'Pathways to knowledge'

Australian Library Week Oration 29 April 1998

Dr Lois 'Lowitja' O'Donoghue CBE AM

Thank you for that kind introduction. I'm very pleased and honoured to have the opportunity to speak to such a professionally distinguished group who represent key areas in the library, information and communication field.

The title of my talk today is Pathways to knowledge. So I want to talk about knowledge first.

I'm going to begin with a cliché - that knowledge is power. This idea has become a cliché because it is so often repeated. That doesn't mean it isn't true, however.

So, if knowledge is power, it's important to talk about it, to look at what we mean by it. And in particular to ask whose knowledge are we talking about and whose knowledge counts? Whose knowledge is valued, and what in what places is this valued knowledge stored?

My point here is that knowledge is not a neutral commodity. Nor is it made neutral simply because it comes out of a machine. Certain versions of the world win out. Others are ignored.

For a really simple and concrete example we need only look at the school textbooks of the 50s and 60s and even the 70s, where it was 'common knowledge' that 'Captain Cook discovered Australia.' Hopefully this version of events is now vigorously contested.

My point is that that knowledge and experience and perceptions, and ways of seeing and ways of speaking, are not equally valued. They are not equally preserved and not equally accessible. It is for this reason that libraries and the Australian Library Information Association are so vitally important.

In its mission statement ALIA asserts, as a basic right of citizenship, free access to information and information resources. It is significant that the Association also notes that communities which have access to 'timely and accurate' information have a 'competitive advantage.'

It is clearly true that we are now living in a world of the information-rich and the information-poor. The divide between the two is (and I quote Trevor Barr here) 'one of the great social justice issues of the 90s. Disadvantages are increasingly experienced by the information-poor in a world in which information wealth is related to educational opportunity, health, occupation, income and power.' There is huge disparity between information-rich and information-poor nations, but also a great disparity within the so-called 'one nation' that is Australia.

So although learning, research, discovery, and knowledge all appear as unproblematically desirable, benign and good, we cannot escape - especially in the 90s - their connection with power. This connection is perhaps more apparent than ever before.

In fact, even being able to operate in contemporary urban culture requires some knowhow about technology and how it works. And as a culture we are experiencing some interesting new developments in history such as the now-common phenomenon of children teaching their elders how to navigate the pathways to knowledge. How many of us rely on our children or grandchildren to program the video-recorder? (Come on, hands up!) How many of us have been introduced to surfing (not waves but the 'net) by our children or grandchildren?

In this period of rapid change I think it is more important than ever that people whose work is involved in areas of knowledge, ideas and the representation of culture, take the time to debate the issues involved - as the Australian Library and Information Association is obviously doing.

It is critically important that librarians - modern custodians of knowledge - take the time to think about issues of equity, access and representation, and at who and what is represented in physical collections and online.

One of the reasons that it is important to reflect on and debate these issues is for the very real purpose of having some control of where we are going. And we need some critical capacity when directions are taken that might not be in the best interests of the communities in which we work.

If we see knowledge merely as a commodity (which I'm afraid the economic rationalists encourage us to do) then what we will see is knowledge that can produce profit. We will see more examples of transnational produce profit. We will see more examples of transnational corporations defining the curriculum in schools (as we are beginning to see with McDonalds' sponsorship). We will have industry determining what is valuable knowledge, and no distinctions being made between the concepts of skills, training, information and knowledge.

We all need all sorts of information and skills - but they don't substitute for knowledge or real understanding about what is of value. There is a danger, I think, of becoming so bedazzled with the ways in which technology can work, that we can forget to question in whose interests it is working.

There are many examples - but perhaps one of the most obvious in terms of information is the increasingly global stranglehold that certain media barons have over our print media and television. The so-called free marketplace of ideas, theoretically accessible to us via the mass media, is becoming increasingly controlled by an elite few. In Australia, for example, one man - one international media magnate (and American citizen) - owns almost 70% of our national, metropolitan and suburban newspapers. And the vision represented via these media outlets is becoming one dimensional - increasingly short-sighted, if not blinkered.

Against this sort of global big picture I'm painting here, it is absolutely vital to look at the capacity (and the will) of libraries to serve the public interest - a public interest which comprises many diverse individual, local, community and sectional interests.

It seems that from the earliest times all cultures have communicated their important stories, their wisdom, their relationship to the world, and their sense of future and past in some form that could be passed on. The forms are varied: spoken stories, songs, dances, paintings, carvings and rock formations. These forms of communicating are extremely potent and can evoke powerful and imaginative responses in people of all ages. They can bring people together to participate, to listen and to look as a community. Collective meanings are developed, history is told, rules and values are illustrated, and boundaries are drawn.

