Stephanie Arias is the Reference Services Manager in Reader Services Department at The Huntington Library. Stephanie assisted in developing The Huntington’s “Virtual Reading Room” service, and she enjoys finding ways to enhance library users’ experiences both remotely and in person.

This presentation will discuss the presenter’s experience in building an original credit-bearing research and information literacy course for undergraduate students. I will explore my context as a resident librarian and contingent worker, and the use of research justice and anti-racist pedagogical practice and design in the development and facilitation of this class. INT 100, titled “Critical Research and Information Studies,” focused on developing critical research skills and promoting research and information literacy as central to activist and social justice work. INT 100 was also developed during the twin pandemics of white supremacist violence and COVID-19, and impacted the delivery and organization, as well as the significance of the course. This presentation will share the positionality, process and project of this course, as well as the challenges and opportunities involved. It would be an honor to share this transformative experience with the Symposium. Presenter: Des Alaniz Des Alaniz is a queer and biracial researcher, librarian and zinester who lives in Central Coast, California. Their interests include research justice, social movements, archives, and zines. They are the Evolving Workforce Resident Librarian at the University of California at Santa Barbara.

The ten-page research paper has its value, but there are many other ways to demonstrate knowledge. By creating a zine (or podcast or activist campaign, or timeline, etc.), students can explore and show facets of themselves that highlight skills beyond those recognized and valued by an academy built by the ruling class to train its own to self-replicate. Zines and other self-publishing media can speak effectively to an audience beyond a grading-weary professor. In this workshop, zine makers and zine librarians Jenna and Ziba will model zine-making as a means of challenging the white patriarchy. Participants will create teaching and learning manifesto zines that we hope will bring them joy and a sense of empowerment. Presenters: Jenna Freedman & Ziba Perez Photo of Jenna Freedman Jenna Freedman is a zine librarian at Barnard College in NYC, she is also a zine maker and co-organizer of the NYC Feminist Zinefest. Jenna has published articles on zine librarianship and presented around the United States and in France on that topic as well as on other themes of library activism. Photo of Ziba Perez Ziba Perez is a librarian at the Los Angeles Public Library where she helped create the first circulating zine collection in 2017, LAPL.ORG/ZINES #LAPLZineLibrary. Previous to that, Ziba was a senior librarian at the Long Beach Public Library in her hometown of California where she helped create the first circulating zine collection there in 2015, #LBPLZineLibrary. Ziba was also co-organizer of the Long Beach Zine Fest (2016-2019) #LBZF

Imagine you are going to teach a first-year seminar, semester-long class that looks critically at the information systems students will encounter in their research. What content would you like to cover in the syllabus? Problematic subject headings? Academia’s discouragement of non-traditional publishing? In this workshop, attendees will brainstorm what a syllabus could look like that discusses the creation, dissemination, and production of information in our socio-political environment as well as the power relations and structures at play that can limit access and exposure to a diversity of voices. Attendees will be encouraged to contribute examples, resources, and topics that they think would be of interest especially to college students. Attendees will walk away with critical examples and topics they can include in their instruction even if it’s only one a limited, one shot basis. Presenters: Breanne Crumpton & Dusty Ross Breanne Crumpton is the Information Literacy Librarian for the Humanities at Appalachian State University with liaison duties primarily to English and History. Her research interests include how to help students better navigate research through critical pedagogy and practice as well as incorporating inclusive teaching within the library instruction classroom. During this short presentation, I will share my experience guiding teaching faculty through a 6 week discussion series designed to help introduce, illustrate, and apply the concepts of critical information literacy to their pedagogy. Some of the specific topics I will cover include: how the discussion series was designed and how participation was sought, the themes of each week and how materials were chosen, and the challenges to the overall program. I want to focus most on the ethos of our weekly conversations (from engaging with critical theory to designing assignments), feedback received, and make the case that teaching faculty should engage with the work of library workers and benefit from having the opportunity to learn together. This session will give participants ideas for how to host their own discussion series and provide access to a syllabus to adapt for their own workshops. Presenter: Symphony Bruce Symphony Bruce (she/her) is the Interim Business Librarian at American University. Influenced by her time teaching high school English, Symphony believes in the power of relationships and care in the ability to create powerful learning experiences. Her research interests include critical information literacy, care ethics in librarianship, and privacy literacy.

