InfoLit Meets Civics: Experimenting with Legal Research Workshops in Academic Libraries
Lightning Talk | Wednesday, May 17, 2023 | 1:45pm – 2:45pm EST
As we witness debates about the importance of African American history alongside waves of legislation aimed at rolling back decades of hard-won progress, librarians can embrace the activist spirit of critical race theory by introducing basic legal research workshops into their rotation of information literacy workshops. Finding the original text of laws and legislative history can be challenging since legal citation and style differs from how we talk about laws in everyday speech. Librarians can bridge this gap and teach researchers how to collect background information, understand basic legal citation, and navigate a range of proprietary databases and open government web resources. These sessions can invite students to go beneath the headlines and current debates, separate myths from facts about our country’s history, and encourage civic engagement through greater understanding of open government resources.
[This talk will not be recorded.]
Presenter: Tierney Gleason / Presenter slides
Tierney Gleason is a Reference and Digital Humanities Librarian at Fordham University and an adjunct reference librarian at New York University. She earned an MSLIS from Long Island University and an MA in Irish and Irish American Studies from New York University through the Dual Degree Mentoring Program. She completed her BA in Women’s Studies at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. Before becoming a librarian, she worked for progressive social change in the nonprofit sector.