‘Do you think Crazy Horse checked his warriors’ status cards?’ The fight over Joseph Boyden’s Indigenous heritage

December 27, 2016
by Tristen Hopper

Following the explosive allegation questioning Canadian author Joseph Boyden’s Indigenous identity, debate surges in aboriginal circles over whether Boyden is really one of them.

“Do you think Crazy Horse checked his warriors’ status cards before the Battle of the Little Bighorn?” read a fierce defence of Boyden posted to Facebook Monday by Maurice Switzer, a former director of communications for the Assembly of First Nations.

Ernie Crey, chief of B.C.’s Cheam First Nation and a prominent Indigenous commentator, struck a similar tone, calling Boyden a victim of “envy” and “identity cops.”

“The worst thing this guy (Boyden) could be guilty of is identifying too strongly with us, and I’ll take it,” he said by phone. 

Bemoaning similar instances of bloodline scrutiny, Crey said “if they persist in this line of approach, many of us are going to end up taking mouth swabs and sending them off to a DNA lab.”

A lengthy expose by the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network published Friday dug into Boyden’s genealogical background, finding no records to support the author’s various claims of having Metis, Mi’kmaq, Ojibway and Nipmuc ancestry.

Boyden is arguably among Canada’s most famous Indigenous authors. But most notably, the APTN found evidence from the 1950s showing that Boyden’s uncle Earl — who ran a souvenir shop under the alias “Injun Joe” — explicitly dismissed any claims to aboriginal heritage.

In response, Boyden said in a statement on the weekend that he had “mostly Celtic heritage,” with traces of Ojibwe and Nipmuc, an Algonquian nation from Massachusetts.

He said that he has mistakenly said he was Metis, which is traditionally applied to descendants of French traders and trappers and indigenous women in the Canadian northwest, when what he meant was he was of “mixed blood.”

“I don’t believe anyone should ever be made to feel shame in their identity,” said the Scotiabank Giller Prize winning author, who was was an honorary witness at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

Since the article’s publication, other curious examples of Boyden’s unclear heritage have come to light.

In a Monday post, Rebeka Tabobondung, the editor of the Indigenous publication Muskrat Magazine, said she asked Boyden what his home nation was at a writers conference several years ago.

Boyden replied “Wasausking First Nation” — Tabobondung’s home nation. “I later asked a respected community geneologist what his connection was and she said she didn’t know,” she wrote.

Robert Jago, a blogger who uncovered much of the evidence cited by APTN, found a NUVO magazine interview on Monday in which Boyden incorrectly uses the term “two spirit” to refer to his love of living in both New Orleans and Ontario.

“There’s something called the ‘two-spirit person’ in a lot of First Nations cultures … meaning somebody who is never completely in one physical place,” Boyden said.

The term “two-spirit” is actually used to describe sexual identity; the two “spirits” are male and female.

Suspicions of cultural impostors are particularly high in the Indigenous community because accused pretenders seem to emerge so often.

“Why are so many of our most famous Indigenous (people) … not Indigenous?” read a Friday Tweet by Metis Chelsea Vowel, who writes on the blog âpihtawikosisân.

Boyden critics were quick to draw parallels with Grey Owl, a British-born environmentalist prominent in the early 20th century who fraudulently claimed aboriginal heritage.

Twenty years ago, critics were also questioning the Indigenous identity of Ontario-born country singer Shania Twain, who used her Indian Status to move to Nashville without a visa.

“The native community is much more apt to see impostors than another community,” Dean Chavers, director of the U.S.-based native scholarship fund Catching the Dream, told the National Post by email.

For the Cherokee nation alone, Chavers said there are dozens of fake tribes and potentially millions of Americans falsely claiming status. “Jobs are the leading cause of people assuming an Indian identity,” he said.

Both in Canada and the United States, it’s also common that a family’s claim to Indigenous ancestry will turn out to be nothing than a rumour sparked by portraits of a particularly swarthy great grandparent.

Forums for genealogical websites abound with people expressing confusion that their DNA test or genealogical search turned up no rumoured evidence of Mohawk, Mi’kmaq or Sioux.

And Chavers told the National Post he has a friend who believed her whole life she was Cherokee, only to discover following a DNA test that she that was 89 per cent English and 11 per cent Scandinavian.

However, Switzer dismissed the scrutiny of Boyden’s background, calling the controversy a case of “cultural one-upmanship” brought about by the “racist system of ‘Indian status.’”

Switzer has said that the idea of “blood quantum” did not exist before colonialism, and in an interview Monday he defended Boyden, saying the author has not “traded off whatever Indigeneity he can trace.”

“He is just a damned fine writer who has done a great deal to raise the profile of native issues, and who happens to believe he has some Indigenous heritage,” he said.

Ernie Crey, in turn, dismissed the fear that somebody would purposely pretend to be aboriginal to enhance their public profile. Often, he told the National Post, it has been the reverse: Native peoples taking on European identities to avoid stringent Canadian social and legal barriers against aboriginals. 

Nevertheless, critics have noted Boyden’s increasingly political public persona. Boyden delivers paid speeches about Indigenous issues, is a regular editorialist on aboriginal policy and makes frequent appearances as the native voice on political panels.

And as APTN noted, Boyden’s sister Mary works as the aboriginal liaison for Goldcorp.

“It has been conversation among Native people for years — who is this person? Who does he belong to?” wrote Audra Simpson, a Mohawk anthropologist at New York’s Columbia University, in an email to the National Post. 

Simpson said that the question is not driven by a need to measure blood quantum, to see Boyden’s status card or to critique his appearance, “it is simply a matter of kin … it is not shameful to ask who you belong to.”

What was “disturbing” and “egregious” about the whole Boyden controversy, wrote Simpson, was how willing the author is to “take up space” in literary circles and frame the political debate around reconciliation. 

