Libraries Rethink Police Presence
The mass protests for Black Lives Matters and racial equality that erupted after the killing of George Floyd by police has also made some libraries rethink their use of police. Some are rethinking their Coffee with a Cop program, how hiring off-duty police negatively affects many patrons, and looking to divest from police while researching other alternatives that don’t potentially put vulnerable communities at more risk.“’There’s no possible way to have intellectual freedom if police are in the building,’ says Alison Macrina, who as LFP [Library Freedom Project] director oversees the organization’s efforts to educate libraries on privacy and surveillance.”
Colson Whitehead Will Be Honored By Library of Congress
Pulitzer Prize for fiction and the Orwell Prize for political fiction winning author Colson Whitehead has now won the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction. At fifty, the author of The Underground Railroad and The Nickel Boys, will be the youngest recipient of the lifetime achievement prize. On Thursday the 16th, at 7 p.m. EDT, you can catch Whitehead in conversation with Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden on Hear You, Hear Me on the Library of Congress’ Facebook, YouTube and website.
#PublishingPaidMe
Last month L.L. McKinney created #PublishingPaidMe in the hopes of exposing the open secret that Black authors have always and continue to be underpaid compared to their white counterparts in publishing. “McKinney said the callouts from publishers to buy books by Black authors, following George Floyd’s death at the hands of police officers, were ‘bittersweet’ and reminded her that ‘we don’t get that support until we start dying in the streets.’” The hashtag has in no way solved the issue, nor was it meant to, but has put focus on an industry that remains quiet. The conversations arising from it will hopefully lead to transparency, making it more difficult to underpay Black authors.
True Stories of Living With Disability
From the history of design and its impact on what is considered disability to wide-ranging essay collections, dig into true disability stories.