The Everyday Work-lives of Public Librarians in a Diverse US City

Abstract

This dissertation is situated within the context of the author's personal experience as a librarian of color and educator, exploring the dissonance between the perceived value of their role and their own understanding of its worth. The study aims to bring to light the processes that shape the experiences of female librarians, particularly those who are women of color. The research is informed by Institutional Ethnography (IE) and Narrative Analysis, which focus on the everyday lived experiences of people as the research problematic, and progress through layers to uncover how external power structures influence daily life. Five active female and two active male librarians were interviewed to understand how the value of female librarians’ work is socially constructed, how librarians are positioned to understand the role of education in library systems, and what the lived experiences of diverse librarians who work with children/youth are, and how this knowledge can influence instructional changes. Ultimately, the study highlights the inseparable connection between the librarian and the library, and suggests that by fully actualizing public librarians' potential, a critical praxis of librarianship can advance information fluencies and the social, political, cultural, and economic dimensions of information environments.