Move Over, Melvil! Momentum Grows to Eliminate Bias and Racism in the 145-year-old Dewey Decimal System

Name: Kim, Jessica

Topic: Educational Theory and Practice

Citation: Joseph, C. (2021, August 18). Move over, Melvil! Momentum grows to eliminate bias and racism in the 145-year-old Dewey Decimal System. School Library Journal. Retrieved September 11, 2021, from http://www.slj.com https://www.slj.com/?detailStory=move-over-melvil-momentum-grows-to-eliminate-bias-and-racism-in-the-145-year-old-dewey-decimal-system

Summary: There are a growing number of school librarians who have noticed the bias built into the Dewey Decimal System and are taking various measures to try to make functional changes to the classification system within their own libraries. For example, according to the traditional Dewey classification, Black history is shelved separately from American history, anything considered “women’s work” is shelved separately from jobs, and the only holidays shelved in the holidays section are Christian holidays, with the holidays of other religions shelved under mythology and religion. School librarians who have noticed this bias, and noticed the ways that Melvil Dewey’s beliefs of 145 years ago are keeping their students of today from finding information they are looking for, are making changes to their own classification systems in an effort to undo this bias and make their library more accessible for their students.

Evaluation: This situation is such a great example of the ways that white supremacy is built into the basic structures of our lives and we don’t even realize it. Just because something has always been done, or everyone else is doing it, doesn’t mean that it continues to serve us and doesn’t need to be changed or updated. And we certainly don’t need to continue using the opinions of someone who has a known history of racism, antisemitism, and misogyny to guide our modern library classification. It would be nice if, as some of the article’s comments suggest, a group of expert librarians could convene to update Dewey based on more equitable ideas. As school librarians, we might not have the ability to dismantle white supremacy, misogyny, and other biases from the world at large, but, until broad changes are made to Dewey, we do have the power to make those changes on our own, within in the walls of our own libraries.