EVENTS
Candidate Cohort Open House
Learn more about For The People’s upcoming candidate cohort of folks who are running for or seeking appointment to library boards. LEARN MORE & REGISTER NOW >
Criminalization 101 for Information Workers
Join FTP for a teach-in as part of Interrupting Criminalization and Project NIA’s Building Your Abolitionist Toolbox series. We’ll be covering the various intersections of libraries, library work and criminalization, including surveillance and privacy issues, retribution against library workers, social work and social services, and more. The session will also include power mapping, resource-sharing, and opportunities for discussion. LEARN MORE & REGISTER NOW >
Beyond Book Bans: Building Power in Public Schools and Libraries
Most of us have been transformed by a book that's currently on a banned book list. These bans represent a larger swath of chilling authoritarian-style policies that are affecting communities across the country, seeking to divide us along lines of difference. Join Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) and For the People: A Leftist Library Project to hear stories about how regular folks are building people power to make decisions about how the libraries and schools in their communities are run. LEARN MORE & REGISTER NOW >
Return to Sender: Take Action Day
The Return to Sender exhibition conveys that the prison itself is censorship, which is multifaceted and complex. Thus, the only way to put an end to prison censorship entirely is by putting an end to prisons. In the meantime, there are nearly 2 million people in U.S. jails and prisons daily who need access to books & information. Join us on October 7 as part of Banned Books Week (October 1-7) to discuss prison censorship and to take actions against it. Learn more and register now >
How They Did It: Community-Based Efforts to Defend Public Libraries
Join For the People for a dynamic how-to session focused on local organizer efforts to strengthen and defend public libraries. We'll hear firsthand accounts from the Hennepin County Library Patrons Union and Louisiana Citizens Against Censorship. Discover how these organizations threw themselves into the struggle, built power, navigated challenges, and made a difference in their local public libraries. LEARN MORE & REGISTER NOW >
The ABCs of Getting Involved in Your Local Public Library
This event is a teach-in for Leftists about how local public libraries actually function: Who governs local libraries? Who funds local libraries? How does one find out this information? How to get involved in your local library as a trustee, board member, “Friends of the Library” group? We will be asking participants to do some pre-work which involves local research. Learn More and Pre-register Now >
Essential to the Public: Libraries at the End of the World
Libraries are among the last funded public spaces open to the public. They’re also under attack by organized extremists who use censorship as a bludgeon against one of the few public institutions still standing. As progressives, we must be as organized as they are, putting libraries on the top of our organizing agenda. Featuring Emily Drabinski, incoming ALA President, and co-sponsored by Project NIA and the Barnard Center for Research on Women (BCRW). Learn More and Register Now >
Toward Narrating A People’s History of U.S. Public Libraries
This event will offer a space for participants to discuss a people's history of the American public library. It will also offer an opportunity to learn about a new project that will invite those on the political Left(s) to take a more active role in their local libraries. Featuring Dr. Wayne Wiegand; co-facilitated by Mariame Kaba and Megan Riley.