Cultural Sensitivity or Censorship?

Librarian Susanne Caro writes about her encounter with cultural sensitivity and censorship in the book True Stories of Censorship Battles in American Libraries.

While working with the Museum Resources Department of New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, Susanne became involved with a project to put the historic magazine, El Palacio, online.  El Palacio dates back to 1913 and contains articles about archaeological sites in New Mexico and around the world.  The magazine also contains articles on Native American culture, art, and poetry.  The goal for digitalizing the magazine was to preserve the old brittle pages and to make the content more widely available. 

Susanne encounters several problems with this project.  The first is the detailed articles about archaeological sites.  State law protects these sites and prohibits information that could put sites at risk.  Although the magazine provides very detailed articles for locating these sites, it was published before the law come into effect.  The worry is that if the information is made widely available online, the sites will be looted.  Susanne has to consider which articles in the magazine violate the law.  The other problem is the photographs of native ceremonies and burials.  There are no laws protecting these images – just good intentions.  Susanne contacted other libraries and archives who have digital images pertaining to indigenous people.  Some of the institutions had policies which they shared with Susanne while others had no policies about what they put on the internet.  Susanne was advised to meet with tribal advisors that could help decide if materials should be digitized and which ones could be accessible to place online. 

Susanne had this to say about picking and choosing pieces of the magazine to put online:

“When images or text are redacted, the document is changed.  What does redaction do to the integrity of the material?  You are changing a historic artifact and the experience of the reader by blacking out sections.”

The big question that arises is: When does respect for cultural cross over to censorship?

In the ALA Guidelines – Librarianship and Traditional Cultural Expressions: Nurturing Understanding and Respect – there is a suggestion to create separate user policies for documents containing cultural expressions.  Putting the information online can led to misuse of information and libraries need to “ensure appropriate use.” 

This suggestion is at odds with ALA’s Freedom to Read statement:

“Freedom is no Freedom if it is accorded only to the accepted and the inoffensive.  Further democratic societies are more safe, free, and creative when the free flow of public information is not restricted by governmental prerogative or self-censorship.”

Restricting access to El Palacio is censorship.

Removing images is censorship.

Susanne raises the question: if we do this for one group, will we do it for all?  Are we willing do this for any other segment of the population, and if not, why make any exceptions?  What about Masons?  They have secrets and rites that only the initiated are supposed to know, but books that expose their secret societies stay on the shelves of libraries, as do books on Scientology that have information Scientologists object to being public.  What are the requirements for a culture or group to have this kind of special status in libraries? Why make the exception for Native American cultures?

The argument for cultural sensitivity is that Native Americans have their own governments that are recognized by the U.S and these sovereign nations have laws about cultural heritage.  NAGPRA is effective in protection artifacts but not images.  Susanne raises more questions: Should librarians restrict access to culturally sensitive materials?  Should they question patrons who request to use the materials, why do they need the information and how will it be used?  Susanne says, “At what point is it better to hide information and allow only certain people to view materials than to make that information available to the world?

The Department of Cultural Affairs and the Office of Archaeological Studies advised Susanne to stop the project or there might be legal complications including a lawsuit.  Their opinion was that certain information should not go online.  The state librarian also wanted to scrap the project to avoid problems.  At the time True Stories of Censorship Battles was published (2012) the El Palacio project was being evaluated to protect archaeological sites in accordance with the law.  Since there is no law about images and articles with information about ceremonies and burials, there will be no redactions related to issues of cultural sensitivity.

Susanne finishes by saying:

“On one hand, I love the idea of collaborating with tribal representatives to help education the public about the vibrant and varied cultures of Native Americans past and present.  I think the culture of New Mexico’s native people should be protected.  On the other hand, putting public knowledge under lock and key is not the way.  It puts us as librarians on that slippery slope toward censorship.”