Articulate the ethics, values and foundational principles of library and information professionals and their role in the promotion of intellectual freedom.
Though librarianship is at its core an information profession, there is a second but equally important component to its practice, mainly service. This service can take many forms; to one’s constituents, the public, or other professionals. Rubin astutely calls library science a field where the goal is “the resolution of human problems” (2004, p. 32). A librarian’s role is as a key facilitator in connecting information with information seekers, an objective of increasing importance in a world where information sources have proliferated at an incredible pace.
This goal of service is supported by a number of ethical and principled considerations enshrined within the core values of the profession. Clearly aligned with the goal of service to its constituents in mind, the Code of Ethics of the American Library Association positions the profession as one that respects user needs and interests. This includes the protection of user privacy and distancing one’s personal beliefs from the activities of information gathering and dispensation. These ethical principles are intended to guide librarians in their service to users and ensure professional fairness and the upholding of user rights within library institutions.
First among these rights is that of intellectual freedom. This principle, connected to first amendment rights of free speech, and the right “to seek and receive information on all subjects from all points of view without restriction and without having the subject of one’s interest examined or scrutinized by others” (Morgan, 2010, p. 3). This overarching concern of profession is foundational and crucial in ensuring the profession resists all forms of censorship from within and without. In the often grey world of the public information desk, this core value is both necessary and important to ensure both information seekers receive the ethical service guaranteed to them by their constitutional rights and by the American Library Association’s Library Bill of Rights.
The six tenets of the Library Bill of Rights broach directly the necessity of providing information services to all, regardless of origin, age, background, or views. Likewise the document advocates for providing users with diverse sources of information and resisting all attempts at censorship. The Library Bill of Rights is clear, it is not enough to merely provide information, but rather it is necessary for libraries as institutions to align themselves against forces which seek to abridge users’ rights and privacy in seeking information, whether that be the US government in the form of the Patriot Act or social or religious groups that might object to the presentation of certain types of information. As the ALA’s Freedom to Read Statement makes it abundantly clear,
"The freedom to read is essential to our democracy. It is continuously under attack. Private groups and public authorities in various parts of the country are working to remove or limit access to reading materials, to censor content in school, to label ‘controversial’ views, to distribute lists of ‘objectionable’ books or authors, and to purge libraries” (ALA, 2004, ¶ I).
With this in mind it is certainly a core responsibility of the librarian to safeguard the right to intellectual freedom, and furthermore the right to access by users.
The importance of these values is hard to overstate, which goes far in explaining why the core values of the profession are stated and repeated in numerous policy documents at the state, national and local level. They are present in the American Library Association’s Core Values of Librarianship, in the California Library Association’s Advocacy Program, and in Collection Development Statements nationwide.
Evidence
As a public desk employee at five different public libraries throughout my career I have consistently aided users in seeking diverse classes of information, including that from sources that some might find objectionable. I have aided in maintaining computer networks ensuring free, equitable and unfiltered access to the internet for all library users. I have fought for the removal of local government imposed filters on staff computers, which prevented the efficacious practice of our professional services. I have organized banned book displays and served as an information access point for under-served Spanish speakers to utilize a variety of library services. Many of these behaviors were reinforced and made conscious via my coursework in the Library Science program at San Jose State University.
In LIBR 266: Collection I was able to explore in depth the idea of intellectual freedom and user rights to access information in the process of creating a Collection Development Policy. My first piece of evidence is composed of excerpts from a Reading Log, which was composed in the process of researching Collection Development policy. This document includes an Informal Paper, in which I discuss concepts learned from the class and my readings. Chief among these is a reassessment of censorship within the public library framework. Also included are a number of reading log entries that deal explicitly with censorship and access to materials in the public library setting.
My second piece of evidence, also derived from LIBR 266, is a complete Collection Development Manual for a proposed Children’s library collection. This very thorough look at the type of library policy that is at the core of the ethical and principled stances of the professional librarian, takes into consideration selection process, dealing with user complaints through reconsideration, and the issue of access generally. This manual was a group project, I was responsible for gathering demographic data, budgets, content regarding Spanish language materials, and for applying practical context to the manual as someone with experience in collection development.
My third piece of evidence comes from a discussion post for LIBR 268: History of Youth Literature. This post deals explicitly with the development of some of the core tenets of access within the public library framework, in this case for children, while also noting the fallibility of an early pioneer of Children’s librarianship on the issue of censorship.
References
- LIBR 266 Reading Log Excerpts
- LIBR 266 Collection Development Manual
- LIBR 268 Anne Carrol Moore Discussion Post
References
American Library Association. (2008). Code of Ethics of the American Library Association. Retrieved from
American Library Association. (2004). Core Values of Librarianship. Retrieved from http://www.ala.org/offices/oif/statementspols/corevaluesstatement/corevalues
American Library Association. (2004). Freedom to Read Statement. Retrieved from http://www.ala.org/offices/oif/statementspols/ftrstatement/freedomreadstatement
Morgan, C.D. (2010). Intellectual Freedom: An enduring and all-embracing concept. Intellectual Freedom Manual. Chicago: American Library Association. p. 3-11
Rubin, R.E. (2004). Foundations of Library and Information Science. New York: Neal-Schuman Publishers.
