The Los Angeles Public Library (LAPL) wants to know, “What’s your queery?” That phrase is the tagline for the library system’s LGBTservices, established a year and a half ago and the subject of a presentation at the American Library Association’s (ALA) 2015 annual conference in San Francisco.
The confluence of the Supreme Court decision in theObergefell v. Hodges case and the annual Gay Pride parade during the conference
proved the perfect backdrop for the presentation, in which two LAPL librarians
described how they improved LGBT services through grassroots efforts.
“Two of us [are] steering the ship, but we have a wide group
of contributors. We try to find the talent,” said Xochitl Oliva, archivist and
cochair of the LGBT Services Committee at LAPL, of herself and LGBT services cochair
David Hagopian. They are two of the five
librarians who established LGBT services at the library in January 2014 to
ensure quality patron services throughout the 72-branch system.
The group’s impetus started from LAPL’s Leading from Any
Position initiative, which holds workshops designed to promote grassroots innovation.
The LGBT services were founded alongside other affinity groups including
multilingual services, veterans’ services, and homeless services.
“We created this LGBT Heritage Month resource packet with
adult programs, young adult programs, children’s programs, [and] book lists,
and we created this webpage for the self-service patron,” Olivia said. Those
resources including blog posts, podcasts, book lists, and even databases of
interest.
As a part of the Heritage Month resource project, two
children’s librarians created rainbow family story times that could be
implemented at any location. Activities included a family mobile-making craft
program for all ages and another hands-on opportunity to make Pride buttons.
The library’s LGBT book lists are also notable for their
level of specificity, separating out YA books on lesbian and transgender themes
from those with gay male characters. Rudy Ruiz, LAPL adult librarian and LGBT
services member, also organized an LGBT-themed film program. A filmmaker and
former cataloger at the University of Southern California (USC) Cinematic Arts
archive, Ruiz knew about USC’s student films whose copyright was held by the
university.
Since the program launched, “Our [staff] numbers have really
grown,” said Oliva. “Last year we had 70 participating in our outreach.... This
year, we had 86.”
“We are trying to create a structure that anyone could look
at and re-create,” she added. “We’re going for replicability.”
Image: Rudy Ruiz (l.) and Xochitl Oliva share their work and tagline,
“What’s your queery?”
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