As one of the last community spaces where individuals are invited to exist without spending money, libraries are institutions that are naturally positioned to resist capitalism. Yet, as challenges to library funding intensify with each passing year, libraries have increasingly turned to capitalist language and techniques as central elements of their communication strategies. This presentation will explore the impact of capitalist structures on libraries’ position in society, and ways librarians can make simple-but-consistent changes to their communication strategies to reinforce their value as builders of community, not providers of commodities. Learning Objectives for this Session: Attendees will be able to (1) define capitalism and recognize the impact it has on library communities, (2) reflect on the influence capitalism has had on their libraries’ communication strategies, and (3) identify strategies for moving beyond capitalist approaches to communication. Presenter: Hale Polebaum-Freeman Photo of Hale Polebaum-Freeman Hale Polebaum-Freeman (they/them) is a white, queer, and trans practitioner of critical librarianship and pedagogy who works as First-Year Outreach and Reference Librarian at Williams College in the Berkshires. Hale is also one of the primary instigators behind WIlliams’ circulating zine collection, which recently celebrated its first anniversary.

When we connect to our embodied selves, we take a step towards a liberatory way of being that we can bring to our library selves. Embodied practice helps us to make choices for our own bodies and helps us learn from our own bodies. This session is a safe and accessible movement and breath workshop that is intended for all bodies and everybody. No prior experience with yoga, breath work, or meditation is necessary. Drawing upon my training and experience as a certified yoga instructor (RYT-200), I will guide participants in some chair-based yoga and breath work sequences intended to enhance our relationships with our own bodies, help us tap into our embodied selves, and take a step towards an anti-oppressive library practice. Presenter: Anne E. Leonard Anne E. Leonard is Coordinator of Information Literacy and Library Instruction at New York City College of Technology, where she co-teaches an interdisciplinary course, Learning Places: Understanding the City. Her academic and pedagogical interests include place-based learning, embodied and somatic learning, and critical information literacy.

Philadelphia-based Womanist Working Collective (WWC) has formed community resources for the past six years through media literacy, cooperative economics, and wellness workshops for Black women, femmes, and AFAB gender non-conforming people. The WWC Archival Fellows have created a digital archive on Omeka, including an oral history collection to increase access to this community resource. Rooted in womanism, the WWC digital archive enables practitioners from various disciplines to engage communities in critical literacy and grassroots archiving. Through the act of appraising, preserving, and collecting materials, the fellows developed a deeper understanding of womanism as a liberation practice against white supremacy, misogyny, and capitalist exploitation. The goal of this talk is to introduce a womanist form of pedagogy, which enables the archive user to come to their own understanding of anti-oppression through the experiences of WWC members and co-organizers. Presenter: Ashby Haywood & Kailee Faber Photo of Ash Haywood Ashby Haywood is a community oral historian, musician, and librarian. S/he holds a B.A. from Bennington College and currently works at the Highlander Education and Research Center in East Tennessee. Ashby’s archival work centers on critical literacy, grassworks archiving, and Afrofuturism. Kailee Faber is an archivist based in Brooklyn, NY. She specializes in working with collections that deal with Black, queer, and other community based archives. She has worked at The Free Library of Philadelphia, The Institute of Jazz Studies, The Studio Museum in Harlem, Womanist Working Collective, Visual AIDS, and artist studios.