“Like his claims to identity there is no end to what he will do or say, it seems in our name,” she wrote. “There is nothing innocent, or confused about talking about, or speaking for and speaking over us.”

Source: National Post

Bombshell Confirmed: Comics will no longer have NY Times Bestseller Lists

January 26, 2017
by Alexander Lu

Like the death of a warrant canary, sometimes the most notable news stories stem from absence rather than presence. Such was the case last night when literary agent Charles Olsen tweeted out this doozy:

Graphic novels can no longer be @nytimes bestsellers as of February 5th. No explanation for change, I think we deserve one. Please RT!

— Charlie Olsen (@ComicsisPeople) January 25, 2017

According to an email subscription version of February 5th’s NY Times Best Sellers List, “Beginning with the advance BSL edition that will be delivered today for February 5, 2017 there will be revisions to multiple categories in the publication. These changes will span weekly and monthly lists.” One of these changes appears to be the deletion of the hardcover graphic novels, softcover graphic novels, and manga Best Seller lists, as none of these sections are included in the document that we have reviewed.

Graphic novels have been a constant source of profit and expansion for the ailing publishing industry over the last several years. According to ICv2, “graphic novels in the book channel represented the biggest area of growth” in 2016. Raina Telgemeier’s Ghosts received a monumental 500,000 copy first printing when it was released last year. Recently, John Lewis’ biographical comic March won four awards from the American Library Association and topped the Amazon Bestseller List as well. With these things in mind, it is certainly seemed possible that the NY Times had omitted the three graphic literature lists by accident.

@ComicsisPeople @simoncurtis @acthomasbooks Do we know that they won’t return to the body of the list?

— Neil Gaiman (@neilhimself) January 26, 2017

However, as confirmed by comics sales aggregator Comichron, graphic novel and manga categories have been eliminated from the NY Times Bestseller lists.

Cindy from TimesDigest, the advance subscription service that provides the bestseller list early to publishing professionals, told Comichron “Please be advised that the Best Sellers List will be focusing on its core lists. These include the lists in this week’s advance BSL publication.” That suggests the lists are gone not just from the advance version, but also will not appear Friday online and this weekend’s print Books section.

This was the @nytimes‘ response when I asked about them dropping the graphic novels best sellers list. Looks like the rumor is true. pic.twitter.com/AXzAYDIGoy

— Christian Hoffer (@CHofferCBus) January 26, 2017

Comics are a demonstrably important cultural force in America. With a deeply rooted history in subversion and resistance, we need them now more than ever. It is a huge loss to us all that the Times has pulled back on their coverage of the industry.

Asked for comment, the New York Times provided the following response:

Beginning February 5, The New York Times will eliminate a number of print but mostly online-only bestseller lists. In recent years, we introduced a number of new lists as an experiment, many of which are being discontinued.

We will continue to cover all of these genres of books in our news coverage (in print and online). The change allows us to devote more space and resources to our coverage beyond the bestseller lists.

Our major lists will remain, including: Top 15 Hardcover Fiction, Top 15 Hardcover Nonfiction, Top 15 Combined Print and E Fiction, Top 15 Combined Print and E Nonfiction, Top 10 Children’s Hardcover Picture Books, Top 10 Children’s Middle Grade Hardcover Chapter Books, Top 10 Children’s Young Adult Hardcover Chapter Books and Top 10 Children’s Series. Several more including Paperback Trade Fiction, Paperback Nonfiction, Business, Sports, Science and Advice Miscellaneous will remain online.

Readers will be notified that individual lists will no longer be compiled and updated by The New York Times on the relevant article pages.

It’s worth noting that while the loss of the graphic novels and manga bestseller lists is of great import to the comics industry, it was not the only sector to be impacted by this policy change. Mass paperbacks will be losing their sales coverage as well. Sports books, however, will continue to receive coverage.

In addition, while the Times called the graphic book and manga charts an “experiment,” these charts first appeared in 2009 when the Watchmen movie debuted and have now been around for nearly a decade. The Times’ post heralding the arrival of these sales charts proclaimed that “comics have finally joined the mainstream.”


UPDATE: The New York Times has explained its reasons for eliminating the graphic books bestseller lists.

Source: The Beat

CBC.ca: 'It's a happy place now': Literacy rates on Manitoba First Nation soar

'It's a happy place now': Literacy rates on Manitoba First Nation soar
Waywayseecappo First Nation credits improved literacy scores to working with Park West School Division
By Meagan Fiddler
January 16, 2017

Six years after a Manitoba First Nation partnered with a neighbouring school division, student literacy rates have dramatically increased. It's a change even the students embrace.

"It was much easier than what we were doing before," Grade 9 student Twyla Mecas said, "The way they taught the classes and the group activities, it helped me be more social."

"It was good," Leighton Heroux, also in Grade 9, echoed. "The teachers were fun."

Heroux and Mecas now go to Major Pratt School in Russell, Man. But they both attended elementary school in nearby Waywayseecappo when the Park West School Division and the First Nation formed a partnership.

The student say the smaller class sizes, one of the results of that partnership, helped them learn.

In November 2010, only three per cent of of Grades 1 to 4 students in Waywayseecappo, about 300 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg, were at or above grade level literacy rates. As of June 2016, 47 per cent met that standard.

"It's a happy place now," said Colleen Clearsky, Waywayseecappo's education director, adding that students across the board are showing positive results.

All 500 students from junior kindergarten to Grade 12, and even adult education, have benefited, she said. Teachers are less stressed and there are fewer behavioural issues to deal with.

"The accomplishments are the children's. They are the ones that are making this work."

VLT revenues top up federal funding

Clearsky said the partnership has increased professional development and given teachers access to speech and language therapists and psychologists. Waywayseecappo has been able to retain teachers for longer because they're a part of the same collective agreement with the same salary and benefits as teachers in the neighbouring school division, she said.

