As the tenth anniversary of 9/11 approaches, I am excited to introduce the theme of our annual meeting this year: Intellectual Freedom in Special Libraries. We will focus on media diversity which has become an increasingly important issue with information professionals who rely on various media outlets that are disappearing due to consolidation and database conglomeration. Academic and public libraries are facing the same issue as journalism evolves, newspapers fold, bloggers replace researchers, etc. To access a background paper on the issue: “Fostering Media Diversity in Libraries: Strategies and Actions” or go to an article on “Libraries and FCC Rules Related to Media Concentration and Localism”.
Other dangers that HOA blogger, Julie Timmins has already alerted you about include the personalization of Google. Reading her blog post is good place to start learning about this issue and how it is already affecting your work. Another great New York Times article about this topic is “Trouble with the Echo Chamber Online” by Natasha Singer. (Thanks to Katie Schneider for finding this one.) Those who would have us search and find only results that agree with our perspective should remember the old saying “Beware the sound of one hand clapping.” Enhanced technology can bring the same old censorship issues to bear that we have been fighting against for decades. According to IFLA:
- Intellectual freedom is the right of every individual to both hold and express opinions and to seek and receive information.
- Intellectual freedom is the basis of democracy.
- Intellectual freedom is the core of the library concept.
I personally have chosen an Android smartphone over the Apple iPhone because Apple censors their mobile apps and will not allow apps with anything contrary to their company value system to be released. Large companies with deep pockets can censor the flow of information which is increasingly moving toward mobile devices. On a another personal note, I often hear objections to displays of personal faith in various arenas, and have been warned of appearing “unprofessional” to the HOA chapter members if I allow my personal beliefs to influence my service as your president. But I consider it to be even more unprofessional to censor a fellow librarian in ways that we would never even consider censoring any other author, actor, speaker, or publisher. If my promotion of intellectual freedom and freedom of expression (which encompasses speech, press, religion, assembly and association) offends anyone, I sincerely ask you to overlook it. The alternative of violating my personal beliefs and offending my Creator would be a worse course of action for me. We have been blessed to live and work in a free country whose foundation for self-government is an educated people. Librarians champion these freedoms and in so doing, we honor those who have sacrificed much to protect them.
Mary Odom
HOA Chapter President
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