Raking the Forests: Information Literacy, Political Polarization, Fake News, and the Educational Roles of Librarians

Abstract

While much discussion of information literacy in librarianship has focused on the educational roles that librarians play in promoting information literacy among the communities they serve, the information literacy education of librarians themselves has not received much attention. In response to an article written by the authors of this chapter, a surprisingly large number of librarians responded to them to try to contradict the assertions of their article using what was clearly disinformation. Drawing upon these attempts by librarians to spread misinformation in a professional context, this discussion explores the ways in which a lack of critical information literacy among information professionals can impact the ability of libraries and librarians to support their communities. This chapter also considers ways in which the librarians and library professional organizations could work to promote critical information literacy among current and future members of the profession.

Citation

Jaeger, P.T. and Taylor, N.G. (2021), "Raking the Forests: Information Literacy, Political Polarization, Fake News, and the Educational Roles of Librarians", Taylor, N.G., Kettnich, K., Gorham, U. and Jaeger, P.T. (Ed.) Libraries and the Global Retreat of Democracy: Confronting Polarization, Misinformation, and Suppression (Advances in Librarianship, Vol. 50), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 211-224. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0065-283020210000050009