Aboriginal and Visible Minority Librarians - by Deborah Lee & Mahalakshmi Kumaran (Paperback)

About the Book

This book, the first of its kind in Canada, is a collection of chapters from Aboriginal and visible minority librarians, working in Canada, speaking about the challenges they face in their profession; their strategies to overcome challenges; the support they have received; the...

Book Synopsis

This book, the first of its kind in Canada, is a collection of chapters from Aboriginal and visible minority librarians, working in Canada, speaking about the challenges they face in their profession; their strategies to overcome challenges; the support they have received; their professional fulfillment; and their contributions to the profession.

Review Quotes

[T]his collection of thoughtful, personal narratives of 18 career librarians presents a clear overview of the challenges the aboriginal and visible minority librarian faces. They share their love of their chosen profession and are more interested in evolution than revolution, which gives impact to their narratives.... Editors Deborah Lee and Mahalakshmi Kumaran are founding members of the Visible Minority Librarians of Canada Network (ViMLoC) and must be commended for their foresight and dedication. They are among the 18 who shared experiences in this book. All look toward the future with a great deal of hope and a willingness to be part of the solution to the issues.

A very insightful read! Peer reviewed, this book was a joy to read learning much from the various visible minority and Aboriginal librarians who share their experiences working in Canadian libraries. A must read for anyone interested in diversity and librarianship from an international point of view.

Aboriginal and Visible Minority Librarians is a valuable contribution to our knowledge of what it means to be a minority in the field of librarianship in the US and Canada. Such a work is especially useful to the non-Native library world for enriching everyone's knowledge of a variety of cultures and backgrounds that contributors bring to their practice. The 18 chapters represent a spectrum of diverse voices among librarians practicing in a wide variety of library settings. Each chapter author describes the challenges and rewards of librarianship from a unique lens as minority library practitioner; contributor backgrounds include Filipino, Cree, Metis, Jamaican and more. This work will enhance every reader's perspective of the rich diversity and wide cultural participation in the library profession, while introducing them to individual practitioners who so generously share their stories.

I found these oral histories full of introspective insights into the Aboriginal and visible minority librarians' personal experiences and well worth reading.

With this new edited collection, Kumaran (originally from India) and Lee have done a tremendous service to the profession in filling this gap. They present a mix of personal narrative, scholarship, and career advice that will both empower and encourage aspiring Aboriginal and visible minority librarians and enlighten Euro-Canadian professionals as to the struggles they face. In fact, the diverse pathways to satisfying careers offered here would be of value to any library school student or new professional, regardless of racial or ethnic background. . . .Aboriginal and Visible Minority Librarians is a significant milestone in the professional literature that should be required reading for all library professionals, administrators, and students, and rewards repeated reading.

About the Author

Deborah Lee is of Cree, Mohawk, Métis and French ancestry. She was a reference librarian at the National Library of Canada and Library and Archives Canada in Ottawa/Gatineau for seven years. Lee was the Indigenous Studies Portal Librarian and team leader at the University of Saskatchewan Library in Saskatoon for four years but has been the Indigenous Studies Liaison and Aboriginal Engagement Librarian at the U of S since 2011. She would like to dedicate her chapter to her two adult children, Eric and Tara, her son-in-law, Jake, and twin grandchildren, Liam and Elizabeth.

Maha Kumaran is the initiator, founding member, and co-moderator of the Visible Minority Librarians of Canada (ViMLoC) Network, a CLA Network. She works as a liaison librarian at the University of Saskatchewan. She is grateful to the support she has received from the University of Saskatchewan to pursue her research. She would like to thank the many librarians who have played a major role in shaping her career as a librarian. She would also like to thank members of ViMLoC for their support.