This article from American Libraries juxtaposes public library actions after 9/11 with their actions during in the 1940s in order to illustrate how libraries responded to WWII in their collection development policies, patron services, and even in their compliance with the federal Office of War Information. Becker writes that intellectual freedom was a "fairly new professional committment" and most libraries/librarians fulfilled requests by the Office of Facts and Figures and the FBI that violated their patrons' privacy. When libraries/librarians objected to censorship or invasions of their patron privacy, they did so mostly on "practical grounds."
So what happened in the next few decades that made the Library Bill of Rights and the ALA's stance on intellectual freedom and censorship central to the profession? What socio-political forces changed the way in which public libraries dealt with censorship? And why were libraries complicit in violating patron privacy and removing "offensive" or "dangerous" materials from their shelves during WWII?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
I think one major reason for a change in librarian attitudes towards intellectual freedom was the Vietnam War.
A lot of librarians in the '60s and '70s openly opposed the war, and were much less willing then librarians during WWII to cooperate with government interference in their collections. In the book I'm reading for my report, the author mentions that during the Vietnam War law enforcement officials wanted to be able to get at library records (a la the Patriot Act) to see who might be reading about how to build bombs. The Feds weren't worried so much about foreign terrosits though, they were more concerned with Americans who were against the war.
I think this sort of thing made a lot of librarians feel that the ALA needed to take a stronger anti-censorship stance and that librarians needed to stand up more for intellectual freedom.
Post a Comment