In these non-written forms of representation, there is no need for demarcation between subject matter. Indeed, stories or pictures can encapsulate aspects of, for example, geography, science, art, history, religion, and so on, in ways which don't need separate boxes - and in ways which function on many different levels of complexity.

Written ways of recording serve the same sorts of purposes and, like the oral tradition, it is only through the act of sharing, that the written word adds to our store of knowledge or collective wisdom. The library then, in our times has become the site for cultural, intellectual and imaginative exchange. Libraries are important places because they house knowledge, ideas and information. Like beaches and parks they are public places which can sustain and regenerate us.

Originally libraries were repositories only of the written record, preserving and protecting their printed information in quiet spaces for research. In this sense they were highly elitist originally, because only a very small proportion of the population was literate. And those who were literate were exclusively male and predominantly the clergy.

Libraries today are still repositories, but now they provide access to information in many formats, either physically in the book and journal collections, or electronically. While collections typically also include audio, video and pictorial components, it is valid to keep posing the question: just how welcoming and accessible are libraries to the general population?

We know that use of cultural venues such as libraries, museums and galleries is strongly-correlated with socioeconomic status, education and employment.

It's always difficult and often counter-productive to make generalisations - you can never, for example, speak of Aboriginal people as if they are one group with the same experience, responses and aspirations. But having made that important qualification, I think it is true to say that libraries, like many institutions in our society, have not typically been places that Aboriginal people have been drawn to.

There are many possible factors involved here. For example whether the experience of books has been an unpleasant one. I know that for many people books that they 'had' to study or use at school, are not things that would be sought out voluntarily or remembered as pleasurable.

Other obvious factors are the relevance of what is housed in the collections, and the general atmosphere, which from my early recollections of libraries can be quite stuffy and rarefied. And there's also the general friendliness and attitude of the library staff. Commonly it has not been the experience of Aboriginal people that government or other 'bureaucratic organisations' are helpful or easy places to negotiate.

And of course there exists in the world of libraries all sorts of presuppositions about the value of reading - which may not be shared equally by all users or potential users.

So many new bridges need to be created if libraries are to be regarded as centres of knowledge for all. And there are many encouraging developments in this direction.

In particular the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander protocols for libraries, archives and information services, which were developed in 1995, are an example of the way in which moves towards better practice are being formulated and institutionalised at a national level.

The Protocols, and those libraries which are implementing them, uphold the spirit of the UN Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, particularly Article 12. This section deals with the right of indigenous peoples 'to practise and revitalise their cultural traditions and customs.' Article 16 is also relevant to library policy on indigenous peoples. It deals with their rights to have 'their cultures, traditions, histories and aspirations appropriately reflected in all forms of education and public information.' Article 29 specifically mentions cultural property, asserting the entitlement of people 'to the recognition of the full ownership, control and protection of their cultural and intellectual property.'

The protocols document is enormously significant and I congratulate those of you who have had an input into it. What's important, when thoroughly worked documents are produced, is that they don't become an end in themselves. They must be used actively, become well-thumbed, and hopefully debated vigorously amongst colleagues.

The Protocols are intended to guide libraries, archives and information services in appropriate ways to act with indigenous people in the communities which their organisations serve. They also aim to provide guidelines on the handling of materials with indigenous content.

The protocols are a guide to best practice and incorporate issues about the moral rights of indigenous peoples as owners of their knowledge. They also cover matters of content, balance and perspective in materials, appropriate representation, accessibility and use, governance of libraries, education and training, and employment of indigenous peoples.

Some of the issues they raise go to the very heart of library classifying practice, and can not be simply addressed. To give you an example of this I quote one point which highlights the scope of the challenge before you.

I quote Mick Dodson:

'We have been referred to and catalogued as 'savages' or primitive while Western industrial peoples are referred to as advanced and complex... A total paradigm shift away from Eurocentric approaches to categorisation and description is necessary.'

Other matters are more concrete and possibly should therefore be more easily addressed. One concerns employment of indigenous peoples in libraries. The employment rate of indigenous people in libraries is currently very low.

In 1996 the Australian Library and Information Association conducted a survey of 395 publicly-funded libraries across Australia, which identified only 103 Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people working in those libraries. This figure is very low when compared with the almost 24 000 people identified as having a library occupation in the 1996 Census. Of the 103, twenty-five were funded under government employment programs, and four under organisational employment strategies; seven were qualified librarians, six library technicians and two teacher-librarians.

It is interesting that as long ago as 1979 Maisie Wilson said, and I quote:

'What we have to get is Aboriginal staff in libraries, if we are going to have Aborigines in libraries.'

I don't know that Maisie would be any more encouraged by the 1998 figures.

Another significant matter raised in the Protocols is that of Cultural Copyright. In 1992 when I was the chair of ATSIC I spoke to the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations. I emphasised the need for the return of cultural property, and the protection from exploitation of our songs, our narratives, our ceremonies, our traditional knowledge.