"We used to have so many teachers come in and in a couple of years they would be gone, because the provincial school divisions were getting a lot more funding than we were," Clearsky said.

When the agreement was signed, Waywayseecappo increased education funding to match what provincially-funded students received. The federal government provides $7,200 per student per year.

The First Nation has been supplementing that with $3,690 per student per year from revenue generated by 70 VLT machines in the community. That's allowed for smaller classroom sizes and the hiring of more education assistants.

Teachers share, learn from each other

The partnership also means literacy specialist Louise Langevin splits her time equally between Waywayseecappo and the Park West School Division. Langevin supports teachers and supplies them with new literacy programs. She models different in-class strategies and can also co-teach alongside regular teachers.

"It was a lot of work, a big investment for those teachers." Langevin said. "It enabled them to do a lot more with the [professional development] they were now able to partake in. Teachers talking to teachers within the school division, that's such a powerful form of PD," she said.

Langevin said literacy rates for Grades 5 to 8 are now being collected to see if the trend continues into the later grades.

"There's a lot of time spent with our students today, to teach them the proper way so we have more graduates, so we can become competitive in the education field," Chief Murray Clearsky said.

"One day I guess you'll see greater results by our people, by our children, which will make me very proud," he added.

Waywayseecappo has plans to hold an education conference in the near future for other Manitoba First Nations who are interested in setting up a similar partnerships, Clearsky said.

Park West and Waywayseecappo just recently signed a new agreement to extend the partnership for another three years.

Source: CBC.ca

CNBC.com: How reading helped Obama deal with the 'isolation' of leadership

How reading helped Obama deal with the 'isolation' of leadership
by Catherine Clifford

Being the leader of the free world brings with it incredible power, responsibility and influence. It also involves feelings of seclusion, especially during crises.

President Barack Obama says that, at those times, he turned to books.

"During very difficult moments, this job can be very isolating. So sometimes you have to hop across history to find folks who have been similarly feeling isolated," says Obama, in a wide-reaching interview with Michiko Kakutani, the chief book critic for The New York Times.

After the mass killings in Newtown, Conn., or in the midst of the financial crisis, for example, Obama says that he consulted the writings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma Gandhi or Nelson Mandela.

"I found those particularly helpful, because what you wanted was a sense of solidarity," says Obama.

Similarly, Obama found comfort in the biographies of Presidents who occupied the White House before him.

"I do think that there's a tendency, understandable, to think that whatever's going on right now is uniquely disastrous or amazing or difficult," says Obama. "And it just serves you well to think about Roosevelt trying to navigate World War II or Lincoln trying to figure out whether he's going to fire [George B.] McClellan when Rebel troops are 20, 30, 40 miles away."

"Fiction was useful as a reminder of the truths under the surface of what we argue about every day and was a way of seeing and hearing the voices, the multitudes of this country," he says.

Shakespeare, in particular, is a favorite of the 44th President. The playwright's tragedies are "foundational for me in understanding how certain patterns repeat themselves and play themselves out between human beings," he says.

Like most successful leaders and entrepreneurs, Obama is a lifelong fan of books. And, as he transitions out of the White House, he says he is looking forward to having more time to catch up on reading, and on his own writing, too.

Source: CNBC.com

SF Gate: SF library book returned, 100 years overdue

SF library book returned, 100 years overdue
By Steve Rubenstein
San Francisco Chronicle
Friday, January 13, 2017

Webb Johnson of Fairfield returned a San Francisco library book Friday, 100 years late. There was no fine.

“Whew,” Johnson said.

The book, a collection of short stories published in 1909, had been checked out by his great-grandmother Phoebe Webb in 1917 from the old Fillmore branch which, like his great-grandmother, is no longer around.

Head City Librarian Luis Herrera welcomed the book back and said the library was very glad to get it, finally. At the 2017 rate of 10 cents a day, the overdue fine would have come to $3,650. Fortunately for Johnson, fines on overdue books are now capped at $5. And under the library’s current amnesty program for overdue books, there’s no fine at all.

The amnesty program has gotten 2,000 overdue books back onto library shelves since it began Jan. 3. About 1,400 delinquent borrowers have had their library privileges restored. An additional 54,000 patrons with accumulated fines of $10 or more are still walking around with suspended library cards. Under the amnesty program, they have until Feb. 14 to turn in their books with no penalty.

Amnesty programs — which San Francisco also offered in 2009, 2004 and 1998 — are somewhat controversial in the generally noncontroversial world of libraries. Some say that when libraries are known to forgive and forget every few years, it offers little incentive to return overdue books at other times. But Herrera said it was all about getting books back in the library where they belong, not about collecting a dime or two or 36,500.

Johnson said a check of family history showed that his great-grandma had died one week before the book was due. The timing suggests that Webb may have had more pressing business to attend to at the time than returning the book, he said.

The amnesty came in handy because Johnson said he had discovered the overdue book in 1996 and had hung onto it ever since. That means “Forty Minutes Late” has been unintentionally late for 79 years and deliberately late for 21 years.

“We figured it was ours now,” Johnson said. “I’m guilty. I know it. Guilty, guilty, guilty.”

The book is by F. Hopkinson Smith, an author, artist and engineer who designed the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. The first story in Smith’s collection is about a cranky man who nearly misses a speaking engagement because of a late train. The author, in the story, suggests there are worst sins than being late, such as being cranky — a notion that Johnson says he fully endorses.

Conscience, along with the amnesty program, persuaded him to bring the book back. Another reason he brought it back is his cousin Judy Wells wanted to check it out.

She showed up at the Park Branch Library on Page Street on Friday along with Johnson. After Johnson handed the overdue book back to the library, Wells stepped up to the circulation desk and applied for a library card. She figured she could go right home with “Forty Minutes Late” again, for three weeks or 100 years, whichever comes first.

But Herrera, perhaps reluctant to entrust the volume to the extended Webb-Wells-Johnson family for another century, said “Forty Minutes Late” would be temporarily unavailable until it could be properly re-cataloged and evaluated by library historians.

“I can wait,” Wells said.


Source: SG Gate

CBC.ca: You can now 'borrow' a social worker at the Kitchener Public Library

You can now 'borrow' a social worker at the Kitchener Public Library
'The library has tonnes of resources and I’m another one that people now can access,' says social worker
By Kate Bueckert
January 15, 2017

Long gone are the days when librarians were simply asked to recommend a good book.

Now, library staff members are asked a number of questions that range from homework help to local tourism to aiding someone who needs community services.

It's part of the reason some libraries have started introducing a social worker to their staff, and Kitchener Public Library (KPL) is no different.

"I think of my role as a resource. The library has tonnes of resources and I'm another one that people now can access," says Kym Bohachewski, who has been a social worker for 17 years and is currently working on her master's degree at Wilfrid Laurier University.

As part of her school work, she's completing a practicum placement at KPL, which means she's in the building for three days a week.

"I'm basically acting as a resource, so whether I'm a resource for staff – maybe library users are coming to them with some questions around finding some things in the community and staff can come to me – or I can work directly with the library customers," Bohachewski said.

Social worker a 'great fit'

Laura Reed, the manager of children's and teen services at KPL and the person overseeing Bohachewski's work placement, said having a social worker on hand is a "great fit."

"Public libraries are evolving. We're not what we were 10 years ago, or 20 years ago or two years ago. And that's especially true here in Kitchener with this new space and this beautiful new building and all the changes that are happening in Kitchener and downtown Kitchener. We need to evolve and we want to be as relevant and useful to the community as we possibly can be," she said.

People are initially surprised to hear there is a social worker at the library, but that quickly turns to people saying it makes sense, Reed said.

"We see an absolute cross-section of society here and often encounter customers with complex needs and we want to be able to help as much as we can," she said.

Part of growing trend

It's not a new idea – but it's also not an idea that has taken off everywhere yet.

The San Francisco Public Library hired a social worker in 2009 when staff started to notice a large number of patrons were homeless.

Since then, a trend has formed in the United States and spread into Canada. Edmonton, Winnipeg and Hamilton have social workers as well, while Brantford added a child and youth worker in response to problems with unruly teens and Toronto has a public health nurse who works out of the reference library.

"Some people might not access existing social services, but visit EPL knowing it's a safe, friendly space," Edmonton Public Library says on its website. "In collaboration with library staff, our three outreach staff (all registered social workers) work in and outside four branches ... But their impact reaches well beyond the library's walls."

KPL hopes to continue program after April

A big part of what Bohachewski can offer people is simple: it's her time.

"I've got the time to sit down and kind of chat with people and look at what might be helpful after talking with them and hearing what their needs are, and trying to find some way to connect them up with a resource," she said.

"Being able to do that, being able to sit down with somebody and work with a customer and know that OK, yeah, this has been helpful for them, they've said this is great, I didn't know about so-and-so, and then they're able to go and utilize that, that's a great thing."

Bohachewski started working at the library in September and will be there until April. A big part of her job over the next few months will be training staff members to be able to find the proper resources for people coming in with questions.

Reed said they hope to have another social work student come in and fill Bohachewski's shoes, but it will be up to the students.

In the meantime, staff will gain a better understanding of the services in the community that could help patrons in need.

"This just is another way that we can really help the people in our community," Reed said.

Source: CBC.ca

The Waterloo Region Record: Not just books — Kitchener Public Library puts a social worker on the shelf

By Catherine Thompson | December 13, 2016

The library has always loaned books, videos and even CDs that offer guidance and advice on everything from how to manage money to how to lead a healthier lifestyle.

Now, the Kitchener Public Library's Central branch is offering a little bit more: a trained social worker who can give advice and guidance, offer a friendly presence and a sympathetic ear.

Kym Bohachewski admits many of her friends and colleagues were skeptical when she said she would do a work placement at the library as part of her requirements for a master in social work at Wilfrid Laurier University.

It's actually a logical fit, said Laura Reed, the library's manager of children and teen services. "We're a public building and we see a good cross-section of society," Reed said. "Our role is to make sure people can find what they need."

People come to the library for all kinds of things: to access computers for free, to get help filling out applications or e-documents, to search for housing or to get resources if English isn't their first language. A social worker could help any of those clients, Reed said.

"People find their way here not because it's a library but because it's a warm place, it's a welcoming place, it's a place to bring your kids to read a book," Reed said. "Over the years we've always gotten questions around, 'I have nowhere to stay tonight' or 'Where can I get a hot meal?' We'll be able to not just answer those questions but be able to add some support."

Social workers have in-depth knowledge about what's available to help people in the community, and they have skills in helping figure out what they need, Bohachewski said. "I've got the time to sit down and talk with somebody who maybe isn't quite sure what's available or what they need."

Her placement, which runs three days a week until April, includes training library staff in how to recognize when a library customer may need help with a bigger issue; outreach with community agencies to help the library figure out how it can best meet the needs of clients such as women staying at a shelter, or homeless men. That work could include helping people sign up for library cards, or even offering library tours for groups from the House of Friendship or OneROOF youth agency, or even organizing pop-up libraries at community agencies.

Having social workers at the library is still fairly unusual, but is something that libraries across North America are trying. The first was probably in San Francisco in 2009, while Edmonton Public Library was the first Canadian library to bring in a social worker in 2011, Bohachewski said.

"Libraries are increasingly a hub for the community, meeting different community needs," said Nancy Schwindt, the field education co-ordinator at Laurier who helped set up the placement. "This is just an extension of work we do with, for example, community centres, with drop-in centres, all those sorts of agencies."

To read the original article, please visit therecord.com.

TheGuardian: Library cuts harm young people's mental health services, warns lobby

By Danuta Kean | Friday January 13, 2017

Public libraries’ significant role supporting the mental health of young people risks being undermined by swingeing budget cuts forced on local authorities, the head of their professional body warned this week. He added that, if funding is not protected, the work of libraries as frontline information resources for young people in need will be pushed on to the already overstretched police, health and social services.

It is estimated that one in 10 UK children experience mental health problems, as do one in four adults. Nick Poole, head of the Chartered Institute of Librarians and Information Professionals (Cilip) providers, told the Guardian that cuts to local library services would “continue to bite the availability of dedicated resources such as advice on anxiety, stress, exams and bullying”.

He warned: “Under-investing in our libraries simply pushes costs elsewhere and means that a young person growing up today has less help and is more vulnerable to the impact of mental health problems on their life.”

His comments follow prime minister Theresa May’s announcement this week of a raft of measures to “transform” attitudes towards mental health, including an extra £15m for community care, extra training for teachers and improved workplace support.

Wellbeing initiatives run by libraries around the country include the Association of Senior Children’s and Education Librarians’ autism–friendly libraries, the Cilip-backed reading for pleasure and empowerment scheme as well as yoga and mindfulness sessions run as part of Oldham libraries’ mental health and wellbeing support. Birmingham, Devon and Bolton city councils are also among library authorities that run dedicated mental health services.

The Shelf Help scheme, which is dedicated to children and young people and was launched in 2016 by the Reading Agency, provides a list of 35 books selected by mental health experts and young readers that range from self-help and information guides to comics, memoirs and novels including The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon and The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. Subjects covered range from body image to depression and self-esteem.

Suffolk library authority said that 68% of the books on the scheme had a 30% or higher loan status than other stock. Last year, 10,000 wellbeing inquiries were handled by the county’s libraries. Although it did not have an official breakdown of who sought help through its branches, Sarah Lungley, mental health and wellbeing coordinator, said anecdotal evidence suggested that the majority of enquiries came from concerned parents of young people experiencing difficulties.

“We are in a really good position to connect people to the help and services that they need,” Lungley said. “I would like to think that the powers that be recognised the role of libraries in helping vulnerable people. A lot of people in the community who struggle with mental health will be left vulnerable and lonely if their local library shuts.”

Poole added: “Children, young people and their parents are simply going to find it harder to find a well-stocked library where they can find information about the issues they face.” Without access to professional librarians trained in mental health resources, he said, those struggling would be more reliant on unmediated internet searches to gain information. “As a parent myself, I would be worried about my children using Google like that.”

Public libraries have been caught in the crossfire of a ferocious funding battle being fought between local councils and central government. Official figures released at the end of 2016 revealed that library budgets had fallen by £25m in a year, as a result of councils raiding their resources to shore up frontline services such as social care.

According to an annual survey of library authorities in the UK undertaken by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (Cipfa), total expenditure for the sector fell from £944m to £919m over the year, a 2.6% fall. Over the same period, 121 libraries closed, taking the total number open down to 3,850.

Before Christmas Poole predicted that over the next five years, a further 340 libraries will face closure if proposed cuts go ahead. Libraries in Warrington, Lancashire, Edinburgh, Denbigh and Swindon are among those facing the most severe losses.

Poole said: “We have to find a way of making our political stakeholders understand that a big part of what libraries do is making sure that people with a whole range of issues feel safe and can access information.

“If we remove that function from communities, all you are doing is pushing those library users on to the police and healthcare professionals. If Theresa May isn’t aware of that, her comments are nothing more than an empty soundbite.”

Fifteen-year-old Josh is adamant that his local library has saved his life. A year-and-a-half ago, school felt like a prison for him, as he struggled to keep up with his classmates due to a variety of issues including severe anxiety and Irlen syndrome, a problem that affects his ability to read and process information. He was also suspected to be on the autism spectrum.

Two years earlier, anxiety attacks and vulnerable feelings had begun to make him dread each school day. “School became an oppressive place to be,” he says. “I was scared and upset and everything just became too much. Everything made me worried and afraid.”

The troubled teen was not a victim of bullying, but the normal noise and chaos to be found in any classroom were a daily nightmare he had to confront.

Only one place made him comfortable: his local library. “The library was a calm, quiet and safe place for me to be,” he says.

Already a regular user, Josh welcomed the available support and guidance when he needed it. Based in a deprived part of Suffolk, his library benefits from a coordinated county-wide health and wellbeing policy funded by the Mental Health Pooled Fund, which is a combination of Suffolk County Council and Suffolk’s Clinical Commissioning Group.

He was eventually allowed to swap school days for days in the library – and the impact on his learning has been considerable: “Because I don’t have to go into school much, I use the library to do my revision. It’s quiet and I find it much easier to study. I am relaxed and calm when I am working because I can take as much time as I want without being constantly rushed.”

When stuck on a difficult maths or English problem, librarians are at hand to guide him towards answers. “They have really supported me,” he says. “They are always there to talk to and help me through a basic part of a question and then will find me a book to help me with the rest. It has given me a lot more confidence.”

A sign of how positive an experience it has been for Josh is that he has now begun volunteering, leading groups of eight to 12-year-olds who have been bullied by older children. “I wanted them to get off the street and come into the library and have a safe space to be,” he says. His idea was to set up an after-school club; by the end of 2016, 20 children were attending every Wednesday.

“It’s great,” says the teenager. “It has given them their own space where they aren’t being picked on by the older children. Before it was a struggle to talk to people because it really scared me. But now I am much more calm and confident.” He smiles: “I seem to be smiling a lot more and am feeling a lot better about life.”

To read the original article, please visit The Guardian.

