know as California’s Napa Valley thousands of years from the present day. What Le Guin likely means by the phrase is the most grammatically simple yet conceptually brain-melting interpretation: to replace the past with the future as the object of archaeological study. She is telling us to turn our heads and look in the opposite direction.
The dissonance of studying the ruins of a society that doesn’t yet exist is apt for approaching the Anthropocene, the Earth’s current, unofficial geological epoch characterized by the ecosystem-altering impact of
Homo sapiens
and resulting planetary disruptions.
2
Since the term was coined in the early 2000s, scholars from various academic disciplines have considered its implications as a framework that elevates human behavior to the level of worldshifting ecological events.
3
One such discipline is the environmental humanities, a field that emphasizes narrative and culture in approaching environmental challenges. Through an interdisciplinary lens combining the political, anthropological, literary, and/or philosophical, the field is united by the belief that humans and nature are intertwined. The environmental humanities welcomes traditionally excluded or undervalued perspectives into the discourse, with a particular openness to…

In the Library with the Lead Pipe Noticias

Investigating the “Feeling Rules” of Generative AI and Imagining Alternative Futures

Investigating the “Feeling Rules” of Generative AI and Imagining Alternative Futures

In Brief
Since the public debut of ChatGPT in November 2022, the calls for librarians to adopt and promote generative AI (GenAI) technologies and to teach “AI literacy” have become part of everyday work life. For instruction librarians with reservations about encouraging widespread GenAI use, these calls have become harder to sidestep as GenAI technologies are rapidly integrated into search tools of all types, including those that libraries pay to access. In this article, I explore the dissonance between, on the one hand, instruction librarians’ pedagogical goals and professional values and, on the other, the capacities, limitations, and costs of GenAI tools. Examining discourse on GenAI and AI literacy, I pay particular attention to messages we hear about the appropriate ways to think and feel about GenAI. These “feeling rules” often stand in the way of honest and constructive dialogue and collective decision making. Ultimately, I consider work from within and outside librarianship that offers another view: that we can slow down, look honestly at GenAI capacities and harms, take seriously the choice some librarians may make to limit their GenAI use, and collectively explore the kinds of futures we want for our libraries, our students, fellow educators, and ourselves.
By
Andrea Baer
At the April 2025 Association of College & Research Libraries Conference, academic library workers gathered in person and online to explore the theme “Democratizing Knowledge + Access + Opportunity.” Before sessions about how to integrate generative AI (GenAI) tools into essential public services like teaching and research services, sociologist and professor of African American Studies Ruha Benjamin offered the opening keynote. Articulating the resonance of the conference theme for her, Benjamin reflected, “One way to understand the stakes of this conference, … why it’s so vital that we work in earnest to democratize knowledge, access, and opportunity at a moment when powerful forces are working overtime to monopolize, control, and ration these social goods, is that this is a battle over who gets to own the future, which is also a battle over who gets to think their own thoughts, who gets to speak and express themselves freely, and ultimately who gets to create” (Benjamin, 2025). Noting that technologies are never neutral but rather reflect “the values or lack thereof of their creators,” Benjamin drew a connection between current attacks on libraries and higher education and a category of technology that was prominent throughout the conference program: artificial intelligence. “[I]t should give us pause,” she asserted, “that some of the same people hyping AI as the solution to all of our problems are often the ones causing those problems to begin with.” Applause followed.
Though Benjamin did not name the prominence of AI across conference sessions, I was probably not the …

In the Library with the Lead Pipe Noticias

Book Club Pláticas: Reflexiones on Culturally-centered Methodologies

Book Club Pláticas: Reflexiones on Culturally-centered Methodologies

In Brief
In spring 2024, two Latinx colleagues at California State University, East Bay, developed a pilot program focused around hosting a book club which has evolved into a larger exploration of plática methodology. This article explores culturally sustaining co-curricular collaborations and spaces on a university campus through the use of book club pláticas and PRAXISioner reflexiones (Reyes, 2021). The authors reflect on their roles as PRAXISioners, plática as methodology and practice, and engage on the value of self-sustaining practices as Latine educators.
By
Daisy Muralles
and
Vanessa Varko Fontana
“This pedagogy makes oppression and its causes objects of reflection by the oppressed, and from that reflection will come their necessary engagement in the struggle for their liberation. And in the struggle this pedagogy will be made and remade.”
Paulo Freire (1921-1997)
Introduction
In spring 2024, we took a popular model often used in American libraries, the book club, and added a cultural and community-building lens as part of that experience. In this article, we will share how we came to this work as PRAXISioners, and the barriers we aim to break down through our collaborative work. We will also describe how our collaboration on the book club project acted as a vehicle to hold culturally informed pláticas and what they looked like; and, finally, we also reflect on how this work allows us the space to come together with our own experiences as teachers and learners. The book club gave us an opportunity to explore the works of Latine scholars and authors, to engage in pláticas, allowing us to dive into new concepts and ideas about our culture that we had not discussed before–the unnamed things that somehow we understood as being part of our cultural identities but were not always sure of where they came from or why they existed. Throughout this article we will use the gender-inclusive “Latine” in place of the plural Latinx or Latina or Latino or Latin@, or its many variations. Created by feminist and nonbinary communities in both Latin America and the United States in the 2000s, Latine aims to describe all people, not just men or women (Guzmán, 2023).
We hope readers will walk away knowing the importance of culturally-sustaining co-curricular programs. We hope readers feel empowered to lean into their cultural-sustaining pedagogies to inform practices that are by and for BIPOC communities. We hope to inspire or mostly affirm for librarians who are already doing this cultural work, that this is important work for ourselves, our students, and campus communities.
Some of the content of this article was originally presented as, “Praxisioners Platicando: Fostering Belonging Through Culturally Centered Learning,” for Case Studies In Critical Pedagogy hosted by the Metropolitan New York Library Council (Muralles & Varko Fontana, 2024). The “Case Studies in Critical Pedag…