The organizational structure of academia is by nature hierarchical and colonialist. While librarianship remains a feminized field, the few men employed hold leadership positions. Additionally, whiteness is the default. Adherence to traditional power structures afford faculty access to networks unavailable to frontline staff. Across all strata of society, COVID-19 has exacerbated inequities and discrimination; academic libraries have not been immune. Statistically, frontline positions have higher numbers of BIPOC employees. The CDC notes that minorities are at an increased risk of “getting sick and dying from COVID-19”. However, frontline staff have regularly been required to work in unsafe conditions with leadership’s perceived need to keep the library physically open for patrons — a tool of abuse as staff have little or no choice about patron contact regardless of community infection rates or personal responsibilities altered or increased by the pandemic. We propose that librarianship’s ideals are diametrically at odds with its practices. Presenters: Juanita Thacker & Suzanne Sawyer Juanita Thacker Juanita Thacker is the Information Literacy Lecturer at UNC Greensboro. Thacker also holds an MLIS from UNC Greensboro. She is devoted to advocating for all library users particularly students and paralibrary staff. Thacker is also a founding and marketing team member of WOC+Lib. Suzanne Sawyer Suzanne Sawyer is a Preservation Specialist at UNC Greensboro University Libraries. Sawyer holds an MFA in Book Arts from UA, a BFA and BSW from VCU, and is an MLIS candidate at UNCG. She serves as a staff representative to the library’s Administrative Council and is an EDI team member.

Recent studies have shown that social justice education is still lacking, if not absent across MLIS programs. As a gatekeeping tool into the profession, the content taught in MLIS programs has substantial implications for the future direction and focus of the work in the field. Additionally, what is learned through each program can radically transform a students perspective on the profession (for good or bad). This may either serve to trap LIS in an unresponsive, uncritical, or at worst oppressive state or instead lend a fresh vision to the possibilities and power of libraries and the critically minded people working within them. In this panel, participants will hear from MLIS students at the University of Arizona about their experiences within an elective course on social justice in the information sciences and how the content and topics explored influenced how they view the profession, their future, and offer suggestions for change. Presenters: Michelle “Ashley” Gohr, Kristina Santiago, Aarti Kumar Pani, Mario Villa & Andrew Barber, and Jung Mee Park. Michelle “Ashley” Gohr (they/she) is a First Year Experience Librarian with Arizona State University where she teaches information literacy to first year students and provides research assistance to students and faculty in women and gender studies, social justice/human rights, and other subject areas. Kristina Santiago (she/ella) is an MLIS graduate student at the University of Arizona iSchool. She is a Knowledge River program scholar, and has centered Critical Race Theory and social justice education throughout her degree coursework and career activities. Aarti Kumar Pani (she, her) is a first-year MLIS student, mother, Indian American, daughter of immigrants, anti-kyriarchist, recent returnee to the south with experience in the fields of education related non-profits. Mario Antonio Villa Mario Villa (Apache) is in the final semester of the MLIS program at the University of Arizona. Mario’s research interests include Indigenous Nations’ information infrastructures, technology and inequality, and algorithmic accountability. He starts the PhD in Information Science and Technology program in the fall at the Syracuse University iSchool. Andrew Barber Andrew Barber is a MLIS student at the University of Arizona and shift supervisor at Arizona State University Library where he provides information literacy instruction and supervises student workers. His past research focuses on the U.S. prison system, the history of economic thought, critical librarianship, and LGBTQIA+ information services. Jung Mee Park Jung Mee Park (she/her) is a MLIS student at the University of Arizona. She holds a PhD in Sociology from Cornell University. She hopes to work as an academic librarian specializing in data curation, scholarly communications, or user experience. Her forthcoming article in JELIS examines statistical training in LIS.

In response to the media rhetoric surrounding Black Lives Matter, COVID-19, and the 2020 election, librarians, in partnership with the First-Year Writing Program at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, created a Quote-Tracing assignment for English 101 as part of a larger Critical Media Literacy for Writing and Rhetoric Unit. In this activity we are encouraging students to engage in the (sometimes rather uncomfortable) rhetoric used in media. This goes beyond fake news and junk science. This is about guiding students through quote tracing so they can discover, for themselves, the voices in media that they would like to amplify in their research. This is a difficult task and includes discussions about privileged voices and opinions as well as representation and political motives. In this workshop, we hope to share our experiences, guide other librarians and professionals through the Quote-Tracing assignment, and receive feedback that will make this activity more impactful. Presenters: Elizabeth Kamper & Mitchell Haas Elizabeth Kamper Elizabeth Kamper, MLIS, is the Information Literacy Librarian and an Assistant Professor at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. She has been teaching information literacy in academic libraries for the past eight years. Elizabeth specializes in teaching first-year student research skills and creates online learning objects to support distance learning. Mitchell Hass Mitchell Haas is the Online Learning Librarian at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. His research interests include Critical Information Literacy, Diversity and Inclusion in Libraries, Critical Library Pedagogy and Student-Centered Library Instruction, Instructional Design and Adult Learning, Information Seeking Behaviors of Non-Traditional Students and Veterans.

