the riot act

Many of the conversations about libraries both inside and outside the blogosphere have been described as “too nice.”  People seem hesitant to disagree with colleagues, and great dialogues seem stifled by sometimes passive aggressive, sometimes simply naïve tendencies. I strongly believe that nothing bad has ever come out of disagreement, and that a healthy discourse is one in which opposing viewpoints are voiced and heard. Avenues for change are shut down when we shut up, and often, we need that dialogue to make change possible.

In short, this blog is an attempt to apply radical politics to many of the issues facing libraries of all types, with politics defined more traditionally as an examination of power structures, with all their complications, challenges, and opportunities. It’s not a political blog per se, but one that will attempt to hold up some of our assumptions about libraries for critical examination, all while celebrating the intellectual and personal freedoms that our institutions foster and protect.

Yes, there will be posts where I agree with other people or posts where I applaud something awesome a library somewhere is doing. And there will even be posts where I blog about my personal life, as many bloggers sometimes do. But the overriding purpose of this blog is to make some noise in the blogosphere and hopefully ferment a sense of awareness and maybe even activism in the library community.

Expect some guest bloggers, maybe some interviews, some news (sometimes with commentary, sometimes without) – lots of things that, I hope, will spark great discourse and dialogue in Library Land.

The revolution will not be blogged. But I still think this is a good place to start.