Colonization and Imperialism in Libraries
08/08/2019
12:00pm - 1:00pm

Non members in Florida please contact training@seflin.org to register

About this Session:
Immigrants, Indigenous and former colonized people have had traumatic experiences of being separated from family members and ties and the familiar, then having to learn foreign customs, systems of symbols, language, and culture in order to survive. Libraries play a role in this transfer of survival skills to adjust to new cultures. However, librarianship as an institution struggles between facilitating intercultural understanding among global library users and supporting the minded/aware citizens, they can also support the domination of the knowledge and culture of a specific group of people over others. This presentation explores how legacies of colonialism and imperialism have imprinted themselves on librarianship and how this process has affected immigrants, indigenous and former colonized library users and the librarians who serve them. This webinar aims to support librarians wishing to do outreach to immigrants, former colonized, or Indigenous peoples with an understanding of some of the issues pertaining to the legacies of colonialism and imperialism. 
Participants will learn about:
1) the basics of library colonization and library imperialism
2) the differences between library colonization and library imperialism
3) how library colonization and library imperialism affect information use and access needs

About the Presenter:
Mark-Shane Scale is a Caribbean immigrant to Canada and former library educator at the University of the West Indies. Mark-Shane Scale taught courses for librarians in Jamaica and as a Limited Duties Instructor at the University of Western Ontario in Canada. He has researched and published on library topics, presented at many library conferences and has served as an Executive member of the Library and Information Association of Jamaica (2007-2011).