Anthropologist and activist David Graeber called bureaucracy “the water in which we swim,” and Max Weber, a century before him, used the metaphor of an inescapable “iron cage.” Bureaucracy manifests as “dead zones of the imagination,” and props up the status quo, and yet, a phenomenon called “the iron law of liberalism,” states that any effort to lessen or remove bureaucracy will ironically produce more bureaucracy! Efforts to foster more humane workplaces can instead produce “toxic positivity,” or what Karen Nicholson has referred to as “soft-touch hegemony.” What is an activist librarian to do? Chelsea Jordan-Makely and Emma Karin Eriksson share a passion for abolition, organizing, and imagining a better future for libraries. Our aim is to facilitate a conversation about these big theoretical ideas and problems in which participants from libraries of any type will feel safe and inspired to share their experiences and ideas for change. Presenters: Chelsea Jordan-Makely & Emma Karin Eriksson Chelsea Jordan Makely Chelsea Jordan-Makely – I’m a small town library director who has also worked in urban, resort, academic, and state libraries. My focus in librarianship has been to raise the bar on the service experience, especially for the most vulnerable members of our communities, and to center libraries as a forum for exploring new and difficult ideas. My research has focused on libraries as bureaucracies, and more recently, on public library services for people impacted by the Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) . I’ve served on the PLA’s Digital Literacy Committee since 2018, and am excited to co-lead the ALA’s Library Services to the Justice Involved (LSJI) interest group beginning this year. I also volunteer with a local Books Through Bars organization, and a local group of abolitionist library workers. Beyond libraries and organizing, I like riding bikes and gardening. Check out my website at renewedlibraries.org. Emma Karin Eriksson is a Young Adult Librarian at the New York Public Library. She is also the Organization Facilitator, Design Lead, and Social Media Manager for the Prisoner Library Support Network. In her downtime, she creates zines, most famously Radical Domesticity, and teaches workshops on zine-making. To learn more about her and her work visit www.bit.ly/emmakarin.

As Joy James has articulated the need for the term abolitionisms, wherein she distinguishes academic abolitionism from radical abolitionism, Sandy Grande has similarly described the existence of multiple critical pedagogies in her text Red Pedagogy. As we saw this past summer during the uprisings, social justice is an expansive term that can mean painting Black Lives Matter on a street, to pouring money into police reform, to calls for police abolition and beyond. For critical pedagogy practitioners to come together in community and share our experiences and deepen our pedagogy, it is important to know what we mean by terms such as social justice and liberation. I propose an interactive workshop where practitioners can engage with each other on thinking about how critical pedagogy can be used to make material contributions to social justice, and clarify our collective vision for change. Presenter: Betsy Yoon Betsy Yoon Betsy Yoon (she/they) lives and works on Lenape territory. She does reference for NYU and CSI and is a member of Nodutdol, a grassroots organization fighting for peace, decolonization, and self-determination on both Turtle Island and the Korean peninsula through political education, collective action, and principled solidarity.

