Information Privilege: Beyond the Individual and into the Collective (Video Replay)

This is a recording of the March 6, 2004 presentation, Information Privilege: Beyond the Individual and Into the Collective.

Over a decade ago, Char Booth coined the term “information privilege” and advocated for using the conceptual framework to further critical information literacy and open access. Information privilege critiques how access to information can be disparate, based on an individual’s privilege, and usually informed by one’s institutional affiliation, status, or social identity. The discourse on information privilege in Library and Information Science (LIS) has grown in recent years, with dozens of articles and conference presentations on the topic published in venues focused on critical information literacy, public services, scholarly communication, area studies, and health sciences over the last five years.

This presentation aims to push conversations around information privilege further towards a collective and justice-oriented framework. Presenters will share their experiences implementing information privilege in libraries, briefly examine how sociocultural factors impact the use and production of information, and then invite participants to collaboratively explore ways that library workers can expand our understanding and use of information privilege. The presenters invite participants to bring examples of their own use of information privilege, as well as ideas for expanding information privilege.

If you can’t make this session but wish to view a recording later, please register so that you’ll receive an email that includes a link to the video of the presentation.

Presenters:

Jessica Dai (she/her) is the Organizational Development and Learning Librarian at the University of Delaware Library, Museums and Press. In her former student-facing instructional roles, she used information privilege as a framework for teaching a range of courses from workshops to credit-bearing instruction. Her research interests include anti-oppression in LIS, organizational development, feminist and critical pedagogies, and the intersections in between.

Charissa Powell (she/her) is Head of the Student Success and Curriculum Partnerships Department at the Library, Museums and Press at the University of Delaware. She created and taught 3 semesters of a first-year seminar on information privilege at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Charissa published “Information Privilege and First-Year Students: A Case Study from a First-Year Seminar Course Using Access to Information as a Lens for Exploring Privilege” with In the Library with The Lead Pipe. Charissa is also co-founder of The Librarian Parlor and a Project Team Member for LibParlor Online Learning.