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Public Policies as Spaces for the Articulated Professional Identity of Librarians
Abstract
This chapter provides a preliminary analysis of Internet Use Polices in public libraries as a vehicle for the articulated professional identities of librarians. Policy documents are one of the ways, especially outside of one-on-one interactions, that librarians can articulate their professional identities to users. By examining policy documents through a discursive lens, the identity of librarians can be discerned. Internet Use Policies provide an excellent place to examine librarians’ identities because they deal with the difficult task of managing user behavior within the library while the patrons use a resource, the Internet, which is often out of the librarians’ control. Policy documents highlight areas that the authors, librarians, believe require action or direction. The way a document is worded, the intended audience, and the intended outcome of the document all shed light on the professional identities of librarians. Internet Use Policies, for example, share wording with policies on freedom of information and Internet use from professional associations, and while their intended outcome is to warn patrons of the potential dangers of the Internet and place limits on how the Internet is used within the library, the unintended outcome is to position librarians as gatekeepers of the Internet. The non-librarian written policies that librarians choose to support in their work, such as Creative Commons licenses, also provide insight into how librarians understand their professional identities. The public policies they choose to support, as well as those they reject, indicate which professional values they value and which aspects of their professional identities they want to highlight.
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