People who are incarcerated’s ability to access information is heavily constrained. They may not have access to leisure materials, educational materials, and most often are deprived access to the Internet. Reference by Mail provides a practical opportunity for incarcerated people to access library services to meet their life-affirming information needs and desires. San Francisco Public Library has overseen this service for three years, and offers internships to library students seeking to build reference skills and awareness of incarceration. This panel will incorporate reflections on supervising and participating in the Reference by Mail internship, drawing from critical pedagogy to engage with what it is like to provide information to people inside of carceral facilities. Panelists will share their perceptions of incarceration and information access prior to involvement with the service, how information requests reflect the information landscape within carceral facilities, and what they collectively learned in the process of the internship. Presenters: Lawrence Maminta, Jeanie Austin & Jeremy Abbott Lawrence Maminta Lawrence Maminta (they/them) is from Long Beach, CA and a recent graduate of UCLA’s MLIS program. They are currently participating in the SafeLAPL campaign to reinvest $12.5 million of the Los Angeles Public Library’s budget into community-centered public safety programs. Jeanie Austin earned their PhD in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Their research interests and activities include the provision of library services to people in juvenile detentions, jails, and prisons. They primarily examine the complex political and social systems that surround this work. Jeremy Abbott Jeremy Abbott is a doctoral student in UCLA’s Department of Information Studies. His research centers on the confluences of spatial and legal infrastructures that act to control information access in public library spaces. He is currently focusing on the impact of library codes of conduct upon patrons experiencing homelessness.

In this workshop, two librarians from Pace University will discuss how their team pivoted to remote learning in Spring 2020 and collaborated to engage students in this new environment. We’ll discuss the challenges that we faced when we first changed modalities (i.e. moving from in person one-shots to synchronous and asynchronous online classes and tutorials), and where we were successful in our teaching pedagogies and praxis (using tools like Padlet and Libwizard; collaborating with other librarians to create engaging content and not just online-triage for basic database demonstrations) – and also how we weren’t successful. This workshop invites participants to learn more about how we developed our tools and critical pedagogy, share their remote learning successes, and to reflect on how theory and praxis can work together to create a more enhanced student centered learning environment. Presenters: Jessica Kiebler & Gina Levitan Jessica Kiebler Jessica Kiebler (she/her/hers) is an Instructional Services Librarian at Pace University where she teaches students about the library, the ways we engage with information in our world and how to use research skills to build knowledge. In previous lives, she has worked in project management, public libraries and elementary education which all bring another aspect of information to her work with students in the classroom. Her research interests include disinformation culture and the media landscape, library outreach and expanding information literacy methodologies. Gina Levitan Gina Levitan is currently the First Year Outreach Services Librarian at Pace University. Her work primarily focuses on critical library instruction and student outreach. Her research interests include critical pedagogy, student engagement in library instruction, and critical information literacy. Gina completed an MA in Humanities and Social Thought at New York University, an MLIS at Long Island University, and a BA in Critical Theory and Media Studies at Hampshire College.

The LibGuides Open Review Discussion Sessions (LORDS) Project works towards cultivating a community across California State University Libraries that provides space for critique, conversation, and criticality. In using critical race theory to acknowledge structures of publishing, libraries, and reference, this LibGuide review system works towards holding criticality to fight against the farce of neutrality within knowledge organizations. Started at a predominately white institution, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, we hope to bring anti-racist practices to our LibGuides by understanding and acknowledging the white supremacist structures of publishing, libraries, and reference in our work. As a CSU-wide system, we are establishing a people-to-people network in working towards self-reflective anti-racist practices, web usability best practices, critical information literacy, and more. The facilitators of this project hope to share the methods, developments, and lessons learned through a game style presentation (most likely along the lines of family feud, but subject to change). Presenter: Jaime Ding & special guests Jaime Ding (she/her) works as the Digital Publishing Research Fellow at California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo. Through designing a more equitable digital publishing workflow, she strives to collaborate to rethink ideas about the ‘public,’ accessibility, and knowledge organization. She also loves trash in/and public spaces.

‘LGBTQ’ Cataloging for Inclusion or Exclusion Creating Under Pressure: Online Critical Pedagogy and Re-envisioning Library Instruction Practices During a Pandemic Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Trainings: Do They Benefit Ethnic and Racial Minority Public Librarians? Defined by Absence: Situating the Public Library Within the American Neoliberal Carceral State

Engaging Conversations: Foregrounding Twitter Feeds in Library Guides as a Way to Critically Promote Discussions of Social Justice If All Lives Matter, Wear a Mask: The Amplified Vulnerabilities of Public Library Staff during a Politicized Pandemic Cruising the Classroom: Contact and Desire in MLIS Critical Librarianship Reading Group: An MLIS Student Experience Developing Critical Disciplinary Knowledge Under (Always) Less-Than-Ideal Circumstances

