Event Type
Presentation
Location
U-Hall Classroom 3304
Track
Critical analysis of DEIA, Self-care and wellness
Start Date
21-7-2023 1:15 PM
End Date
21-7-2023 2:15 PM
Description
Since 2021, I have been working on a book chapter for a co-edited book entitled "Women of Color Practicing Sisterhood: Reflections from Community Intersections." My work on this chapter has inspired me to remember and reflect on my past as a young Black girl in Denver, and how that has affected me as a professional Black woman in Southern California. As a woman of color in academic libraries, I have worked with precious few people of color. In addition, since moving to California in 2006, I have had no opportunity to live in a diverse environment due to family commitments. This chapter explores the unique dynamics I have had to navigate as one of the few Black people in eastern Ventura County, California, as well as my efforts to find colleagues of color with whom I could bond, regardless of the homogenous environments in which I have been employed. One of the lessons I have learned through my experiences as a child can be summarized by the Zora Neale Hurston quotation, “My skinfolks but not my kinfolks.” I was not able to articulate this concept so succinctly until I read a variation of the phrase written by a library worker of color in a Facebook group. Suddenly, my life began to make sense. I would like to share some of my research on this chapter, in hopes that we all may learn something from resulting discussion.
Outcomes
- To describe my research to other people of color in LIS, some of whom may have endured similar experiences and may have enlightening insights.
- To discuss our own individual searches for kinship within our professional field and the importance of such searches to our wellness and longevity in the profession.
- To assess as a group the phenomena that have led to so many people of color in LIS seeking out kinship through whatever means necessary.
Session 2C: "My Skinfolks but Not My Kinfolks": Searching for Kinship in Libraryland
U-Hall Classroom 3304
Since 2021, I have been working on a book chapter for a co-edited book entitled "Women of Color Practicing Sisterhood: Reflections from Community Intersections." My work on this chapter has inspired me to remember and reflect on my past as a young Black girl in Denver, and how that has affected me as a professional Black woman in Southern California. As a woman of color in academic libraries, I have worked with precious few people of color. In addition, since moving to California in 2006, I have had no opportunity to live in a diverse environment due to family commitments. This chapter explores the unique dynamics I have had to navigate as one of the few Black people in eastern Ventura County, California, as well as my efforts to find colleagues of color with whom I could bond, regardless of the homogenous environments in which I have been employed. One of the lessons I have learned through my experiences as a child can be summarized by the Zora Neale Hurston quotation, “My skinfolks but not my kinfolks.” I was not able to articulate this concept so succinctly until I read a variation of the phrase written by a library worker of color in a Facebook group. Suddenly, my life began to make sense. I would like to share some of my research on this chapter, in hopes that we all may learn something from resulting discussion.
Outcomes
- To describe my research to other people of color in LIS, some of whom may have endured similar experiences and may have enlightening insights.
- To discuss our own individual searches for kinship within our professional field and the importance of such searches to our wellness and longevity in the profession.
- To assess as a group the phenomena that have led to so many people of color in LIS seeking out kinship through whatever means necessary.
