ACONDA and ANACONDA: Social Change, Social Responsibility, and Librarianship

摘要

In the context of the declining legitimacy of the war in Vietnam andwidespread challenges to the authority of established institutions andcultural norms, the American Library Association (ALA) was thetarget of criticism by a diverse coalition of librarians who asserted twobroad demands; first, that the ALA expand the scope of its activitiesto include consideration of social and political issues that had not,to that point, been regarded as ???library??? issues by the establishedleadership of the ALA; second, that the ALA democratize its structureof decision making. This challenge led to the creation of theSocial Responsibilities Round Table (SRRT), which is still active as acomponent of the ALA. It also prompted the formation of two committeesin response to the above demands: the Activities Committeeon New Directions (ACONDA) and the Ad Hoc Activities Committeeon New Directions (ANACONDA). A central concept at play in thepolitics of these events is the notion of ???social responsibility??? and itsmeaning in time of war and social change. This article focuses onthe discourse of the challengers to the ALA and the ALA???s responsethrough the work of ACONDA and ANACONDA to examine thecontesting and contested meanings of the ???social responsibility??? oflibraries, librarianship, and the ALA. These events and this discursivestruggle established an explicit professional concern for and continuingconflict over the meaning and role of libraries and librarianshipin the creation of culture that before these events had been merelyimplicit in professional discourse.