Toronto Public Library names its most popular books of 2016

By Quill & Quire

The Toronto Reference Library (TPL)

The country’s largest library system has released the lists of its most-borrowed titles of 2016. A number of the year’s biggest Canadian books proved to be just as popular with Toronto Public Library patrons as they were with retail customers and award juries:

Top 10 overall fiction

1. The Nest by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney
2. Do Not Say We Have Nothing by Madeleine Thien
3. The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena
4. A Great Reckoning by Louise Penny
5. The Best Kind of People by Zoe Whittall
6. The Wonder by Emma Donoghue
7. The Widow by Fiona Barton
8. The Whistler by John Grisham
9. The Illegal by Lawrence Hill
10. I Let You Go by Clare Mackintosh

Top 10 non-fiction

1. When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
2. The Rainbow Comes and Goes: A Mother and Son Talk About Life by Anderson Cooper
3. The Girl With the Lower Back Tattoo by Amy Schumer
4. Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right by Jane Mayer
5. Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of Family and Culture in Crisis by J.D. Vance
6. Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance by Angela Duckworth
7. The Happiness Equation: Want Nothing + Do Anything = Have Everything by Neil Pasricha
8. Spark Joy: An Illustrated Master Class on the At of Organizing by Marie Kondo
9. Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen
10. Stalin’s Daughter: The Extraordinary and Tumultuous Life of Svetlana Alliluyeva by Rosemary Sullivan

Top 10 Canadian

1. Do Not Say We Have Nothing by Madeleine Thien
2. The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena
3. A Great Reckoning by Louise Penny
4. The Best Kind of People by Zoe Whittall
5. The Wonder by Emma Donoghue
6. The Illegal by Lawrence Hill
7. Fifteen Dogs by André Alexis
8. When the Music’s Over by Peter Robinson
9. The Twenty-Three by Linwood Barclay
10. 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl by Mona Awad

CBC also has the scoop on the Vancouver Public Library’s most in-demand books of the year‚ which include Thomas King’s The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America, Wab Kinew‘s The Reason You Walk‚ and Justin Trudeau’s Common Ground.

Source: Quill & Quire 

Ranganathan on shyness: Get over it!

By Saskia Leferink
29 November 2016

Advice from the father of library science

In 1931, S.R. Ranganathan, a mathematician and librarian who is widely regarded as a founder of modern library science, published his seminal work, The Five Laws of Library Science. His five principles about managing the library get most of the publicity, but tucked away on page 65 is a gem of a quote sometimes overlooked but extremely important in our fast-changing world.
“If you want to be a reference librarian, you must learn to overcome not only your shyness but also the shyness of others.”

Ranganathan used this quote to describe behavioral change librarians needed to make in his day, when they were transitioning to serving readers from preserving books. No longer were readers considered a nuisance—they became the focus of the library. Librarians had to lose their shyness and come out from behind the desk to serve users, as well as overcome any reader shyness.
As we in the library community wrestle with change management, Ranganathan’s words ring as clearly today as they did 85 years ago. You can’t be shy when tackling change. Change requires a boldness that leaves reticence behind in order to embrace something new.
 

Getting a formula for change

Last month, I had the honor of hosting the 12th annual OCLC Contact Day in the Netherlands. More than 300 members from across the country came together in Utrecht for one day to discuss change—what it means to us as both professionals and individuals.

Ben Tiggelaar, well-known Dutch publicist, trainer and researcher on behavioral sciences, was our keynote speaker that day. He shared his insights on the psychology of change and led us through the process of change as well as how to deal with the continuum of change in our day-to-day lives.
 
Appropriately, Ben used Ranganathan’s quote on shyness to introduce his five steps for adapting to change:

• Formulate goals as ‘learning goals’ and not as ‘performance goals.’ Behavioral change starts with a succinct, easy to repeat, emotionally compelling message framed as a learning objective.
• Define the desired behavior. Successful change requires clear steps anyone can take—simple, actionable steps without elaborate new processes.
• Start with the ‘bright spots.’ In most cases our brain exaggerates the negative. List the advantages on a whiteboard and place reminders at the point of action to help make the jump to a new behavior.
• Organize support and a ‘safe’ environment. Successful change requires many people working together—a community designed to partner with individuals and inspire each other.
• Realize that you’re never finished! Changing behavior is not a one-time decision. It’s an ongoing campaign that requires enlisting your heart and mind every day.

Coming together to support one another

Ben’s presentation hit home with attendees, who had identified transparency, listening and warmth as the behaviors they would like to see more of in their libraries. Here’s what a few of them said:

• From a public library staff member: I feel the need for change, but how can I change when I’m the only staff member in this little library and my other colleagues work at different locations?
• From an academic librarian: I love to change, but I do not want ‘to be changed.’
• One of our members said that implementing a new library system is often a key driver for changing workflows.
• And a public library director asked how OCLC can help public libraries change from the traditional lending library—a perception that’s still in the minds of many users—to a community library where people get support for their personal development.

Well, that’s where our library cooperative shines. And why we come together every year at Contact Day. This annual gathering has grown into one of the biggest events for the Dutch library community because of the desire to support one another in our quest to lead the library profession forward. We are a community that shares knowledge and knows that, collectively, it’s easier to change together.
Change can be intimidating even when you know it’s needed. It means uncertainty, especially in times like today, when it seems unending and unrelenting. But with the support of colleagues and the strength of a community, this very difficult task becomes doable.
S.R. Ranganathan knew it. And our members know it as well.

Source: oclc.org

Kitchener Public Library wi-fi lending program doubles reach thanks to donation

Sandvine donates 20 hotspots to library to help meet demand

 

Dec 28, 2016 10:48 AM ET
By CBC News

Kitchener Public Library has expanded its wi-fi hotspot lending program thanks to a donation of 20 devices by local tech company Sandvine. (CBC News ) 

 
A popular wi-fi lending program at Kitchener Public Library has received a boost thanks to a donation from a local tech company.
Sandvine has donated 20 hotspots to the library, doubling the number of devices the library can lend out.

