Showing posts with label Information and Culture. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Information and Culture. Show all posts

Sunday, December 4, 2016

Fake News Stories are Related to Culture and Information Literacy

[This blog post is a sketch of ideas. I plan on fleshing these ideas out.  I want to share them now though.]


Fake News as Related to Culture and Information Literacy:

The recent information that has come out about fake news sites and stories that were shared on social media and influenced the recent elections are directly related to the concept of Information and Culture.  The idea of controlling public perception via the control of media was perfected by the Nazis' Josef Goebbels.  Now the ideas of Edward Bernays have been combined with Goebbels  techniques to manipulate and reinforce the idea of Whiteness in US culture. In many ways, this election was about Whiteness versus the alternative developing multicultural worldview that exist within the USA.  These ideas, because a lack of access to education and publishing by people of color, are still developing.  The pace this development has picked up steam recently. The backlash by the Racists in our country is a reaction to this progress.

As a person of color, I am struck by how similar these fake news sites and stories are to how the dominant culture publishes and diffuses the idea of Whiteness.  This is done by packaging and repackaging the idea that europeans and european culture are the most important things in the world.  Whiteness also sees itself as the epitome of culture.  It sees itself as superior in every manner.  
This message is embedded in our history particularly.  People of color and other marginalized groups have been almost completely left out of history, except for using them as examples of primitive culture or other savageries.





Not only does this apply to people of color, it applies to class, gender, sexual identity, and physical ability and more.

The #Breitbart Nazis and their ilk are good at FAKE news stories. In fact, they proved that people didn't care if the news was fake after the fact. #ACORN story. How do you think their techniques of social control will be incorporated into our educational system?

Our stories, information relevant to our understanding of our history, liberatory information, information that could topple the concept of #Whiteness which is so embedded in every aspect of our culture. We need to tell our own stories and to develop our own ideas about the world without being boxed in by Whiteness.

Purposes of fake news:

The purposes of the fake news sites and stories seem to be to form and shape (CONTROL) public opinion about particular political and societal viewpoints.

Social control

Promotion of Whiteness as the norm.

Purposes of fake information in libraries and education:

The purposes of the fake news sites and stories seem to be to form and shape (CONTROL) public opinion about particular political and societal viewpoints.

Social control

Promotion of Whiteness as the norm.

We have been living with Fake News and Fake Books, and Information for a long time in the USA.


Sunday, October 23, 2016

Whiteness in Libraries

Whiteness in US Libraries

[Note--this is a blog post.  These ideas can and will be further developed.  These ideas are sketches of what I am thinking at the moment.  Feedback is encouraged and welcome.]

US schools and libraries serve as points of diffusion for Whiteness.  

Whiteness, as used in this post is defined as the concept that European people and European culture are more important than other people and other cultures.  

Whiteness is purveyed uncritically in libraries.  This shucking of Whiteness is done under the guise of objectivity, of adhering the the 'marketplace' of ideas.  But this so-called neutrality is really an adherence and capitulation to the Whiteness paradigm.  

Children of color hear the message of Whiteness--"European people and European culture are more important than other people and other cultures.  


Children of color live in a world of discrimination and bias in US schools.  
Some think US culture is not European. But US culture is derived from European culture and is fundamentally White-supremacist. 

I don't say this lightly.  Whiteness is embedded in our culture.  From the shapes of the buildings, to the hierarchies of the library staff and administration.  This is especially true in the American Library world. Ethnic categories, demeaning classifications, cataloging systems with names like the Anglo American Cataloging Rules, and staff who (too often) don't look like the people who live in the neighborhood.  Microagressions, discrimination, hiring bias and collections centered around Whiteness all are outcomes of the ubiquitousness of  this paradigm in our libraries.  


Engravings on Multnomah Co. Library Central Building Photo by Ismoon Maria Hunter-Morton.
Many people will now be thinking that I am saying all White people are racist, or that all White people are bad, or some such nonsense.  That is not what  I intend to say.  I'm saying that the idea of Whiteness, as defined above, is what our country was founded upon. 

European immigrants live on stolen indigenous land.

These immigrants and their descendants committed genocide against Indigenous peoples throughout the Americas.

