Equipped for resistance: An agonistic conceptualization of the public library as a verb

Johanna Rivano Eckerdal

35 citations0/0 files storedJournal of the Association for Information Science and Technology

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Library Science and Administration Library Science and Information Information Science and Libraries

Abstract

A theoretical framework for understanding public library development is presented; plural agonistics is used in combination with an approach inspired by posthumanism. The framework is related to examples from a study of two Swedish public libraries. Antagonism is viewed as foundational, and democracy as an ongoing process, the task being to transform antagonism to agonism, with institutions like libraries postulated as important spaces for adversaries to meet in dialogue. Libraries are viewed here as constantly becoming institutions, and the librarian's identity as an ongoing enactment of the library. To underscore the crucial role the library fills in society, it is conceptualized as a verb and a new word is proposed: to librarize. Discussions about the content of libraries are critical for librarians to find ways to perform the library. The ongoing debate is part of the professional performance of librarians. Librarians should, while acknowledging that there may be no single right way, debate over what is the most beneficial way to facilitate libraries’ vital role in democracy. Conceptualizing of the library as a verb and its implications for librarianship as a possible active agent for radical change within society are offered as articulations of resistance.

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References

1983The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields 1989A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia 1983The Iron Caged Revisited : Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields 1999Handbook of qualitative research 1986Kafka: Toward a Minor Literature 2013Agonistics: Thinking the World Politically 2020Understanding Deleuze 2003Dismantling the Public Sphere

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