Call for Chapter Proposals:
Borders & belonging: Critical examinations of LIS approaches toward immigrants
Book Editor: Ana Ndumu
Publisher: Library Juice Press
Series: Critical Race Studies and Multiculturalism in LIS
Series Editors: Annie Pho and Rose L. Chou
Borders & belonging: Critical examinations of LIS approaches toward immigrants is a response to the need for discourse on how the LIS field, particularly in North America, is shaped by longstanding ideologies on nativity, race, ethnicity, language, class, and “belonging.” The goal is to probe concrete aspects of the LIS field (e.g., workforce, programs, facilities, resources, education and publications) and shed light on ethnocentric and essentialist frameworks. Here, an immigrant is defined as a person who permanently lives in but was born outside of the U.S. or Canada and respective territories. An immigrant is either a refugee, asylee, legal permanent resident, naturalized citizen or undocumented person. Please consult the editor about ideas involving international students.
Works should critically examine the role of immigration policy along with sociocultural paradigms in the library-immigrant relationship. Prospective authors are encouraged to refer to Mignolo & Walsh’s1 On Decoloniality: Concepts, Analytics, Praxisalong with Caidi, Allard, and Quirke’s2 Information practices of immigrantsto develop their contributions.
Below is a sample, not exhaustive, list of topics:
- libraries and the promotion of assimilation or westernization
- linkages between libraries and colonialism and/or imperialism
- the role of libraries and information in mass migration and globalization
- immigrant self-determination versus structural inequality
- immigrant pre-migration information behavior
- immigrant contributions to information innovations (e.g., Silicon Valley, H-1B visa)
- presumptions of immigrant information incompetence and/or digital divides
- libraries and model minority narratives
- libraries and liberation rhetoric in the immigrant context
- libraries in sanctuary cities/states
- libraries in immigration detention centers
- libraries, privacy and the USA PATRIOT Act
- library services to specific immigrant groups (i.e., DACA recipients, TPS holders, religious minorities, forcefully displaced groups)
- nativism, populism, or xenophobia in libraries
- historical aspects of library services to immigrants
- gaps in immigrant information behavior research
- immigrants in the LIS workforce
Invited authors will complete 3,000 to 6,000 word chapters. LIS affiliates (LIS professionals, paraprofessionals, students and faculty) in the U.S. and Canada are encouraged to propose chapters. Chapters may be conceptual or empirical, exploratory or explanatory. All research methods are welcome. Case studies and literature reviews must draw from both migration/population studies and LIS literature. No previously submitted or published material.
Submissions:
Please email a 300-500 word proposal to Ana Ndumu at andumu@umd.eduby December 15, 2018. Proposals should include:
· Anticipated title
· Chapter rationale
· Brief outline
· Author(s) bio(s)
About Library Juice Press:
Library Juice Press, an imprint of Litwin Books, LLC , specializes in theoretical and practical issues in librarianship from a critical perspective, for an audience of professional librarians and students of library science. Topics include library philosophy, information policy, library activism, and in general anything that can be placed under the rubric of "critical studies in librarianship."
About the Series:
The Critical Race Studies and Multiculturalism in LIS series collects and publishes works from theoretical, practical and personal perspectives that critically engage issues of race, ethnicity, cultural diversity and equity in library and information science (LIS). Works published in this series include:
edited by Rose L. Chou and Annie Pho
edited by Gina Schlesselman-Tarango
edited by Nicole A. Cooke and Miriam E. Sweeney
About the Editor:
Ana Ndumu is a researcher at the University of Maryland (UMD), College Park’s College of Information. She earned a Ph.D. in Information at Florida State University´s School of Information and explores the intersection of libraries, information and demography. She has completed studies on Black immigrants’ ICT device and Internet access; Black immigrants’ information behavior and experiences with information overload; the development of a scale for measuring and examining information overload as immigrant acculturative stress; and critical discourse analysis on LIS literature involving immigrants. Ana is a UMD President’s Postdoctoral Fellow and Digital Library Federation (DLF) Futures Fellow.
1. Mignolo, Walter, and Catherine E Walsh. On Decoloniality: Concepts, Analytics, and Praxis . Durham: Duke University Press, 2018.
2. Caidi, Nadia, Danielle Allard, and Lisa Quirke. "Information practices of immigrants." Annual review of information science and technology 44, no. 1 (2010): 491-531.
