Head Tale

So the concept of privilege has been on my mind lately.

Thanks to the kind (and kind of) folks on my Facebook feed, I’ve been regularly sent articles about “white privilege“, “male privilege“, “heterosexual privilege” (uhm, for anyone keeping count, I get to tick the box for all three…plus most other types of privilege out there – education, class, ethnicity, ability (which privileges me against those with mental or physical disability), etc.)

Lately, I’ve been asking myself if there’s another type of lesser-known privilege I qualify for – “Librarian Privilege”?

What I mean by this is that, in general, librarians tend to be the type of folks who are very conscious of things like class differences in society, equality issues, GLBT issues, etc. etc.

But I wonder if sometimes this is a more theoretical understanding for many of us and we don’t realise how by simply being librarians, we have a level of privilege that many others don’t, a difference we don’t always “get” in a real, first-hand way?

I’m reminded of a discussion in library school about how something as simple as having security gates and/or security guards in a library can create a certain impression for many of our patrons that we’re not aware of – that the library is more like a jail than a place of safety and refuge.  Or how so many libraries have signage that’s English only.  I’m not saying we should have signs in every language of the world but something simple like pictograms on every sign could really help address say, the needs of new immigrants.  (I was recently in a Toyota dealership and noticed they do this with almost all signage as pictograms.)  Or an issue we face at my own branch where people who can afford laptops, tablets and other devices get unlimited time on our wireless network but those who go on our public computers are restricted to two hours per day (although to be fair, we’ll always extend people’s time if at least one other computer is available and the limit used to be one hour so that’s getting better too.)  Or another example – many libraries have rules against letting patrons use the phone, even though the phone is probably sitting unused 99% of the day.  Why, especially when the reality is that many underprivileged patrons might not have any phone at home.

The idea of a separate “Librarian Privilege” really came home for me during a a recent meeting I had where my male, white privilege was superceded on a committee comprised of a group of folks who didn’t share those characteristics and where the only thing we had in common was that we were all well-educated, well-renumerated librarians.  Yet there we were making decisions that would affect some of the library’s most disadvantaged patrons from our positions of Librarian Privilege.

Or tonight, where, without vague-blogging too much, I had an experience that made me come home, hug Pace as tight as I could then go in my room and have a good, cathartic cry.

Yeah, librarians are privileged.  Just like being a man or white or heterosexual, it’s part of the reality of who I am (although of course, the only thing that was a conscious choice).  But that doesn’t make it any easier when you’re confronted face-to-face with your own privilege versus what others in this world deal with on a daily basis.

[Edit: Some might read this and think that there’s no difference between Educational Privilege – the advantage I’ve been given to know how our education system works – and how to work that in kind, how to apply for and get accepted to educational programs, etc. etc. – but I think of Librarian Privilege as a distinct sub-set of Educational Privilege that is created by the values and knowledge that this particular form of education has given me.  To put it another way, although they’re all forms of Educational Privilege, I think there’s a difference between Masters of Library Science Privilege, Masters of Business Admin privilege, Masters of Pick-A-Specialty privilege and so on – as every type of educational specialty is going to give an individual a specific framework which houses much of their professional behaviour and approach.]