In the Library with the Lead Pipe Noticias

Going around in Circles: Interrogating Librarians’ Spheres of Concern, Influence, and Control

Going around in Circles: Interrogating Librarians’ Spheres of Concern, Influence, and Control

In Brief: The practice placing one’s anxieties into circles of concern, influence, and control can be found in philosophy, psychology, and self-help literature. It is a means of cultivating agency and preventing needless rumination. For librarians, however, it is often at odds with a profession that expects continuous expansion of responsibilities. To reconcile this conflict, it is useful to look back at the original intent of this model, assess the present library landscape through its lens, and imagine a future in which library workers truly feel in control of their vocation.
By
Jordan Moore
Introduction
It is a beautiful experience when you discover something that reorients your entire outlook on life. This happened to me during one of my first therapy sessions after being diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder. My therapist gave me a piece of paper and a pencil and instructed me to draw a large circle. Next, they told me to imagine that circle was full of everything I was anxious about, all the real and hypothetical problems that stressed me out. We labeled that circle “concern.” Then, they asked me to draw a much smaller circle in the middle of it. I would say it was one-tenth the size of the first circle. “That” they said, “represents what you can control.”
Figure 1: My first model
I felt disheartened while looking at that picture, as if it spelled out a grave diagnosis. The second circle was already so small, and I could have sworn it was even tinier when I looked back at the page and compared it to the first circle. Then, we began to populate the circle of control with what was in my power to determine – how much sleep I got, how often I reached out to loved ones, how many hours I spent doomscrolling, and so on. Finally, my therapist asked, “How much time do you spend thinking about things in the outer circle?” If I didn’t answer 100%, the number was close. They tapped a finger on the inner circle and, in the way that therapists often phrase advice as a question, asked “What if you concentrated on what is in your control instead?” What if indeed.
That conversation occurred over a decade ago. Since then, I have grown accustomed to categorizing my anxieties into ones of concern or control. If something is weighing on me, but is outside of my circle of control, I do my best not to ruminate on it, or at least redirect my thoughts back to what I, as a single person, can do. I try to devote most of my energy to practices that keep me in good health and good spirits. This has done wonders for my mental health. It has also proven beneficial in my professional life, keeping me focused on the aspects of my job that fulfill me. It has become so integral to my way of thinking that I have even discussed the concept (and the context I learned it from) at work. Naturally, I was at first hesitant to bring “therapy talk” into work. However, it h…

In the Library with the Lead Pipe Noticias

Interest Convergence, Intersectionality, and Counter-Storytelling: Critical Race Theory as Practi…

Interest Convergence, Intersectionality, and Counter-Storytelling: Critical Race Theory as Practice in Scholarly Communications Librarianship

In Brief:
Despite the ever-increasing presence of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) rhetoric in librarianship, library workers who are Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) are still underrepresented and marginalized. Critical race theory (CRT) offers the tools necessary to understand why the underlying racial power dynamics of our profession remain unchanged and to generate new ideas to move toward true equity and inclusion. This article presents applications of the theoretical frameworks of interest convergence, intersectionality, and counter-storytelling to the authors’ work with users and to our collegial relationships. As scholarly communications and information policy specialists of color at a predominantly white academic library, these three frameworks inform how we teach about scholarly practices, such as copyright and citation, as well as how we analyze and educate about the open access landscape. We also argue that a critical race theory lens can provide useful analytical tools to inform practice in other types of libraries and different kinds of library work, and encourage all library workers to engage with it as they seek meaningful change in their work settings and the profession more broadly.
By
Maria Mejia
and
Anastasia Chiu
Introduction
As scholarly communications practitioners of color located in an academic library of a predominantly white
[1]
institution (PWI), we find that critical race theory serves as a cornerstone for how we relate to each other and to the profession. Multiple theoretical frameworks in this movement give name and shape to our approaches and to the racialized phenomena that we seek to resist. The themes of counter-storytelling, intersectionality, and a problematized approach to interest convergence speak most closely to the ways in which we practice CRT in our relationships and our work. We are members of a department consisting entirely of librarians who are Black, Indigenous, and people of color—a somewhat uncommon occurrence in our PWI and in librarianship more broadly—and this dynamic has shaped our CRT-informed practice. Collectively, as a department, we seek to set our own terms around what it means to be a good library worker and a good colleague. We work together to advocate for communities that are systematically excluded in scholarship and librarianship because our librarianship is for those communities. Yet, we must also contend with the fact that our institution’s support for this work is mainly a matter of interest convergence. To paraphrase Derrick Bell (1980), PWIs value and promote racial progress and racial justice work only insofar as it serves their political interest to do so. In our case, our institution benefits from the optics of our intersectionality as a woman and a non-binary person of color, taking on the labor of b…

Te has perdido

ARGENTINA Australia

¿Estás listo para la hora de los AC/DC? 🔥

ARGENTINA CHILE COLOMBIA

¿Puerto Madero se Convirtió en un Bajo Nivel de Protección…

ARGENTINA COLOMBIA ESTADOS UNIDOS

Houston, tenemos un problema: ¿AC/DC sigue tocando sin Stevie? 🤡

Arabia Saudita COLOMBIA México

🎉 ¿BTS Vienen a México o Solo Fingen la Gira?