Digital Literacy Against Digital Violence: A Handbook for Academic Library Workers
Paige Walker; Adam Jazairi; and Chelcie Juliet Rowell
Access Digital Literacy Against Digital Violence: A Handbook for Academic Library Workers.
This handbook was created as part of the National Forum on the Prevention of Cyber Sexual Abuse (NFPCSA), a grant project funded by the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) and hosted by Tufts University. The Forum sought to foster a community of academic library workers, strengthen their understanding of the socio-technical landscape of digital violence, and empower them to take action against it at college campuses throughout the United States.
As experts in digital literacy, library workers are uniquely positioned to join the vast and growing community of people engaged in preventing digital violence. We hope that digital literacy can help raise awareness of these issues and make our campuses safer. We also acknowledge that building digital literacy places the responsibility for harm reduction on survivors themselves. Digital violence is not an individual problem, and can’t be solved with individual solutions. It’s structural and cultural in nature and will persist unless there are structural and cultural changes. This is an unjust reality, and we advocate for the eventual shift of this burden from the shoulders of survivors to society at large.
We worked with experts in many disciplines, including social work, student services, survivor advocacy, law, sociology, and Title IX, to ensure that this guide is as comprehensive as possible and trauma-informed in its approach. However, some content may be activating or triggering for readers. As you read, please check in with yourself periodically, and step away if you feel overwhelmed.
Walker, P., Jazairi, A., & Rowell, C. (Eds.). (2022). Digital literacy against digital violence: A handbook for library workers. https://nfpcsa.pubpub.org/handbook
Contributors: Jennifer Holland, University of Houston Libraries, and Chelcie Juliet Rowell, Harvard University Library, co-convener of the ACRL Privacy Literacy Discussion Group and co-principal investigator of the National Forum on the Prevention of Cyber Sexual Abuse.
