Communities of praxis: Transforming access to information for equity

Abstract

At the 33rd Annual NASIG Conference, Lauren Smith, of the Institute for Research and Innovation in Social Service in Glasgow, Scotland, presented a vision session on the intersections of power, praxis, and privilege in the information sphere. When librarians acknowledge the power and privilege embedded in their creation and use of systems that allow access to information and their expertise in navigating those systems, it allows librarians to practice the beneficent exercise of that power to challenge, modify, and dismantle current power structures if they are injust. Smith explained how the collective use of this power aids librarians in actualizing real change to advance the democratization of information access.