Disk imaging is an important tool in the digital preservation toolkit. But what is a disk image, how do you make one, and why might it be useful at your institution? This webinar breaks down the structure of a disk image, the types of images you can create, and other options for reformatting digital media. Learn strategies for prioritizing media and identifying risks, as well as identifying hardware and software tools that can help. By the end of the webinar, you'll be able to create a basic disk imaging workflow for objects in your collections. Annie Schweikert is a digital archivist at Stanford Libraries, where she processes, preserves, and makes accessible born-digital archival collections. She is a graduate of the Moving Image Archiving and Preservation (MIAP) program at New York University.

In this webinar, Milo Thiesen presented digital asset management (DAM) best practices. They reviewed the differences between a DAM system and a digital preservation system. The webinar included an overview of the DAM Maturity Model and OAIS information packages, as well as the NDSA Levels of Digital Preservation 2.0. The second half of the webinar included demos of open source tools that can be used outside of a given system such as BagIt, hashdeep, DROID, Exiftool, MediaInfo, tree, Siegfried, and ClamAV. Below are a list of resources provided by Milo Thiesen to supplement the webinar: DAM Maturity Model NDSA Levels of Digital Preservation 2.0 Corey Schafer’s Video on Homebrew Archivematica External Tools Page AMIA Open Source | Open Workflows GitHub Martin’s twoBit Digital Preservation Bash Script Library Community Owned digital Preservation Tool Registry (COPTR) Tree ClamAV Setting up ClamAV on MacOS DROID PRONOM Siegfried Hashdeep BagIt (python) MediaInfo Exiftool

This workshop deals with health and wellness issues associated with COVID and the new “normal.” We also include functioning back at work and working remotely. Instead of a New Year’s resolution, this presentation provides information on how to create a wellness vision which is a statement of who you are, and what healthy behaviors you want to do consistently. This webinar shares how to create this statement, and how to identify what SMART goals you want to achieve in your life, and the importance of a “bucket list.” Linda Carignan-Everts is the NYS Employee Assistance Program Wellness Coordinator. Linda has worked for New York State for 25 years as the Wellness Director for the Department of Health, and the EAP Wellness Coordinator, and manages WellNYS-Everyday.

Archipelago leverages the Twig templating system to transform in realtime the open schema metadata that lives in every strawberryfield as JSON into close to any fixed schema (DC, MODS, IIIF Manifests, etc.) you may need. Twig templating is fast, cached, and versatile. During this workshop, we will review the core role Twig templating plays in Archipelago, introduce the basic of Twig, and demonstrate editing Twig templates in Archipelago to refine metadata displays and AMI ingests.

Archipelago Multi-Importer (AMI) is a module for batch/bulk/mass ingests of Archipelago digital objects and collections. AMI also enables you to perform batch administrative actions, such as updating, patching/revising, or deleting digital objects and collections. During this workshop, we will introduce AMI, discuss ingest strategies and options, and demonstrate an AMI ingest.

This workshop walks participants through the basics of determining where their retirement income will come from and how-to best plan for a financially secure and happy retirement. Topics covered include: Social Security Pension Plans including 401(k)s or 403(b)s Self-Directed Retirement Savings Plans About our presenter: Kathleen Kalmes, CFA has served NYPL’s Business Library as a financial resources specialist since 2002. She creates and teaches financial literacy training programs for the public and staff. Previously, she was an investment vice president at NY Life Insurance Company, working as a securities analyst/portfolio manager. Ms. Kalmes holds an MBA from NYU and is a Chartered Financial Analyst.

Join us on Wednesday April 21st from 2-3PM for a BIPOC Community Call. This is meant for BIPOC cultural workers only, we kindly ask that allies and comrades who identify as non-BIPOC to sit this one out. Our intention is to create a space that offers community, joy and conversation during this time. Please come with a spirit of openness and empathy as we share thoughts and feelings without judgement. This call will be facilitated by Traci Mark (Media Archivist & Educational Programming Associate at METRO) and Zakiya Collier (Digital Archivist at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture).