Beyond Banned Books

Defending Intellectual Freedom throughout Your Library

Kristin Pekoll

• Publisher: ALA Editions
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9780838919019
• eBook ISBN:
  9780838918890
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Library & Information Science
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

1

Displays and Exhibits

“Design creates culture. Culture shapes values. Values determine the future.” This quote from the world-renowned designer and educator Robert L. Peters connects visual design with active verbs about how the world is perceived. Libraries, too, use visual design in displays and exhibits in order to connect users with information possibilities.

Free-Range Browsing

The term display is often used casually by library staff to describe the placement of materials with the covers facing out to attract attention. The most common type of display in libraries is a book display. In Creative Management of Small Public Libraries in the 21st Century, author Cynthia Harbeson writes about the need for small libraries to establish their space as a community center through the intentional use of inviting displays and physical spaces that are welcoming and engaging.1 She establishes a working definition for library displays by adapting the dictionary definition to the library environment: a display is “any creative arrangement of objects on view for a specific purpose.” A cousin of the display is the library exhibit. Exhibits are usually broader in their sources and materials than displays are. Exhibits often include more than a library’s internal collections, and in fact, sometimes no library items are used in them at all. Exhibits may encompass artworks, artifacts, objects, and other materials. Exhibits can be online or physical and of any scale or duration. Most commonly, the materials in a library exhibit are curated from an outside source for a temporary loan. The sources can be large agencies, like museums or art galleries, or small groups, like Cub Scouts, photographers, or local historians. Harbeson distinguishes library displays from exhibits by the size of the project and the amount of planning, time, and resources that are invested in it.

It’s common knowledge that most libraries are arranged with books placed upright on horizontal shelving with their spines facing outward and a directional label adhered to the spine. Usually the spine labels include the general collection area with a call number. These materials are organized systematically for retrieval and for the efficient use of space.

Alternatively, when librarians create displays from the materials in their collections, the intention is to showcase attractive book covers and highlight relevant topics or new materials. Displays differ from traditional organization by disregarding call numbers, collections, formats, and uniformity. Displays allow librarians to embrace their inner creative artist.

Displays have a multitude of purposes. They are attractive and eye-catching, and they often welcome and entice users into the space. Displays showcase materials that might otherwise get overlooked. Displays increase foot traffic to different areas within the building. Displays offer opportunities to cross-promote additional services and events in the library.

The market for display furniture, shelving, easels, signage, and accessories has grown exponentially in the last few decades. The funding available for creating displays has also increased. Terms like visual merchandising have spread beyond the retail industry to the information profession. Searching Pinterest, blogs, and social media for ideas for new displays can often stimulate a librarian’s creativity. The range of complexity, skill, quality, and size of material displays can vary greatly. These variables may depend on the staff that libraries have available to devote to the projects, or they may simply depend on what space is available. Many newer libraries have prioritized display space with their designers and architects. By contrast, some rural or small neighborhood libraries are lucky if they can find display space along the top of a high bookshelf against a wall.

The libraries with the most successful displays mirror the practices and strategies of bookstores and other retailers. When priority is given to attracting customers and is shifted away from simply stocking inventory, the circulation of library materials skyrockets. In a culture of selling and advertising, visual appeal and catching the attention of the audience are as important for the Boise Public Library as they are for Barnes & Noble.

Some libraries don’t understand the value of high-quality displays. After all, it can be difficult to measure the success of a display. Library managers need to balance the time spent to create and maintain displays with the fuzzy output of their value. Often, the needs of performing other tasks are more pressing than that of creating a display. Similarly, if a library doesn’t value the resource, there is less intentional thought about how displays are created, who is responsible for them, and what the parameters are for displaying the materials in them. Librarians consider displays a valuable commodity, yet rarely is this professional function considered in job descriptions, budgets, training, or education.

