Sunday, August 18, 2013

When Libraries are Evicted and Books are Thrown in a Dumpster


It is not accidental that those who display contempt for teachers show equal contempt for books, and for history. Yesterday's demolition of a "people's library" created by community residents adjacent to a Chicago public school in the dead of night by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel bears a startling resemblance to what happened to the 5,000 plus books accumulated by Occupy Wall Street when OWS was evicted, also in the dead of night, by NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg. In each instance, the collection of books lovingly collected and used by thousands of people ended up in a dumpster. In the neo-liberal city, history is an inconvenience, teachers are disposable, and a book is an inanimate object infused with no more significance than a table or a chair. I fear for the future of our children, and for the entire democratic project, if this world view should prevail. It is our responsibility, as custodians of teaching, learning and the democratic tradition, to contest it fiercely.

4 comments:

  1. Mark, can you share some sources for this? I've seen photos showing this took place during the day--still trying to find info on the books getting thrown in a dumpster.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ok--saw a news video where a mom says she saw them boxing up the books. Checked 4-5 sources and can't find anything about books getting thrown in dumpsters. Help me out!

    ReplyDelete
  3. we had BATS at two protests for something similar in Highland Park (a small city surrounded entirely by Detroit)- the charter management company, The Leona Group, entirely decimated the high school library, the only place in Highland Park where books were available for students (the city library has been closed for a while now). Somewhere between 10,000- 30,000 books were thrown away, even though other schools chartered by The Leona Group have a great need for resources. Worst of all, the library had what was called the best collection of black history books in the state-

    and people still wonder why i walked, and don't feel the need to unionize??????

    wait until the Leona Group comes for their library. google highland park books.

    https://www.youtube.com/results?q=highland+park+books&bav=on.2,or.r_qf.&bvm=bv.50768961,d.dmg,pv.xjs.s.en_US.E_1kRF_UP4s.O&biw=1138&bih=536&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=w1

    xxalainaxx

    ReplyDelete