The wealth of the Americas, in large part, was created by slave labor. This slave labor was both African and Indigenous.  

Whiteness says that this is okay, that this is correct and that it is justified. Those who adhere to Whiteness also believe in these fundamental principles.  Mostly, the information found in libraries says it is okay, natural and normal, or does not bother to address these issues...



Engravings on Multnomah Co. Library Central Building.  Photo by Ismoon Maria Hunter-Morton.
The diffusion model works something like this:

Whiteness, brought from Europe has been part of US Educational system from the beginning.

Children are inculcated with #Whiteness via books, lectures and the culture of US schools.

Some children become authors, scientists and other types of academics.  They produce information and knowledge in the form of books and other types of media.



Racist mainstream 'Intellectual' book 
The knowledge, which too many authors, scientists and academics create is fundamentally flawed with Whiteness embedded within. Even if the creators of this knowledge are people of color. They are working with tainted information that has not been fully analyzed from a cultural perspective. This lends itself to embedding Whiteness in all new knowledge created from this information. This is why we have seen no real advancements, even with the educated people of color. They exist within and are heavily influenced by Whiteness. Libraries serve as key distribution points for culturally biased information.

One example is historic documentation Thomas Jefferson, as a land-owner and slaveholder, is understood to be a rapist. He took advantage of his position and raped his slaves, yet he is still hailed as a hero still. This is Whiteness. 
Thomas Jefferson (Slave Rapist) bust in the Library of Congress
Technology in libraries needs to be reexamined with a critical eye. Embedded Whiteness prevails. Metadata, algorithms and other location tools are just as infected with Whiteness as the rest of the library world and larger American Educational culture. This issue is particularly pertinent as we transition into a more digital information world.  

These people are probably still in control of your library technology.
The idea that White people, European Americans are more important, smarter, better, stronger, more worthy, and that their culture is superior is embedded in most of the books in US libraries. People check out these books and are then influenced by these books. And since most of these books have the message of Whiteness uncritically embedded in them, the reader is most often influenced by Whiteness without giving it the critical eye it deserves.
This is how libraries serve as points of diffusion for Whiteness paradigm.

Thursday, October 13, 2016

Culture and Information Literacy Video

This is a video I created (with help from the school's video production team) for my introductory Information Literacy class. It was meant to broach the subject of Culture and Information Literacy. It can be used to generate a discussion or as a reflection writing assignment catalyst. I would LOVE feedback on this please.

Sunday, July 17, 2016

Please Help Us Publish Librarians With Spines


This is your chance to be part of a unique publishing endeavor. Yago S. Cura and Max Macias are co-editing a book of essays written by specifically invited librarians who we feel have some of the best minds in the world. We need help with funds for publishing. Please consider giving what you can to help us create this one of a kind work. We plan on continuing with a series of unique, forward-thinking and courageous librarian works from outstanding minds in the Information world.

My name is Max Macias and my Co-editor is Yago Cura. We are seeking help publishing an invitational anthology of radical essays written by exceptional librarians, many of whom are also librarians of color. All funds will be used for publishing and promotional costs. We are projecting to publish this anthology of essays by May, 2017. Few books have been written about how information and culture impact the creation of knowledge. Even fewer books critique how oppression is bolstered and enhanced by cultural concepts that are embedded in our information. Since information is important to all of us as librarians and consumers of information, these essays will seek to fill the void described above. One of the things we are trying to understand is the relationship between culture and information, and how this impacts the creation of knowledge. 

These essays will range in theme from colonialism and whiteness in library science to representation in children’s literature. Going beyond what has been written in the past on this subject and bringing together a diverse group of great librarians is the goal of this endeavor. These essays will attempt to move LIS forward in the areas of culture, information and education. You will not only be helping us publish this work, but you will be helping the field and profession of Library Science with your support. Please give anything you can to help us change the field of library related publishing. Description: Hinchas Press invites original chapters for a new volume. 

This edited volume seeks to understand culture and its impact on information and knowledge in LIS and Education in general. We seek contributors involved in the ongoing critique of information and culture in the United States and Canada and the rest of the Americas--especially those who are interested in sharing and speaking candidly about their experiences with culture and information in libraries, authorship, books, films, comics, other media and in education. This monograph will offer multiple views and insights from the greatest minds in LIS during the second decade of the 21st century. 

