Thanks, but I was really asking about the displays themselves, not the display cases. Like, were they book-related?
It would be really helpful to be able to see the specific displays that there was “considerable objection” to, but I’m guessing that’s not possible.
When I was volunteering at Recording for the Blind someone brought in the braille edition of Playboy and yes, it was all text. Someone kidded it could have included raised line drawings but it was pointed out parts would have been worn out in no time.
“I once stole a pornographic book that was printed in braille. I used to rub the dirty parts.”
— Woody Allen
How about a book display showing multiple points of view on the subject?
I’ve seen the libraries around here put up explicitly political displays of explicitly partisan material in that fashion – in the same display, books both for and against particular candidates; both for and against specific political parties and/or positions.
Yes.
Not making that statement is making a statement.
I just double checked it, and my county comes in as 96.7% “white alone” and 94.8% “white alone, not Hispanic or Latino”. And while we’re at it only 1.6% “foreign born”. (I expect we’ve got about as many LGBTQ people as anybody else, but the statistics would be less clear and any statistics that exist weren’t on the page I was looking at.)
And the local libraries have been making a point of buying books by people who are not “white alone, not Hispanic or Latino” and by immigrants, including books specifically focusing on the experiences and/or history of members of those groups; and of featuring them in reading clubs etc., and publicizing those clubs.
I think that’s a great idea. Libraries are for expanding your information base. Yes, they’re also for carrying information on local history, local ways of living, etc.; and certainly they should carry information specifically useful to and/or about people who live within their area; but to say that they’re not for also finding about people who live elsewhere seems absurd to me.
I’m not sure, it would be hard to keep it balanced, and almost impossible to not have people from one or both of the sides complain about it being unbalanced. So if I were a librarian I would probably decide its not worth the headache. But as a patron I wouldn’t be bothered.
This is fascinating, I have never seen or even heard of a library doing this. Can you tell me any more about the displays and the library? You’re saying libraries plural, so are they part of a county system? What are some of the issues/candidates that have had displays?
It’s a multi-county system. I don’t know whether all libraries in the system do it; but the ones I go to, in two different villages, do. I’m surprised to learn that this is an unusual practice. What do libraries do about elections in your area – ignore them entirely? admit that they’re happening, but carefully provide no information at all about candidates? buy and display books only by/about one set of candidates/positions? buy and display books by/about multiple disagreeing candidates, but only put out one at a time?
I can’t off the top of my head list the books displayed – if you remind me later this summer, I’ll note more specifically what they do this year.
Other than maybe having reminders about upcoming elections, I cannot recall a single display relating to an election in the 2 libraries that I frequent. However, I will freely admit that I haven’t really looked for such a display, either. I will definitely be more observant between now and November.
Pretty much! Books by/about major candidates/issues will of course be acquired and displayed in the “New Books” section, but that’s about it. Information about the election itself tends to be limited to “how to vote, how to find your polling place” type stuff.
Hmm. The “New Books” section is pretty conspicuous in these libraries; it’s possible I’m thinking of that, with books from various candidates going on that display at the same time and sometimes taking up much of it. But I’m pretty sure I’ve seen separate displays. I’ll have to notice, this year.
I wonder if your library is a polling place. Most states prohibit campaign literature at the polling place and so many feet outside as well.
~Max
My library is not. Polling place is the village hall.
I would think it would be a serious complication for libraries if being a polling place means that they can’t carry current political information in any form. And as the law here is, I think, 100’ from the polling site, that would in many cases mean the entire library.
To the original question:
Libraries conceptually are based on a “social agenda”: that there are common spaces for the entire community to share and to intermix within.
The question is to what end does that serve?
Is the point of having common social spaces and activities to impose the dominant culture on minority cultures within the community? Which could be phrased positively as encouraging integration of those cultures as part of the dominant cultural values and identity.
Or to be a space that exposes the majority to the diversity and welcomes it?
I suspect across history it has been more the former than the latter?
I’m not sure there’s much “across history” of public libraries. Libraries are quite old, of course; but I don’t think the general public usually had access to them.
– google says
The first free modern public library was opened in 1833. The Peterborough (N.H.) Town Libraries was the first institution funded by a municipality with the explicit purpose of establishing a free library open to all classes of the community.
The reference is to libraries as a shared common space for the variety of society to aggregate and intermix within. Public libraries serve that function; are part of that longstanding social agenda.
Part of that agenda has been to assimilate the diversity into the dominant perspectives; part has been to expose the dominant to the other classes and to the diversity of the broader community. This precedes the creation of public libraries.