Mary Chevreau, CEO of Kitchener Public Library, said they knew there was a demand for the program when they started it.

"But we were amazed with the response from our library users," she said in a release about the Sandvine donation. "Not only does the long wait list for our few hotspot devices prove this, but sadly, it also illustrates the very real digital divide that exists in our technology-focused community."
The company helps people around the globe access free internet, so they wanted to do something for the people in Kitchener, said Dave Caputo, CEO of Sandvine.

"Waterloo Region is flourishing thanks to the power of the internet, and KPL's wi-fi lending program plays an important role in ensuring that anyone in the region can have access to the empowerment it provides," he said.

  

 Kitchener Public Library users can borrow these Wi-Fi LTE hotspots for up to three weeks. The library was the first in Canada to offer the hotspots on loan. (Rogers)

In October 2015, the library became the first in the country to lend out wi-fi hotspot devices much the same way people borrow books, magazines or DVDs. Staff started the program because statistics showed 23 per cent of people living in Waterloo region did not have internet access.

"It's a real range of people that are looking to use the internet outside of library hours and in most cases it's people who cannot afford the internet," Lesa Balch, the senior manager of service development at the Kitchener Public Library, told CBC News in January.

'Not only does the long wait list for our few hotspot devices prove this, but sadly, it also illustrates the very real digital divide that exists in our technology-focused community.' - Kitchener Public Library CEO Mary Chevreau on the popularity of their hotspot lending program

The devices, also called internet sticks, are so popular, they are rarely on the shelf for long once they are returned.

"It might sit on the shelf for an hour or so and it's checked out again," Balch said, noting people watch the holds list and as soon as their name pops up, they go into the library. "They're never sitting on the shelf, they're always checked out."

KPL won the the Ontario Library Information Technology Association project award from the Ontario Library Association early in 2016 for the initiative.

Source: cbc.ca

Saskatoon Library Launches Read for Reconciliation Space

January 5, 2017
By Lisa Peet

 Hide cutting at opening of SPL’s Reconciliation Reading Area (l-r): Saskatoon Mayor Charlie Clark, Office of the Treaty Commissioner, Executive Director Harry Lafond, Kelly Bitternose (survivor), Eugene Arcand, SPL Board Chair Candice Grant, Elder Walter Linklater, Elder Maria Linklater and Carol Cooley CEO and Director of Libraries for Saskatoon Public Library.
Photo credit: Eagle Feather News

 

Since the last of Canada’s Indian residential schools closed in 1996, the nation has been attempting to shape a response to the legacy of abuse that the residential school system—which removed native children from their homes and families—inflicted on its Indigenous Peoples. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC), established in 2008, spent seven years assembling documentation from survivors and working to build awareness of these abuses, ultimately issuing a series of Calls to Action at the end of 2015. Since that time a number of institutions have implemented programs to advance the national movement toward reconciliation, including the establishment in 2015 of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation (NCTR), hosted by the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg. In February 2016 the University of Saskatchewan joined eight other post-secondary institutions in partnership with NCTR to make some five million electronic records on the subject accessible.

Now Saskatoon Public Library (SPL), Saskatchewan, has become the first public library to incorporate a space permanently dedicated to truth and reconciliation. On November 21 SPL’s Frances Morrison Central Library opened the Read for Reconciliation reading area, which includes a full set of the reports compiled by the TRC over five years, plus a variety of books about Canada’s history of residential schools, as well as an extensive reading list on the history and legacy of residential schools in Canada on its homepage.

The space currently holds more than 1,200 volumes devoted to reconciliation—adult fiction, nonfiction, and poetry both by and about Indigenous Peoples, as well as information on the history of residential schools and the reconciliation movement and an original boxed copy of the TRC report. This is supplemented by more than 9,000 volumes on the subject within the SPL system. In addition, the space will host programming focusing on healing, truth, and reconciliation.

“Other organizations in the community, for instance the school boards and hospitals, have all done work toward reconciliation,” explained SPL director and CEO Carol Cooley. “But it’s not as public as a public library can be. We can impact every neighborhood and we can insure that we raise the profile of the issue and continue to educate our public, because even in Canada not a lot of people were aware of residential schools and the impact that they had on our Indigenous population.”
  
“CULTURAL GENOCIDE”

The Indian residential school system was a network of government-funded boarding schools across Canada which housed indigenous children ages six to 15, many of them forcibly removed from their families and tribes, in an attempt to assimilate them into what was then considered the dominant Canadian culture. From 1876, when Canada’s Indian Act was passed, until 1996, approximately 150,000 native children were placed in residential schools.

Separated from parents and siblings and forced to abandon their culture, religion, and language, most children in the system received inferior education, nutrition, and health care; physical and sexual abuse was rampant, and parental visits were heavily restricted. An estimated 6,000 students died while in residential schools. The system has been linked to a legacy of post-traumatic stress disorder, alcoholism, substance abuse, chronic medical conditions, and suicide among its survivors.

“Apartheid in South Africa was modeled after the residential school system,” said Cooley. “It was a pretty deliberate cultural genocide.”

The TRC, funded by the 2007 settlement of a class-action lawsuit, was established in 2008 by parties of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement as part of an ongoing attempt to respond to this trauma. The King’s University College of Edmonton, Alberta, held an interdisciplinary conference on Truth and Reconciliation in January 2008, and that March, Indigenous leaders and church officials toured the provinces to promote the TRC’s formation. In June, Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued a formal public apology on behalf of the Canadian government.
 
