Algorithms, Authority and Race on the Web: Consciousness Raising Through Information Literacy Instruction
Type of Presentation
Individual paper/presentation (20 minute presentation)
Target Audience
Higher Education
Location
Room 1002
Abstract
How can librarians align information literacy instruction with academic department learning goals stressing the importance of thinking critically about race and ethnicity? While discussion of problematic racial taxonomies has long been a way to integrate librarian expertise into these courses, a good next step is to include activities and conversations around the growing body of research discussing the racial implications of new technologies as they apply broadly to information sharing and seeking. Topics can include digital colonialism, algorithm bias, and the development of new technologies in the global north that may be ill-suited for knowledges produced in the global south. This presentation offers strategies for working with these topics under the frame “Authority is Constructed and Contextual,” based on work done in courses for the departments of Africana Studies and Latino and Caribbean Studies at Rutgers University.
Presentation Description
How can librarians align information literacy instruction with academic department learning goals stressing the importance of thinking critically about race and ethnicity? While discussion of problematic racial taxonomies has long been a way to integrate librarian expertise into these courses, a good next step is to include activities and conversations around the racial implications of new technologies as they apply broadly to information sharing and seeking. This presentation offers strategies for working with these topics under the frame “Authority is Constructed and Contextual.”
Keywords
Framework for Information Literacy, Race, Algorithm Bias, Digital Colonialism
Publication Type and Release Option
Event
Recommended Citation
Gasparotto, Melissa, "Algorithms, Authority and Race on the Web: Consciousness Raising Through Information Literacy Instruction" (2017). Georgia International Conference on Information Literacy. 64.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/gaintlit/2017/2017/64
Algorithms, Authority and Race on the Web: Consciousness Raising Through Information Literacy Instruction
Room 1002
How can librarians align information literacy instruction with academic department learning goals stressing the importance of thinking critically about race and ethnicity? While discussion of problematic racial taxonomies has long been a way to integrate librarian expertise into these courses, a good next step is to include activities and conversations around the growing body of research discussing the racial implications of new technologies as they apply broadly to information sharing and seeking. Topics can include digital colonialism, algorithm bias, and the development of new technologies in the global north that may be ill-suited for knowledges produced in the global south. This presentation offers strategies for working with these topics under the frame “Authority is Constructed and Contextual,” based on work done in courses for the departments of Africana Studies and Latino and Caribbean Studies at Rutgers University.
