Understanding Social Justice Through Practitioners’ Language

Abstract

Researchers have recognized that aspects of social justice are present in library efforts by acknowledging the importance of using library programs and services to promote social justice and the significance of social justice for the LIS field. However, while public libraries have indicated a strong interest in reaching underserved communities, they may not yet possess a thorough understanding of various aspects of social justice, especially the concepts of equity, engagement, and empowerment, despite the increasing focus on social justice’s centrality in the library science field. This work-in-progress study presents a grounded theory analysis of twenty semi-structured interviews that were conducted as part of an existing study with library staff and their community partners (staff who work at organizations with which the libraries partner to offer outreach programs in the community). The analysis explores and unpacks practitioners’ language to demonstrate a complex, multifaceted portrait of how these practitioners describe equity, engagement, and empowerment. These practitioners express both broad and individual approaches to this social justice work in an effort to offer equal treatment to the whole community while also recognizing individual barriers. Moreover, they underscore the importance of a role for the community to play in achieving their own goals and strengthening connections between community members and institutions. This analysis yields a critical semantic foundation of social justice concepts, situated in practitioner understanding and prior research in social justice.

With Passionate Purpose

“…To be effective, outreachespecially with families and children in underserved communities-requires a community-centered approach that works to bridge these divides between library staff and community members. Additional research can help shape this approach and build on a call to service so evident in the ways many library staff work to close gaps and increase access, as well as to learn from and with communities (Campana et al 2022;Mills, Kociubuk, and Campana 2021).…”