Between 2008–13, the TRC gathered statements from survivors across the country. The resulting report collecting these stories and a series of historical documents ran to more than 4,000 pages. With the report’s publication in 2015, the NCTR was established, with the mandate that former students and their families, as well as researchers and the public, have access to the history of the residential schools so that the legacy of colonialism will not be forgotten. It opened in November 2015, and holds both physical material and digital archives. In December 2015, the TRC issued 94 Calls to Action in order to begin to redress the damages in an ongoing way, and to advance the process of Canadian reconciliation.

PARTNERS IN RECONCILIATION

 

Eugene Arcand 

Photo credit: Eagle Feather News

SPL is a partner in Reconciliation Saskatoon, a partnership between the City of Saskatoon, the Office of the Treaty Commissioner, and some 30 community groups. At the first meeting she attended Cooley met Lorna Arcand, who introduced her to her husband, Eugene Arcand, a Cree from the Muskeg Lake First Nation in Saskatchewan who spent 11 years in the residential school system. He has worked with the Saskatchewan First Nations community in a number of capacities for the past 37 years, and is one of ten residential school survivors to represent Saskatchewan on the TRC Survivor Committee, helping to gather testimonies. He currently sits on the TRC governing circle at the University of Manitoba. Cooley invited Arcand to speak at SPL, and while organizing the lecture details, the idea of the Read for Reconciliation room was born.

Arcand had been presented with five complete sets of the TRC report and Calls to Action, and he proposed donating one set to the library and establishing a space devoted to reconciliation. Cooley had been considering a similar idea for the library. “So it was a nice dovetailing between our readiness to take those steps and Eugene’s desire, as well, to further this cause,” explained Cooley.

The space was set up simply, with several tables arranged in a circle, conducive to both research and reflection. The documents donated by Arcand are prominently displayed in a box wrapped in red broadcloth and tied with black ribbon, “to represent the dark era and the blood that was shed,” explained Cooley. The volumes were blessed in a ceremony and are for display only, but the library has full copies of the report and Calls to Action, which can also be accessed online. (Arcand has also donated copies to SaskPolytechnic, the Greater Saskatoon Catholic School Board, and the Saskatoon Public School Board.)

The opening was attended by residential school survivors, as well as Cooley, SPL Board Chair Candice Grant, Saskatoon mayor Charlie Clark, and Office of the Treaty Commissioner Executive Director Harry Lafond. Attendees joined to cut a piece of hide, and Elders Walter and Maria Linklater offered a ceremonial smudge and prayers. The event was an emotional one for many there. “We’ve been forced to remember in a short period of time what we spent a lifetime trying to forget,” Arcand told LJ. “That’s the best way I can put it.” But the library’s contribution to the effort has been met with warm approval.

“I’m proud to be a part of working with [SPL staff],” said Arcand. “Because they really do understand. They really do engage. They take our thoughts and our words and implement them and you know, that’s a new step in this country.”

Cooley hopes to bring a digital component to the collection as well. The library is in the process of developing an Indigenous services strategy, as a component of its most recent strategic plan involves honoring Indigenous perspectives. “It is a significant pillar to our plan,” Cooley told LJ. “We are making a very public commitment to reconciliation, in large part because it is needed and important, but with Saskatchewan our indigenous population is growing and if our province is going to be healthy and vibrant…we need to really put action behind the call to action, rather than just symbolic gestures and words.”

In addition, Arcand has suggested taking photographs of residential school survivors, displaying them in the library’s gallery, and eventually holding them in SPL’s local history room. Cooley agrees: “Gradually the survivors are going to pass on, and this would be a good way to capture a visual component.”

For now, however, the area is busy every day. “There’s a peacefulness in that space,” said Cooley, describing visitors stopping to catch their breath when they first see it—“not because it’s incredibly large, and it’s not as beautiful as we would make it in a new central library. But it’s a statement.”

 

EMBRACING AWARENESS

 

 SPL director and CEO Carol Cooley and SPL board chair Candice Grant in the 

Reconciliation Reading area 

Photo credit: David Stobbe / stobbephoto.ca

While SPL used no additional funding to establish the space, Cooley told LJ, the library has a firm commitment to furthering reconciliation awareness. Plans to hire an Indigenous services coordinator are in the works, and SPL will be allocating funds specifically for its Indigenous collection and program development. All SPL employees have taken Aboriginal awareness seminars.

The system also recently received approval to double the hours of two branches serving the area’s largest Indigenous populations—one of which is to be renamed for Freda Ahenakew in February. Ahenakew, a Cree mother of 12, returned to high school at the age of 38, and went on to receive several graduate degrees, eventually becoming a researcher of Indigenous languages, prolific academic author, and professor of native studies. She was awarded two honorary Doctorate of Law degrees, a National Aboriginal Achievement Award in Education, and the Order of Canada and the Saskatchewan Order of Merit; at the time of her retirement in 1995, Ahenakew served as the Director of the Department of Native Studies at the University of Manitoba. A new SPL building, completed in December, was named the Round Prairie Branch in honor of the Métis community that originally occupied the area.

The Calls to Action for reconciliation are national, Cooley noted, and she feels that other libraries could institute similar programs easily. “I know not all communities have large populations of Indigenous Peoples, but I think it’s incumbent upon all of us to understand the impact of residential schools and the intergenerational trauma,” she told LJ. “I think that understanding helps remove the judgment about Aboriginal Peoples and some of the mental health and substance abuse issues that they face…. I think public libraries, for adult populations, can play that educational role.” SPL is also working with the Canadian Federation of Library Associations to create a set of best practices for libraries that want to initiate reconciliation work.

Because of its ongoing work, SPL has been called “the rock star of reconciliation,” said Cooley. “That’s great, but I hope one day we get to a place where the library isn’t the rock star of reconciliation, and these things aren’t so remarkable, but are part of everyday life.”

“The effects of colonization and…genocide have to be addressed, and have to be addressed by my people, but you can’t do it alone,” added Arcand. “We have nowhere to look but up, and look forward to changing things.”

Source: Library Journal