What is lacking in most of our profession’s literature, either formal or casual, are guidelines about the subject content of library displays. Obvious display ideas include readers’ advisory requests that often get asked, such as “If you like James Patterson, try one of these books,” or “Binge-worthy reads for fans of Stranger Things.” There are also upcoming program cross-promotions such as “Impress our visiting magician with card tricks and laugh-out-loud jokes,” or “Familiarize yourself with canning and food preservation in anticipation of our master gardener program.” Displays often showcase specific formats like audiobooks, large-print materials, or graphic novels. These all seem like innocent display ideas, right?

Concerns and complaints can arise from even the best and most innocent of intentions, however. A display about Stranger Things might include Stephen King’s horror novel It, which has historically been frequently challenged. It could include Paper Girls, by Brian K. Vaughan, whose artistic work on the graphic novel, Saga was included in ALA’s Top Ten Most Challenged Books of 2014. Additionally, critics of graphic novels have often stated that the books are lowbrow and pornographic.

Libraries will often use displays to recognize significant or historical events. There are weeks and months that pay homage to underrepresented populations, such as Black History Month or GLBT Book Month. Librarians are connecting recent events with calendar celebrations to create displays that draw attention to stories and viewpoints that are neglected, or to highlight their library’s mission of inclusivity. They are spotlighting Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday in January with materials about the Black Lives Matter movement.

No act in the library is too small to foster tolerance and acceptance. Many librarians are embracing their roles as display designers in order to highlight resources and themes in their collections on relevant issues in the news and on people who are change-makers.2

Meg, from a public library in Connecticut, created a display in the children’s room around a quote from Mr. Rogers that says, “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’” The books in the display highlighted kindness, tolerance, and refugee and immigrant stories.

Brytani, from the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, made a display for families to learn about Islam together. In addition to books, the librarian compiled a “fact file.” This folder had articles from library databases that explain Islamic culture and customs, as well as a child-friendly explanation of the controversy over the word jihad. All the resources in the folder have their references listed, and there’s a note indicating that families can take home copies of the articles and ask a librarian for more information.

Andria, from the Charleston County Public Library in South Carolina, created a display titled “Y’all Means All” for June for Pride month, but after the massacre at the gay nightclub in Orlando and the 2016 U.S. presidential election, she decided to make it a permanent display. In addition to the books, she has buttons and “wait a minute” flyers distributed throughout the library’s Teen Lounge.

Front-Facing Fiascos

The American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom began specifically tracking the censorship of library displays in December 2016. In some instances, a patron complained about the subject of a display, or about a specific book being included in display materials. Other complaints have been initiated internally from administrators, board members, or colleagues. When there are no policies to guide the librarians who have to respond to concerns about displays, often the display has been dismantled.

Temple, Texas

In June 2017, librarians at the Temple Public Library created a display to recognize June as GLBT Book Month. The library received few comments about the displays, but the issue gained steam after an Aug. 5 Facebook post by a local group, Concerned Christian Citizens, criticizing the display.

Fast-forward to the next library board meeting, where twenty-one residents spoke about the displays, beginning with former state representative Molly White. “Never, in my wildest dreams, did I ever imagine that my grandchildren would be exposed to materials that are not only contrary to personal growth, but leads people down a path of dysfunction and self-destruction,” White declared. “Family units with a mother and father are the backbone of all society. Without strong, intact family units, societies will collapse.”3

The month of June had been chosen to recognize LGBTQ pride to commemorate the Stonewall riots, which occurred at the end of June 1969. The Stonewall riots were multiple, violent demonstrations by members of the gay community in retaliation against a police raid that took place at the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village of New York City. Libraries and bookstores have been celebrating June as National Lesbian and Gay Book Month since the early 1990s. In 2015, the ALA’s Office for Diversity, Literacy, and Outreach Services and the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Round Table (GLBTRT) continued the nati...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Foreword, by Martin Garnar
• Preface: “You’re Going to Hell”
• Introduction: Pushing the Needle
• 1. Displays and Exhibits
• 2. Artwork
• 3. Programs and Events
• 4. Bookmarks and Reading Lists
• 5. Social Media
• 6. Databases
• 7. Report and Support
• Appendix
• Index