Alison Hicks

Yes, Amelia! And may it be the first citation of many!

Tonight at UCL, the Information Studies department, in collaboration with CILIP SLG and the Library Services Trust, hosted a screening of the @thelibrariansfilm.bsky.social documentary on book censorship and banning in the US. Barbara Band from SLG is talking about censorship in UK school libraries.

Have an interest in Information Literacy and want to get started in academic publishing? JIL is looking for Associate Editors! journals.cilip.org.uk/jil/announce... this is a great opportunity to be mentored by Alison, and to see the inner workings of journals and research.

EXCITING THINGS ARE AFOOT (Check your LIS-LINK).

The Journal of Information Literacy has announced a new special issue on information literacy and censorship- please consider submitting your work! Given political tensions, we will be permitting pseudonymous submissions. Please contact me or @bookelf.bsky.social with questions- DMs open!

Seminar 2 of the LIS Research Seminar Series is now confirmed. Come and hear @patchedelbows.bsky.social talk about his brilliant research on HE librarians & social class. Some of you probably even contributed 😉

cassyni.com/series/KVXBf...

“We Couldn’t Generate an Answer for your Question” - ACRLog Editor’s note: We welcome a guest blog post from Jay Singley, Document Delivery and Circulation Desk Manager at North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics. In March 2025, Ex Libris unveiled thei...

Just read this - it was shared on LinkedIn. ‘To my users, “we couldn’t generate an answer for your question” translates to “your topic is not worthy of pursuing—change it.”’ While it’s nice to think that students will come & ask when they don’t find results, many won’t.

And the blocking of content…

or the toll that the reconfiguration of professional work is having on core functions and long-term viability. Part of my wider project exploring information literacy and censorship, the paper is available free and open access in the journal of librarianship and information science!

Given that censorship creates legal, financial and employment risks for school librarians + risks to young people (eg driving reading into unregulated online spaces), I argue that framing the work of school librarians in terms of risk uncovers the hidden costs of censorship…

Shelves under siege: School librarians as (temporary?) risk workers - Alison Hicks, 2025 Book-banning and censorship attempts are becoming increasingly prominent within UK school libraries. Creating legal and financial risk for school librarians, at...

New paper alert! ‘Shelves under siege: School librarians as (temporary?) risk workers’, uses the concept of risk work to explore the impact that the risks of censorship are having on professional school librarianship journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Reform UK's 'Children's Book Bans' Could Open The Floodgates for Censorship The party that claims to champion "free speech" is now trying to crack down on books whose messages they disagree with, reports Katie Dancey-Downs

"It’s never been more important for us to ensure that libraries have the resources and support to create and defend diverse collections" Read @katiedd.bsky.social’s response to Reform’s attack on books:
bylinetimes.com/2025/07/08/r...

4 panel watercolour comic. Panel 1. The caption reads 'Last week Reform councilors claimed to be removing trans books across Kent's 99 libraries'. The panel shows Reform councilors Paul Webb and Linden Kemkaran with a speech bubble that says "A victory for common sense in Kent! Panel 2. The caption reads 'No books have been removed, no policy implemented, but Kent County Council doubled down with this statement. '. The panel shows a mobile phone view of the KCC library Instagram page. Underneath the latest post the library has written the following statement: "Kent County Council have confirmed that children are not and will not be exposed to trans adult literature in our libraries...including in public welcome displays." Panel 3. Panel shows someone in a Hazmat suit and gloves and boots holding a book. The text reads: "Exposed" because just like all centres of moral panics, trans is a contagion." Panel 4. Panel shows a copy of the book The Autistic Trans Guide to Life. Arrows point at the book with accompanying labels: 'This book will trans you.' 'The front cover will make you change your pronouns.' 'Free hormones for every reader. '

