Contested Spaces: A Critical History of Canadian Public Libraries as Neutral Places

Whitney Kemble, Liaison Librarian, Historical and Cultural Studies, University of Toronto Scarborough

My presentation will discuss an almost completed project examining the history of controversial (mostly third-party) events at Canadian public libraries. In this work I ask what third-party event bookings at public libraries in Canada have created controversies and prompted protests. What were the issues at stake? What kinds of outcry or protest occurred? Did politicians get involved? Did the events happen, or did they get cancelled, and why? What kinds of impacts or outcomes resulted? I take an historical approach to explore occurrences of public outcry over primarily third-party booked events and examine the material, real-world impacts of neutrality policies in Canadian public library space use. I bring this Canadian historical context into the ongoing conversations that are critiquing the concept of neutrality in libraries, and I look at how critical race, feminist, and queer theories can inform library policies and practices that foster community, inclusivity, care, safety, and social justice. I see this work as part of bigger discussions in critical librarianship about neutrality, social justice, equity, diversity, accessibility, feminist ethic of care, workplace safety, and more. Through this historical examination I am finding that concerns about discrimination and hate were at the root of most public protests around controversial events, and that public library commitments to neutrality in protecting intellectual freedom and freedom of expression were determined to outweigh those community concerns in most cases. In this presentation, thus, I will discuss an ongoing conflict between different library values and a de facto hierarchy of those values that most commonly situates intellectual freedom at the top. My analysis also considers relevant librarian perspectives and critical theories to interrogate the myth of library neutrality, and identify positive and productive ways for libraries to engage with and serve their communities that honour library values and work toward social justice.

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