Image 1 - Rows and rows of white shelves sit atop a white floor with hundreds of books stretching into the distance.
TW: This post discusses racism, sexism, anti-LGBTQIA+, and religious discrimination while examining bias in Library of Congress Subject Headings.
While subject headings and classifications can be useful and even necessary, they are inherently biased and flawed. The Library of Congress Subject Headings were established in 1898 and actively reflect that time period. There have been changes, of course, but they are few and far between. This seems odd given that notable libraries all over the country, including the Smithsonian Institute, offer internships in studying bias in subject headings.
Subject headings and classifications often perpetrate "othering": when a view of the world creates categories for those outside of its normal. For example, the LOC subject headings have categories for women's everything. Sure it hits the main ones like women's history and women's rights. But it also includes things like Women's Shoes, Women's Music Festivals, and even Women's Television Programs to be used for shows intended for female audiences. But there are no categories for men's shoes, or men's music festivals, or men's television programs. Yes, there are probably twenty or so subjects that start with "Men's", but there are hundreds that start with "Women's". That's because the default setting is that all topics are about men. There doesn't need to be a men's television program because television programs are made for men, all of them apparently, except those labeled Women's Television Programs.
The problems become even clearer when race enters the conversation. There are hundreds and hundreds of subjects that start with "African American": African Americans in Motion Pictures, African Americans in Professions, African Americans - History, and African Americans - Clothing. But there is no subject for Caucasians in Motion Pictures because the default is that motion pictures are authored, directed, and acted in by white people. This "others" anyone outside whiteness because they must go to a separate section to see themselves reflected in the materials. Their race has been removed from the Motion Pictures subject and placed on a distant shelf under African American or Chinese American. And let's not say that the subject headings and classifications use appropriate words to describe every group. For example, many citizens have been trying to remove the term illegal aliens from the subject headings because of its offensiveness and alienation of human beings in America.
Many of these headings cause irreparable damage to individuals, not just those that are sexist and racist. For example, the subject Homosexuality used to be nested under the subject Sexual Deviation, implying that the LGBTQIA+ community engaged in devious sexual acts instead of "normal" heterosexual acts. And let's not get into the fact that Witchcraft is under Occultism and Black Arts with only a related term of Wicca, the religion under which it belongs. Wicca itself is not even listed under the Religion heading.
The institution of subject headings and classifications are inherently and systemically racists, sexist, homophobic, able-ist, and anti-non-Christian religions among many others I am sure. It should be easy to change these things and turn them into social-justice-oriented subject headings and classifications, but it's not.
The process for changing LOC subject headings is long and painful. So much so that they created a program to teach people how to do it because it was too hard to do alone. The fight to change the subject heading Illegal Aliens met with so much resistance that congress itself got involved. The change never happened. So now, it's up to librarians and catalogers across the country to unweave the bias in the fabric of libraries by creating their own local subject headings. Imagine that, the system won't change so we have to break the rules if we want our items to fall under social justice forward subjects.
I personally am still learning about the ways that subject headings, classifications, and libraries themselves can be biased. I'm even still learning how I myself am biased and what I can do to be a better ally and person. The first step is that I will implement social-justice-oriented subject headings within the Last McCoy Library as needed. They may change as I grow and learn, but I will fight to keep biased terms out of my library and keep all the items accessible under better terms than those provided by the Library of Congress. Secondly, I'll keep reading articles about bias and social justice issues in librarianship, specifically those by BIPOC/disabled/LGBTQIA+ authors.
Sources:
Darbinski, E. (2013). Queering the Catalog: Queer Theory and the Politics of Correction. Brooklyn Library Faculty Publications. Paper 9.
Howard, S. & Knowlton, S. (2018). Browsing through bias: The Library of Congress classification and subject headings for African American studies and LGBTQIA studies. Library Trends, 67(1), 74-88, DOI 1.1353/lib.2018.0026
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