In the Library with the Lead Pipe

"The opaque protocols we used to redact images and text were also moments of refusal—of denying the reader access to stolen, coerced, and unethically extracted materials produced in biomedical research."

"... our current knowledge infrastructure depends on extraction enacted through theft and hidden in plain sight. [We] need to acknowledge that the materials we maintain, use, and reproduce are so defined by their extraction–thefts of people’s biomatter, their history, and their secrets."

Proud to serve as the publishing editor for this fantastic piece. The authors position refusal as an ethical/methodological stance for working with "materials that depend on the objectification of, and through that objectification the commodification of, human subjects." It's a must read!

"We refuse the processes that turn people into objects. We refuse to place the value these materials offer our institutions and disciplines above the people whose bodies were made into valuable epistemic resources."

The Digital Opaque: Refusing the Biomedical Object by Sean Purcell, Kalani Craig and Michelle Dalmau

www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2025/digital...

Coming out Wednesday -

The Digital Opaque: Refusing the Biomedical Object

"... this essay creates frameworks for scholars working with archival or historical materials that were obtained through violent, deceitful, or otherwise unethical means."

"This article shares one academic library’s research and assessment of library vendors’ corporate practices... and how to move forward when it is discovered that a provider’s business ventures could harm our library patrons or their families."

Going back a few years, to a topic that remains timely -

Ethical Financial Stewardship: One Library’s Examination of Vendors’ Business Practices by Katy DiVittorio and Lorelle Gianelli

"An unreasonable expectation would be if that librarian felt the need to make sure that that patron, or any patron, never had a negative thing to say about the library. In my experience, it appears that librarians and libraries seem to have high expectations of influence."

boosting a recent post that people have said they found helpful for navigating what's going on --

"The practice placing one’s anxieties into circles of concern, influence, and control... is a means of cultivating agency and preventing needless rumination."

For those looking to bring an autism-affirming approach to their work, let's revisit --

Autistic Students and Academic Library Research: Recommendations for a Neurodiversity-Informed Approach by Jessica Hinton-Williams

Really enjoyed the process of writing this article - Alaina encouraged us to push harder and deeper into rethinking our conceptions of IL and evaluation, drawing on Project Information Literacy’s years of research, Alison’s deep knowledge of the field, and her own expertise in teaching and research.

Dismantling the Evaluation Framework – In the Library with the Lead Pipe For almost 20 years, instruction librarians have relied on variations of two models, the CRAAP Test and SIFT, to teach students how to evaluate printed and web-based materials. Dramatic changes to the information ecosystem, however, present new challenges amid a flood of misinformation where algorithms lie beneath the surface of popular and library platforms collecting clicks and shaping content. When applied to increasingly connected networks, these existing evaluation heuristics have limited value. Drawing on our combined experience at community colleges and universities in the U.S. and Canada, and with Project Information Literacy (PIL), a national research institute studying college students’ information practices for the past decade, this paper presents a new evaluative approach for teaching students to see information as the agent, rather than themselves. Opportunities and strategies are identified for evaluating the veracity of sources, first as students, leveraging the expertise they bring with them into the classroom, and then as lifelong learners in search of information they can trust and rely on.

Going back a few years to a still-timely discussion on proactively evaluating sources, from Alaina C. Bull, @margymaclibrary.bsky.social and Alison Head

“Because I understand where this information came from and why I’m seeing it, I can trust it for this kind of information, and for this purpose.”

"How are unquestioned ideas about time and decay supporting the carbon-heavy preservation of archival materials? How can libraries consider the legacy of industrial colonialism, acknowledge the emotional impact of environmental destruction, and promote interspecies kinship?"

Another release from earlier this summer is Nora Zahn's Towards a Librarianship of the Future: Fostering Cultural Adaptation to Climate Change

Our next slew of articles will start coming out in October.

In the meantime, let's take another look at our early 2025 releases starting with Cat Lockmiller's False Positive: Transphobic Regimes, Ableist Abandonment, and Evidence-Based Practice

Reminder that our August submission window will close at the end of August 31, midnight Hawaii time.

Correction: This should have said that the articles are indexed in DOAJ, so you can get the URL and then easily find the article itself via the Wayback Machine

In the Library with the Lead Pipe – DOAJ A peer-reviewed, open access journal in librarianship, information science & libraries.

Our website is down again 😭

While we wait for our hosting service to fix it, you can still access our articles through DOAJ

Ever since Knowledge Justice's release, I've noticed that a lot of people seem unclear that CRT analysis can impact what day-to-day library work looks/feels like. This is what it looks like when @mariayakira.bsky.social, April Hathcock, and I apply CRT to our work together. #scholcomm #critlib

"one way to enact equity values is to help each other protect work-life boundaries by judiciously refusing requests for labor that cannot be accommodated without compromising capacity for self-care. [This is not] deprioritizing collegiality, nor is it refusal simply to exercise the power to refuse."

"Interest convergence is a theory that posits that racial progress only happens when the political interests of BIPOC and white people converge. ... we can sometimes use interest convergence to push for useful changes, this approach also has serious shortcomings in [changing] racial power dynamics."

so excited for people to read this article and share their thoughts! 🥳 #criticalracetheory #scholcomm #critlib #libraries

"This article presents applications of the theoretical frameworks of interest convergence, intersectionality, and counter-storytelling to the authors’ work with users and to our collegial relationships."

Interest Convergence, Intersectionality, and Counter-Storytelling: Critical Race Theory as Practice in Scholarly Communications Librarianship by @mariayakira.bsky.social and @chiuchiutrain.bsky.social

Website backups of Submission information Submission form Submission information What We Publish We publish high-quality peer-reviewed articles in a range of formats. While we are open to suggestions for new article types and formats, includi...

Thanks to folks who notify us when our site goes down.

If you're working on a submission for August and it happens again, here is the back-up of our submission information:

(And yes, we are investigating new platform options.)

"pouring time, energy or money into a concern does not guarantee influence over it. ... For libs* being cognizant + honest about what aspects of the profession are [in our control] is a start. The next challenge is to maintain those distinctions in the face of ... job creep, mission creep + burnout"

"... being responsible for assisting patrons experiencing drug overdoses, mental health crises, and homelessness... job creep and mission creep cause librarians’ circle of concern to expand [and] attempting to exert control or influence over all that new territory can spell disaster."

"The practice placing one’s anxieties into circles of concern, influence, and control can be ... a means of cultivating agency and preventing needless rumination. For librarians, however, it is often at odds with a profession that expects continuous expansion of responsibilities."

Going around in Circles: Interrogating Librarians’ Spheres of Concern, Influence, and Control by Jordan Moore