I’m writing this on my last workday of the year, so I thought I would look back on what 2016 meant for me personally and professionally. It’s all very odd–in a year I suspect will carry notoriety for the next several decades, I had a lot of successes. While the headlines seemed to go from bad, to worse, to all-out surreal, life and libraries kept going. I got into a pattern of waking up, reading the news, becoming terrified, then commuting to work and doing my job. I’d teach a class or two, go to some meetings, work on a few projects, then go home and yell or cry at the nightly news. It’s a weird mixture of privilege, numbness, and routine that marked this year, and I’m not quite sure what comes next. Still, I want to look back on the high points.
Here, in no particular order, are some of the nice things that happened in 2016:
- After a rocky first year, I started to feel like I was making a difference at my job. We were able to move the needle on developing new curriculum, and we’ve begun consulting with faculty across campus to change some of their perceptions of what we can and should be doing as librarians. It’s been so much slower than I could have anticipated when I started here eighteen months ago, but we’re starting to build momentum, helped in no small part by some excellent hiring decisions this year. Next year will see two more faculty hires in my department, and I can’t wait to see what energy and ideas they bring with them.
- I traveled to a lot of conferences, and was able to see and do remarkable things. I ate cactus with a bunch of critlib friends in Tucson. I gave a keynote presentation in San Francisco, then walked along Ocean Beach in Golden Gate Park. I stayed in a yurt just outside of Moab and showed up at Library Instruction West with red dirt under my fingernails. Then I ended my presentation year with a trip to Orlando, a place that had a huge influence on my teenage years, but that I hadn’t seen in a decade. I never imagined I would have these opportunities as a librarian, and know that years like this one are rare, so I’ve done my best to savor it.
- I learned from a lot of really, really smart people. In a year full of amazing work, my highlights remain Dave Hudson’s keynote from CLAPS, along with April Hathcock’s blog that came shortly thereafter. I also continue to be in awe of the brilliance of my friend and collaborator Jessica Critten, who said and wrote some stunning things in 2016.
- Seeing three graduate assistants I’ve supervised get hired as full-time librarians. As I’ve developed as a librarian and begun supervising MLIS students, I’ve tried hard to demystify the job search process and do whatever I can to help them get that first professional job, which I know can be a daunting experience.
Still, underneath all of these, I’ve felt a persistent sense of concern, doubt, frustration, and terror. Part of that lunch in Tucson involved discussing with friends from outside the U.S. an election scenario that seemed impossible at the time, but has now come to pass. The trip to Orlando happened just a couple of weeks after the shooting at Pulse. I’ve been advising MLIS students through a job search process I know to be broken, and I find myself explaining archaic rules and exclusionary policies. Dave, April, Jess, and a hundred other librarians have all written and said things that point to deep flaws within librarianship, and yet the ALA seems to be leading us deeper in a dangerous and wrong direction.
And so I find myself trying to navigate the tension between things that are going well, and the simultaneous reality that things are going to hell. It’s an exhausting exercise. It’s exhausting to hear students express fears in one setting, then hear administrators deny those feelings in meetings a week later. It’s exhausting to meet with campus departments who say “we agree with what you’re trying to do, but we’re not going to help you.” It’s exhausting to hear calls for nuance and critical thinking met with infographic and checklist solutions.
If there’s been a motif for my blog over the last couple of years, it’s the phrase “I’m not sure what comes next,” and that accurately summarizes my sentiments here at the end of the year. I do know that 2017 is coming. I know that a lot of people are going to stand up for what they believe in. I know that a lot of things are going to change.
I also know that we’re not going into this alone. My weird little corner of librarianship includes some of the most brilliant people I’ve met in my life, and I know that there are other weird little corners of the world with still more brilliant people. I also know that brilliance isn’t enough. There are power dynamics that were exposed this year that I can’t comprehend, other than to know that they are more powerful than I am.
I hope they’re not more powerful than we are.