LibVoices
By LibVoices
LibVoicesMay 10, 2024
Episode 43:Conrrado Saldivar on Advocacy, Leadership, and Censorship
Conrrado Saldivar is Past President of the Wyoming Library Association and Tech Services Manager at the Natrona County Library in his hometown of Casper, WY. He received his MLIS in 2021 from the University of Washington iSchool and is a 2019 ALA Spectrum Scholar. As one of the few BIPOC librarians in Wyoming and as a leader in the Wyoming library community, he has worked to support EDI efforts in Wyoming, both for library staff and his community. In October 2023, he received the Wyoming Library Association’s Outstanding Hero/Heroine Award (alongside the Legislative Committee Chair) for his work in fighting against adverse legislation that would target library materials written by and about members of the LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC communities.
Episode 42: Denisse Solis on Leadership, Representation, and Collaboration
Denisse Solis is the Digital Collections Librarian at the University of Denver (DU). Prior to this position, she was DU's first residency librarian. She began her career in her alma mater of Florida International University as a cataloger and has since occupied both public and technical positions within academic libraries. Born and raised in Miami, Florida, her research is deeply personal and driven by a desire to effect change. She refers to her work as "me-search," as it revolves around seeking answers to critical questions related to representation, equity, inclusion, and organizational culture.
Episode 41: Shawn(ta) Smith-Cruz on Intersectionality, Community, and Activism
Shawn(ta) Smith-Cruz is an assistant curator and associate dean for Teaching, Learning, and Engagement at New York University Division of Libraries where she serves as the Faculty Diversity Search Liaison. Shawn is also an adjunct assistant professor at Pratt School of information, teaching Reference & Instruction. Shawn is a co-coordinator at the Lesbian Herstory Archives, a co-convenor of the Reference & Instruction Special Interest Group at METRO where she co-curated the Critical Pedagogy Symposium and Case Studies in Critical Pedagogy series. Shawn is the co-editor of a two-volume series, Grabbing Tea: Queer Conversations in Archives and Practice and Queer Conversations in Identity and Libraries expected 2024 from Litwin Books/Library Juice Press.
Episode 40: Treshani Perera on Critical Cataloging, Creativity, and Teaching
Treshani is a cataloging librarian at an academic library in the Southeast region and has been employed in academic libraries since 2014. Her research interests include critical cataloging and diversity, equity, and inclusion in academic libraries and higher education. Treshani enjoys mentoring students of color in LIS and higher education, in general.
Episode 39: sofia leung on Collaboration, Leadership, and Advocacy
Episode 38: Katrina Spencer on Work Culture, Engagement, and Publishing
Katrina Spencer worked as the Librarian for African American and African Studies at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. She is also an active writer whose works include “Uprooted, Nomadic & Displaced: The Unspoken Costs of the Upward Climb,” “The Comprehensive Guide to Resisting Overcommitment,” and various contributions to WOC + lib and Hack Library School. For Katrina’s tips on navigating the academic librarianship job market, check out her content on TikTok channel @katleespe. Also, visit her personal website, www.katleespe.com, for even more.
Episode 37: Nicky Andrews on Collaboration, Indigenous Data Sovereignty, and Open Access
Nicky Andrews is the Open Education Librarian at the University of San Francisco. Originally from Aotearoa, they are of Māori and Pākehā descent and an enrolled member of the Ngāti Pāoa iwi. They graduated with a BA in Social Sciences from Auckland University of Technology, a Master of Library & Information Science from the University of Washington, and a Master of Indigenous Studies from the University of Otago. Nicky has participated in many library communities, including as an ALA Spectrum Scholar, ALA Emerging Leader, NCSU Libraries Fellow, and SPARC Open Education Leadership Program Fellow. Their work exposing imposter syndrome's racialized and misogynist nature earned them the 2021 ACRL WGSS Award for Significant Achievement in Women & Gender Studies Librarianship. Outside of libraries, they dabble in poetry, catch Pokemon, and watch dinosaur documentaries with their cat.
Nicky Andrew's website.
Episode 36: Nicollette Davis & Crystal Chen on Citational Justice, Community, and Belonging
Crystal Chen is the Digital Educator Support Manager & Archivist at Facing History & Ourselves. She received her MSLIS from Pratt Institute and is an active member of the Chinese American Librarians Association and Asian/Pacific American Librarians Association. She also serves as a community admin for We Here (wehere. space), a supportive community for BIPOC in LIS.
