Week 14 Prompt

Consider yourself part of the collection management committee of your local library, or a library at which you would like to work. You must decide whether or not to separate GBLTQ fiction and African American Fiction from the general collection to its own special place. Some patrons have requested this, yet many staff are uncomfortable with the idea - saying it promotes segregation and disrupts serendipitous discovery of an author who might be different from the reader. Do you separate them? Do you separate one and not the other? Why or why not? You must provide at least 3 reasons for or against your decision. Feel free to use outside sources - this is a weighty question that is answered differently in a lot of different libraries.

This is a great topic for conversation and one that I haven't had to deal with working in a small branch library. Most of my collection is categorized by fiction or non fiction. Of course there is also youth and children's titles that are separated by fiction/nonfiction.  The other formats are also labeled and separated, such as Books on CD, CD's, Reference and Large Print. Within those sections, some things are labeled with stickers on the spine. Religious, Sci-Fi and Mystery are a few of the stickers that I have now. At the main branch, they do currently have these sections separated within the fiction area. I say currently because I know that this separation will soon be going away. The patrons found it to be very confusing and asked that the fiction section be mixed together once more. 

So thinking about whether GBLTQ fiction or African American Fiction should be separated from other fiction, I would say I do not agree with this decision. I do think this should be a very individual decision based on the needs of the library, but for the most part I do not think this is a good idea. Number one reason is I don't think that we should separate fiction in this manner. What someones sexual preference or color of their skin should not be a reason to have another section within fiction. At what point does allowing this kind of separation become a slippery slope. Every book has a different theme and could be separated into its own section if we so desired, but at it seems to be a waste of time and resources. Some may argue that some libraries have different inspirational sections and this is the same as having an African American section, and I think this is where each library has to make a decision on their own whether there is enough of a collection to justify having a totally different section for these types of books. 

Having a section such as GBLTQ separated from other sections of fiction could help those in search of them to more quickly find what they are looking for, but may also cause more stress for someone seeking these titles. For the most part a person should be able to browse and check out materials without judgement from staff or other patrons. I can see where a section with this topic and knowing that others know that's what they are looking at may cause some stress for the patron. 

The last reason why having a separate section is not a good idea is because sometimes less is more. Having so many sections within a library is confusing for a patron. The only reason to consider having a separate section in the first place is to make the materials easier for patrons to find. So why not use other means such as stickers to identify different types of materials. Having the stickers will help the patrons find the materials but not have a spotlight on them while they are finding them. Its a win/win situation.