These essays will cover major breakthroughs, barriers to progress, cultural innovation and information, and radical thinking in libraries and in education and other vital areas. What progress has LIS made regarding major problems concerning information and culture? What successes have individuals had creating change? What do great contemporary librarians think about colonialism, feminism, multiculturalism, religion and race, intersectionality and other social justice and equity issues? This compilation will be edited by two of today’s shakers and movers in information and culture: Max Macias and Yago 

Topics to consider from a theoretical and/or practical perspective: Information, culture and user needs Computers and culture Whiteness in Libraries and Education Women and computers in libraries Open educational resources and representation Microaggressions in education, academia, in print Cultural representation in children’s literature Cultural representation in comics Erotica and Information in libraries Sexual identity and collection development Classism in LIS education and librarian culture Hip-Hop culture in libraries...

 Below is the golden ticket we sent invited authors and a link to our GoFundMe drive.  

Please give what you can.



Saturday, February 6, 2016

Colonialism and Whiteness: A Legacy of Brutality


Colonialism and Whiteness

This is the first post in a series of blog posts that seeks to understand the development of Whiteness in the Americas from colonialism to today.  These blog posts are short necessarily short and are not meant to be exhaustive, but to give the reader an idea of where Whiteness comes from and how it appears in our culture. The need for these posts came out of the backlash against Whiteness History Month at Portland Community College this April, 2016. 

Casta Painting
A Casta (Spanish: [ˈkasta], Portuguese: [ˈkastɐ, ˈkaʃtɐ]) was a hierarchical system of race classification created by Spanish elites (españoles) in Hispanic America during the Spanish colonial period. The sistema de castas or the sociedad de castas was used in 17th and 18th centuries in Spanish America and Spanish Philippines to describe as a whole and socially rank the mixed-race people who were born during the post-Conquest period. These unions produced in the process known as mestizaje. A parallel system of categorization based on the degree of acculturation to Hispanic culture, which distinguished between gente de razón (Hispanics) and gente sin razón (non-acculturated natives), concurrently existed and supported the idea of casta.  Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casta 

Whiteness

Whiteness has been with us since the beginning of European colonialism.  When Europeans conquered what was to become the Americas, they also established a racial caste system based on skin color.   The darker one was, the lower they were on the social scale.  Whiteness is a concept that describes the cultural, lingual, institutional beliefs, practices and behavior that maintains access to power and reinforces power for White people and people of lighter skin tones.  This colonial system was created for and by Europeans for the benefit of Europeans.  Everything was in relation to the European--this is a hallmark of the concept of Whiteness--that everything is judged in relation to Whiteness and not something else.  

Españoles (Spanish) [White people]
Peninsulares (Spaniards) [White people]
Criollos (Spanish Americans) [White people]
Indios (Amerindians)
Mestizos (Amerindian and Spanish mix)
Castizos (Spanish with some Amerindian mix)
Cholos (Amerindian with some Spanish mix)
Pardos (Spanish, African, and Amerindian Mix)
Mulattos (African and Spanish mix)
Zambos (Amerindian and African mix)
Negros (Africans)

This is, in a nutshell, how the European imposed hierarchy in the Americas looked.

This system was brutally enforced.  There were strict rules about who could do what with whom....This system was directly related to slavery and servitude.  The people higher up (Whiter) the hierarchy were granted more privileges and rights than those in the lower section.  Consequently, the amount of distance one could put between oneself and the lower states of the hierarchy, the better chance one had of making a living, or even succeeding in the European (White) dominated world of the Americas (Whiteness).   


Another casta painting

     

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     Casta paintings
The casta series represent different racial mixtures that derived from the offspring of unions between Spaniards and Indians–mestizos, Spaniards and Blacks–mulattos, and Blacks and Indians–zambos. Subsequent intermixtures produced a mesmerizing racial taxonomy that included labels such as “no te entiendo,” (“I don’t understand who you are”), an offspring of so many racial mixtures that made ancestry difficult to determine, or “salta atrás” (“a jump backward”) which could denote African ancestry. Source:https://goo.gl/O9DdUP

 These paintings show us the importance of Whiteness to the Spanish from the very beginning of their conquest of the Americas.  The resultant mixture with indigenous, African and Asian people led to a complex hierarchy of racial superiority that was adhered to and, in many ways, is still upheld today.  These notions permeate our society, but in a different guise.