Nicollette M. Davis (she/her) is based in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and is an assistant librarian. She’s a community admin for We Here, a supportive space for BIPOC library workers and archivists. Before becoming an academic librarian, she spent several years working in public libraries as a supervising Reference librarian and Circulation head. Her interests include critical librarianship, BIPOC community building, community engagement, and critical pedagogy in library instruction. All views and ideas expressed are her own.
Episode 35: Dr. Isabel Espinal on on Outreach, Performativity, and Equity
Isabel Espinal is a Research Services Librarian for Afro-American Studies, Latin American, Caribbean, and Latinx Studies, Spanish & Portuguese, and Native American & Indigenous Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She was born in New York City, two years after her parents immigrated from the Cibao countryside in the Dominican Republic. She has an AB in Romance Languages and Literature from Princeton University, a Masters in Library and Information Studies from UC Berkeley, and an MA and Ph.D. in American Studies, English department, from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is a past president of REFORMA, the National Association to Promote Library and Information Services to Latinos and the Spanish Speaking, and has written and given presentations on whiteness and diversity in librarianship, information literacy, the climate crisis and libraries, Dominican women writers in the United States, and Latinx literature, among other topics. Her most recent publication is the book chapter “Microaffections and Microaffirmations: Refusing to Reproduce Whiteness via Microaffirmative Actions,” in the book Dismantling Constructs of Whiteness in Higher Education, edited by Teresa Y. Neely and Margie Montañez and published by Routledge in 2022.
Episode 34: Petrina Jackson on Leadership, Advocacy, and Community
Episode 33: Ashley Watts on Community Involvement, Cultural Awareness, and Leadership
Episode 32: John Light Jr. on Storytelling, Genealogy, and Empowerment
While there, Mister John learned the art of Storytelling. He has shared stories with the old and young, in schools, community centers, and senior centers. He also found a passion for genealogy. As a result, he was able to discover new family members and restore the family tree.
In December of 2019, Mister John graduated from the iSchool of Syracuse University with an MLIS degree. His time at Syracuse was rewarding and taught him how to be a real Librarian.
In 2020, Mister John published 3 picture books "The Adventures of Joshua and Pip", "The Adventures of Joshua and Pip: Calvin the Catfish" and "Las Aventuras de Joshua y Pip". In 2021, he published the picture book "My Mother's Wildest Dreams".
Mister John is currently a Youth Librarian at Islands Library, a branch in Savannah, GA's Live Oak Public Library system. He is married to Deidre Light, his wife of 20 years, and has 13-year-old twins, Joshua and Jeremiah.
Episode 31: K.C. Boyd on Advocacy, Representation, and Belonging
Boyd currently serves on the executive boards for the District of Columbia Library Association and Washington Teachers Union. She is an active committee member for the American Library Association Chapter Council representing Washington D.C. and EveryLibrary Institute/Advisory Board. Boyd is also a member of the District of Columbia Public Schools Library Corps and serves on the AASL School Library Event Promotion Committee. Boyd currently is a National Ambassador representing the Washington D.C. area for Checkology Virtual Classroom and The News Literacy Project. She is also the recipient of the American Consortium for Equity in Education 2022 Excellence in Equity Award and the 2022 National Association of State Boards of Education “Policy Leader of the Year Winner”
A staunch advocate for school libraries, she is widely known and respected for her work in educating parents, teachers, and district officials on promoting leisure reading for children and teens. Additionally, she is a sought-after and popular keynote speaker and conference presenter at the local, state, and national levels. It is Boyd’s belief that all children, despite economic circumstances, have the right to read and should have access to books that reflect themselves and encourage inquiry. Boyd can be reached through her website: www.kcboyd.com/.
To get professional development go to www.kcboyd.com/the-clubhouse.html
Episode 30:Loida Garcia Febo on Solidarity, Inclusion, and Leadership
Episode 29: Jimmy Zavala on Community Archives, Counternarratives, and Student Empowerment
Episode 28:Rhiannon Sorrell on Traditional Knowledge, Community, and Tribesourcing
Episode 27: Ricky Punzalan on Colonization, Repatriation, and Access
Episode 26:Stanton Biddle on Community, Representation, and Leadership
He spent his entire working career as a librarian beginning as a library page in the Rochester (NY) Public Library while in high school and as a library assistant at the U.S. Library of Congress while completing his undergraduate work in college. Upon receiving his library degree, he held increasingly responsible positions at the Municipal Reference and later the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture of the New York Public Library. In 1973 he was appointed Associate Director of Libraries at Howard University in Washington, DC; in 1979 Associate Director of Libraries at the State University of New York at Buffalo; and in 1984 Chief Librarian at Baruch College of the City University of New York. Between 1988 and his retirement in 2011, he held a number of senior positions within the College and City University of New York system.
