Forced migrants, integration, and public libraries: new research published in ‘Information Research’

forced migrants, public libraries, integration, local authorities, Scotland, research, Salzano, Hall, Webster, Brazier

Abstract of ‘Is the public library included? An analysis of local government documentation on the integration of forced migrants in Scotland’ (Salzano, Hall, Webster & Brazier, 2022)

Is the public library included? An analysis of local government documentation on the integration of forced migrants in Scotland by Rachel Salzano, Hazel Hall, Gemma Webster, and David Brazier has been published. The paper features in the Proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Science as the October 2022 special issue of Information Research.The 2022 CoLIS conference was held at Oslo Metropolitan University between May 29th and June 1st 2022. Continue reading

What are public libraries for? Rachel Salzano presents doctoral research at #asist2022

The 85th Annual Meeting of the Association for Information Science and Technology takes place in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania this week. Those of us who cannot be there in person have been following the conference proceedings on Twitter at #asist2022 over the past couple of days.

Amongst the conference speakers is Centre for Social Informatics PhD student Rachel Salzano. Today at 15:00 UK time (09:00 in Pittsburgh) Rachel is presenting a paper co-authored with her PhD supervisors entitled ‘What are public libraries for? Culture as a determinant of conceptualizations of public library services for forced migrants’. The slides are available on SlideShare, and the full text paper can be read online in the conference proceedings. Continue reading

Is the public library included? New paper on local authority services for forced migrants from Edinburgh Napier University team at #CoLIS11

CoLIS11 logo Oslo 2022Conceptions of Library and Information Science (CoLIS) 11 opens today in Oslo, Norway. Hosted by the Department of Archivistics, Library and Information Science at Oslo Metropolitan University, the conference runs until Wednesday 1st June. Continue reading

Paper acceptance at #CoLIS11 for Rachel Salzano and her supervision team

Rachel Salzano

Rachel Salzano

Centre for Social Informatics PhD student Rachel Salzano is looking forward to travelling to Oslo at the end of May to present a paper accepted for Conceptions of Library and Information Science CoLIS 2022.

Co-authored with her supervision team (myself, Dr Gemma Webster and Dr David Brazier) Rachel’s paper is concerned with the findings from an element of the empirical work that she has undertaken for her doctoral study: an analysis of documents gathered from Scottish local authorities on strategies to support the integration of newcomer populations who have entered the country as a result of forced migration. The specific focus of this piece of research is the perceived role of Scottish public libraries in such efforts. Continue reading

Call to UK public library staff (any level) to contribute to study on services for refugees and asylum seekers

Do you work with refugees and/or asylum seekers (forced migrants) as part of your role in a UK public library? Can you assist a PhD student with her study on forced migrants’ use of UK public libraries? Perhaps you have colleagues or other contacts who could help out?

Rachel Salzano of Edinburgh Napier University seeks public library staff (at any level) willing to take part in interviews about their experience of delivering public library services to forced migrants. The interviews last approximately 1 hour and are organised at the interviewee’s convenience. Please contact Rachel on the form at https://librariansanslibrary.weebly.com/contact or email r.salzano@napier.ac.uk to contribute to this important work.