High Civilization (NOT White)
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 Indigenous People and Whiteness

In an idealized Mexico where people of African, European and indigenous heritage were intermingling in seeming harmony, the paintings were a reminder to Spaniards that there was still a strong hierarchy of racial purity — with Europeans on top. Source: http://goo.gl/y1mAZQ
On the social scale indigenous people are close to last.  It was a survival strategy to distance oneself from anything that is indigenous.  Choices like adopting the god of the Europeans, to using their script instead of the indigenous forms of writing,  and becoming as Guero (White) in dress, speech and color if possible.

They had been here thousands of years and had established societies, cultures and hierarchies.

Once the casta system was imposed by invading Europeans they concept of Whiteness became increasingly important.  The abandonment of their culture, their languages and their identity is what was required, at baseline, if one wanted to survive or even advance in the new hierarchy that had been established by bloodthirsty conquerors. 


Up until recently, skin color has been a defining factor in Latino life.

Are you:

Guero?  (White, or Whiter Than)

Maron?  (Brown)

Negro?  (Black)

The answer could be a determining factor in your life....

Spanish burning indigenous books/knowledge/culture

          

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          Cultural Genocide

The racial hierarchy in combination with the destruction of the indigenous cultures by book burning, destroying cultural monuments and using them to build churches (Whiteness), and the enslavement of the indigenous people did much to reinforce the casta system.  Our (Latinos) indigenousness had been written out of the history books, it had been derided and our people discriminated against and persecuted (according to their skin color).  Whiteness can be uncovered when one thinks about how the descendants of European immigrants want to persecute indigenous people from Mexico and other parts of central America for wanting to migrate on their own continent.  Even Latinos are hesitant to use this argument against immigration restrictions on Latinos.  I can only imagine that the bias against Indios still permeates Latino culture and prevents this strong argument from being presented. 

Contemporary Latinos and Whiteness 

As always, this is not a sweeping generalization, but a description of a large part of Latino society in the US that I have been witness to my entire life.

Latinos in large part lost their indigeneity by distancing themselves from their indigenous heritage and appropriating the European religion and culture as much as possible.   It was advantageous to do so, economically, socially and health-wise, it was advantageous to be as European (White) as possible.  This is where we see Whiteness beginning in the Americas.

Since the 1990's there has been a resurgence of interest in indigenous culture by Latinos who want to claim that part of their heritage.  It had never really been a option before--now we see Aztec dancers, and other parts of our indigenous heritage celebrated and exalted by some Latinos.

An example of contemporary Whiteness 

When I pick up a book entitled, American Ethnic Folklore and I open it up and it is really about Indigenous mythology.  I then realize that this is whiteness.  The fact that this book has been written for White people by White people without regard to any other readership uncovers Whiteness in this particular context and moment.  This is Whiteness.  These kinds of subject categories still permeate education and information in general.

We must seek to uncover Whiteness where it is, when it appears.  Whiteness is not a stable, abstract concept.  Whiteness changes according to setting, in shifts it's mode of providing access and maintaining power for White people.   We should and help our allies see and explicate Whiteness when it appears in our institutional and social contexts.

Whiteness displayed before the Irish were considered White



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One other thing about Whiteness is that it can be adhered to by non-white people.  Many people of color and those who purport to want to help People of Color adhere to the system of Whiteness that the educational system upholds, supports and requires of POC who want to succeed.  I say that this is why we have made little to no progress in equity, diversity and inclusion in our school systems and our society.  

The brutalities that were used to enforce the racial hierarchies of yesterday are still with us today.They used to come in the form of lynchings--back in the days of Jim Crow.... Now they come in the forms of Police shootings of unarmed African Americans and Latinos in far greater numbers than Whites.  They come in vigilante shootings of unarmed African Americans, for example--the shooting of Trayvon Martin.  

Colonialism is still in full effect....

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