Much of this can be achieved by having in place workable copyright and intellectual property legislation, as a safeguard for the creator against unauthorised use.

But, for libraries which hold Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural material and information, there are responsibilities which go beyond implementing the required legislation. Legislation will protect the rights of the authors, painters, photographers, recorders and publishers, but it does not necessarily protect the interests of those who are portrayed in or who belong to the knowledge and information.

I have spoken before about the need to redress the misrepresentation and misconceptions of Aboriginality in Australia's Anglocentric history, so that our part can be included in the continuous revision of Australia's history.

Libraries are, of course, the repository of this history and ALIA has included in its policy statement some ways in which libraries can ensure that a balanced perspective is provided within their resources.

As Mick Dodson says in the Protocols document:

'No person is likely to willingly go to a place which portrays or displays them in a way that is alien and degrading.'

Many libraries are also working towards better practice for Aboriginal people and their property through consultation and co-operation with elders and other community members. Access rights to secret or sacred materials are being observed. A balance is being sought in collections. Warnings about offensive content in certain material are being incorporated. Degrading labels are being removed from materials. This is not censorship. It is the sensitive management of cultural resources to respect that culture's information management traditions.

The whole shift towards electronic information technologies opens entirely new possibilities - and new questions for equitable community use. It is arguable that with electronic technologies, Aboriginal communities and individuals can have more autonomy and control over the storage, retrieval and transmission of their knowledge. Work is currently being undertaken at the Aboriginal Studies Research Institute at the University of South Australia in this regard. They are developing protocols for indigenous cultural and property rights in an interconnected, electronic information world.

Electronic information can offer opportunities of access which in the best of examples provide users with an anonymity which can conceal interpersonal inequalities. That is, provide users with control and autonomy which is freer of power imbalance. This of course pre-supposes that access to technological skills is open to all, that the hardware is available and that there is appropriate technological support.

As I'm sure you all know these are not simple issues - and the implications for equity are huge, involving as they do, issues around remote locations, gender-use patterns, and, of course, funding priorities.

I want to give you a couple of examples of projects which have taken these questions on board and which demonstrate possible future pathways.

One is the Australian Library and Information Association's successful bid in 1997 to secure funding through the Commonwealth Government's Online Public Access Initiative (OPAI). The project, Indigenous Communities Online, provides online access and training in five remote communities, Umoona and Koonibba in South Australia, Yarrabah and the Cairns region in Queensland with the assistance of the State and Cairns libraries, and Santa Teresa, Port Keats and Galiwinku in the Northern Territory with the assistance of the Northern Territory Library Service.

The project recognises the importance of giving people in the community the skills to use the technology to its potential and to meet their needs. Meeting needs has always been at the forefront. The project is for the community. Community members decide where the access is to be located and how it is used.

Those being trained come from all areas in the community. The topics they want to access online are as diverse as childcare, book-keeping, health, craft, marketing, living conditions, heritage and the experience of other indigenous peoples around the world.

Overall, there is a sense of empowerment that access to such a range of information provides. This empowerment is not just for their own purposes. Now many feel they can teach others in the community. As one trainee commented, 'I have learned how to learn, using a computer'.

Through the project, communities are setting up their own webpages, e-mail and networking with other communities. One of the first things one group did was to e-mail personal messages and play requests to the regional Aboriginal radio station for broadcast to community members in custody. This was important since there are few families in the community without a member in custody.

Online access has the potential to be a new dimension for the creation, storage and retrieval of information and knowledge in our indigenous communities. Projects such as this show that, where there is choice and control, indigenous people can be empowered by the information and knowledge provided by this electronic pathway.

There are exciting possibilities here. We need to embrace them but be ever-vigilant, in the ways I spoke of earlier, of their social and cultural impact. We need to ensure that technology does deliver the benefits, without a detrimental impact on communities. And we need to be aware of issues of cultural appropriation and to work constantly towards higher levels of indigenous self-determination and participation.

If new technologies can assist in any way in raising the health, education and housing standards of communities, and in resolving social problems, obviously we have to be open to them.

Library and information services are the main public providers of access to repositories of information in our society. The acquisition of knowledge is a pathway we all travel, in our different ways and for different reasons. Those who work in libraries have expertise and skills to guide library users through the pathways of the information maze. A fundamental principle for the practice of librarianship around the world is to meet the information needs of all users, and in so doing to assist users to become independent learners through the development of their information literacy capabilities.

The library sector needs to discover what pathways indigenous peoples walk. In this way there is the hope that information cultures can be reconciled to create knowledge on which we can act to build a just and informed society.

This is no small challenge - but as I said at the beginning, knowledge is power. It is the basis of our work. I support you and wish you well in the challenge of making libraries and information centres truly public places for all.