Stanton has been an active member of the Black Caucus of the American Library Association for 48 of its 51 years. He served on the Executive Board for three terms, as president from 1994-96 and Treasurer from 2002-2008. He edited the proceedings of the first two National Conferences of African American Librarians and served as Conference Treasurer for five of the ten conferences.
Dr. Biddle lives in New York City, where he volunteers with a number of genealogy and family history research organizations and institutions and is still actively involved with the Black Caucus of ALA.
Episode 25: Jennifer Brown on Leadership, Uplifting Others, and Attribution
Episode 24: Madeline Pena on Mentorship, Community, and Solidarity
Episode 23: Nichelle Hayes on Recruitment, Diversity, & Advocacy
Episode 22: Dr. Safiya Noble on Knowledge Spaces, Passion, & Technology
Episode 21: UrbanLibRoom on Community, Commitment, and Care
Episode 20: Ziba Perez on Recruitment, Uniqueness, and Zines
Episode 19: Holly Smith on Collaboration, Meaningful Representation, and Radical Empathy
Episode 18: Shannon Jones & Beverly Murphy on Representation, Retention, and Trailblazing
Episode 17: LaQuanda T. Onyemeh & Lorin K. Jackson on Empowerment, Intentionality, and Solidarity
Episode 16: Jina Duvernay on Leadership, Representation, and Self-Advocacy
Jina DuVernay is the Program Director for Engagement & African American Collections at Atlanta University Center, Robert W. Woodruff Library. Jina was the Collection Development Archivist for African American Collections at the Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library at Emory University. Prior to that, she was the Special Collections Librarian at HBCU, Alabama State University while pursuing her MLIS from the University of Alabama. Jina serves as an editor of both Women of Color and Libraries (WOC+LIB) and the new Library Diversity and Residency Studies journal. She is passionate about engagement and outreach to communities of color, as well as recruiting, promoting, and retaining library professionals of color. Jina was a 2018 ALA Emerging Leader.
Episode 15: April M.Hathcock on Effective Communication, Compassion, and Openness
Episode 14: Joyce Gabiola on Care, Intentionality, and Amplifying Voices
They co-created and are an inaugural editor for up//root, a new publication/media space for Black, Indigenous, Persons of Color (BIPOC) to share research and meditations on knowledge, systems, experiences and/or ways of being associated with libraries, archives, and other information environments. Partnered with We Here, up//root is an intervention that endeavors to unapologetically center and uplift the works of BIPOC exclusively.
Lastly, Joyce would like to take this moment to give a shout-out to their beautiful theyby, Evan. Your laughter brings never-ending joy, even during a pandemic.
Episode 13: Rose Chou & Annie Pho on Advocacy, Mentorship, and Publishing
Episode 12: Dr. Renate Chancellor on LIS Education, Mentorship, and Care
Episode 11: Eboni Henry on School Librarianship, Advocacy, and Forward-Thinking
Episode 10: Laura Tadena on Inclusivity, Creating Spaces, and Leadership
Episode 9: Lalitha Nataraj on Creativity, Inspiration, and Kindness
Episode 8: Nisha Mody on Self-Compassion, Sovereignty, and Radical Acceptance
Episode 7: Dr. Raymond Pun on Engagement and Community Building
Episode 6: Nataly Blas & Jennifer Masunaga on Communities of Practice and Mentorship
Episode 5: Derrick Jefferson on Representation, Empathy, and Self-Love
Episode 4: Trevor A. Dawes on Leading the Way
Dawes had two book chapters published – both on the topic of leadership. These chapters appear in Creating Leaders: An Examination of Academic and Research Library Leadership Institutes and Crucible Moments: Inspiring Library Leadership. His previous publications include being co-editor of Twenty-first Access Services: On the Frontline of Academic Librarianship (ACRL), 2013; co-author of, “Assessing Reserve Management Systems: Do They Deliver on Their Promises?,” Journal of Interlibrary Loan, Document Delivery and Electronic Reserve (Haworth Press) vol. 20, no.2, April 2010; editor of, “Marketing and Managing Electronic Reserves” (Haworth Press), 2006; and co-author of, “SPEC Kit #290: Access Services,” The Association of Research Libraries, 2005.
Episode 3: Kaetrena Davis Kendrick on The Authentic-Self at Work
Kendrick also offers professional development opportunities and organizational consultations designed to promote empathetic leadership in North American libraries.
In 2019, Kendrick was named the Association of College and Research Libraries’ Academic/Research Librarian of the Year. Learn more about Kaetrena’s mission and activities.