Panel 5. The caption reads 'So there will be no more adult literature in public welcome displays.' underneath are illustrations of 4 books: 'Elon Musk autobiography. How to influence elections and destroy everything.' 'Military stuff and war is cool'. 'How to diet and hate your body because being fat is bad.' and 'Jolly Cooper's Rich Shaggers.' The caption continues 'Does this apply to all books which might corrupt and pervert young minds?'. Panel 6. Panel shows a library shelves cordoned off with hazard tape and a sign which reads 'Do not enter these books might trans you.' The caption reads 'Will young people be prevented from reading beyond their age level?' Panel 7. Panel shows a group of library protestors holding signs which say 'Save our library's and 'Keep Folkestone library open ' The caption reads 'How are Kent libraries which are underfunded, understaffed, and under-resourced meant to police this contagion?' Panel 8 Shows two people talking. The first person is a white woman saying "I voted Reform to stop the boats." The second person is me saying "You also voted to stop children from reading."

Did you know that although Section 28 was repealed in 2003, Kent County Council was the only council in England which voted to uphold their own version of section 28 all the way up until 2010. Way before Reform existed.

Groundbreaking new #LIS study on how #publiclibraries serve #multilingual and #heritagelanguage communities by @victoriarend.bsky.social. UK-based public library workers: please consider participating and circulating! #LibraryResearch #LinguisticJustice #KnowledgeEquity #IntangibleCulturalHeritage

This is a horrifying move. Books for children have been through a thorough vetting process, and these collections have been curated for their communities.

The school library censorship convo has hit the House of Lords!

Really pleased to see this conversation, following my @indexoncensorship.org investigation.

We do this at @jinfolit.bsky.social in the editorial- will see if we can integrate into the PDF too!

Strategic silencing: how censorship is reshaping scholarly discourse Restrictions to US databases and scholarly work mean that researchers need new approaches to navigate research absences and silences rather than the more typical information overload, writes Alison Hi...

‪Restrictions to US databases and scholarly work mean that researchers need new approaches to navigate research absences and silences rather than the more typical information overload, writes @alisonhicks0.bsky.social‬: www.timeshighereducation.com/campus/strat... #AcademicSky #EduSky

“Researchers will need to develop a raft of new techniques to adjust to censored information environments. These include becoming more deliberate about search strategies, as the list of words banned by federal agencies works to obscure the many ways in which human life is lived.”

Oh, I’m so pleased, Lauren- thanks for letting me know!

Hey IL folks! If you thought censorship was just impacting school librarians, take a look at my new article in @timeshighered.bsky.social exploring what challenges to intellectual freedom mean for HE teaching librarians, too. How do we shift our work from overload to absence?

What an incredible exhibition! A great way to visualise library censorship.

Thanks so much @alisonhicks0.bsky.social and @ioe.bsky.social for featuring my @indexoncensorship.org investigation.

I know, right- I was so excited to see this!

And watch this space for an upcoming piece from me on the implications of recent attacks on intellectual freedom on information literacy and other academic work and practices…

Thanks to @ioe.bsky.social library for covering worrying growth in censorship in school libraries in their most recent exhibition! Featuring my research as well as the fabulous work of @katiedd.bsky.social 🙌🏼

YouTube video by CALC Conference Heather Barr -Looking for help: exploring the information behaviour of survivors of sexual assault

*CW Discussion of sensitive themes inc. sexual assault*

#CALC25 Recording no. 2 is up!
This is Heather Barr talking about her research into the information behaviour of survivors of sexual assault. Incredibly important and difficult research.
youtu.be/v4mTCO6PsMs
#CritLit #LibrarySky

Oh! I actually have questions about this… will DM.

I loved writing this book- and to my amazement, I am still as eager to think more about this topic as I was when I started writing, so please do let me know if you want to chat about this topic further! Thanks in advance for downloading, reading and buying for your library!

(And I promise that all the other chapters are well worth your while, too…)

If you are interested in book-banning in the UK, head to Chapter 4, which explores how the work of school librarians is changing in the face of censorship challenges. And if methods are your thing (surprisingly understudied in risk research), head to Chapter 7.

If you have never thought about information literacy and risk could be linked, take a look at Chapter 1, which presents my rationale for bringing these two concepts together. If you are an information literacy theory nerd, head to Chapter 6, when I theorise how all these ideas fit together.