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Civil Commitment and the Role of Public Librarians

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  • First Online:
Information Literacy in the Workplace (ECIL 2017)

Part of the book series: Communications in Computer and Information Science ((CCIS,volume 810))

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Abstract

Western culture has developed based on notions that truth, by overcoming falsehood, underpins democracy. Libraries and librarians have played an important part in the provision of information to support democratic processes. This study explored information services offered by the small number of public librarians whose role is to provide information services to employees of local governments, elected representatives and to the general public in Sydney, Australia and their perceptions of their role in supporting the potential for civic literacy to contribute to the quality of public policies and democracy. In the interviews, librarians emphasised the importance of awareness-raising of their role in providing information; some perceived opportunities to highlight existing partnerships or to develop new ones; and community discussions of fake news were seen to give scope for repositioning the services of librarians. The regime of truth relating information access to democratic principles has not yet been replaced.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, Australia

    Hilary Yerbury & Maureen Henninger

Authors
  1. Hilary Yerbury
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  2. Maureen Henninger
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Hilary Yerbury .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Hacettepe University, Beytepe, Ankara, Turkey

    Serap Kurbanoğlu

  2. University of Paris-Est, Champs-sur-Marne, France

    Joumana Boustany

  3. University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia

    Sonja Špiranec

  4. University of California (UCLA), Los Angeles, California, USA

    Esther Grassian

  5. University of California (UCLA), Los Angeles, California, USA

    Diane Mizrachi

  6. University of Texas, Austin, Texas, USA

    Loriene Roy

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Yerbury, H., Henninger, M. (2018). Civil Commitment and the Role of Public Librarians. In: Kurbanoğlu, S., Boustany, J., Špiranec, S., Grassian, E., Mizrachi, D., Roy, L. (eds) Information Literacy in the Workplace. ECIL 2017. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 810. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74334-9_40

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74334-9_40

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-74333-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-74334-9

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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