Changing the Racial Demographics of Librarians

Document Type

Report

Publication Date

4-18-2023

Keywords

Library, Racism, Demographics, DEIA, Recruitment

Abstract

Librarianship has a racial diversity representation problem. Black, Indigenous, and people of color have been underrepresented in the field for decades, and despite the momentum and initiatives in support of diversifying the profession, the numbers appear to not have changed meaningfully. The data tell a consistent and compelling story. The library profession remains overwhelmingly white despite our efforts and interventions. Part of the problem stems from the fact that demographic information about the profession is not measured and reported in a consistent manner. What then would it actually take to increase the racial diversity of the field?

Publisher Attribution

Issue brief published with Ithaka S+R

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

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