43. Tracie Hall, Executive Director of the American Library Association (ALA) on Navigating Political Debates and Putting on a Great Annual Conference

How do you navigate a political topic like censorship when you have members on all sides of the debate? How do you evolve as an association when the environments that your members work in are changing so dramatically?

In this episode of Associations Thrive, host Joanna Pineda interviews Tracie Hall, Executive Director of the American Library Association (ALA). Tracie introduces ALA, talks about her journey to becoming Executive Director, and the things ALA is doing to thrive, and defend our rights to read and learn. Tracie Hall discusses:

• The Five Truths of Library Science.
• The diversity of libraries and how they are changing so dramatically.
• As information has become more digital, we don’t need the library itself to be a repository of physical books.
• How ALS is navigating the censorship debate in America today.
• ALS’ commitment to the freedom to read, adult literacy and broadband for all.
• How Tracie looked back on ALA’s history to see how the association navigated the McCarthy era and the state-sanctioned book bans and censorship campaigns.
• The importance of DEI to ALA, specifically because libraries serve all people, and the librarian profession is not as diverse as it should be.
• The ALA Annual Conference coming up on June 22, 2023 in Chicago.
• What it’s like to be a librarian these days.

References:

• American Library Association (ALA) website
• The Five Laws of Library Science by Ranganathan
• ALA Annual Conference
• ALA Divisions
• ALA’s Fight Censorship page
• The ALA on Diversity
• Unite Against Book Bans