A bibliotecária que ensinou as crianças a amarem livros e sua herança étnica

Charlemae Hill Rollins was born October 21, 1897, in the small farming community of Yazoo City, Mississippi. She was the oldest child of Allen G. Hill, a farmer, and Birdie Tucker Hill, a teacher. The family was poor, but Rollins remembered a childhood rich in family life, the result of growing up among a large extended family. Her grandmother, a former slave, was a wonderful storyteller who shared her book collection with her grandchildren. Rollins recalled her grandmother's influence in More Books by More People; Interviews with 65 Authors of Books for Children: "She gave us all the books that belonged to her master who was the father of her children, one of whom was my father. We enjoyed the books in his library, even though most of them were medical books. But I would read anything and everything."
The Hill family moved to the Indian Territory—now Oklahoma—when Rollins was still a child. She attended a school for African Americans founded by her family, and her mother was one of the first black teachers in the territory. As Rollins grew older few educational opportunities existed for blacks nearby, so she enrolled in black secondary schools in Missouri, Mississippi, and Kansas. She graduated from a segregated boarding school in Quindoro, Kansas, in 1916.
After graduating, Rollins taught briefly in Beggs, Oklahoma, before enrolling in Howard University in Washington, D.C. After a year at Howard she returned to Oklahoma where she married Joseph Walter Rollins in 1918. The couple had a son, Joseph Walter Rollins Jr., in 1920. They moved to Chicago, where Joseph Sr. worked for the Young Men's Christian Association.

Began Career as Librarian

In 1927 Rollins combined her love of books and teaching by taking a job as a children's librarian at the Harding Square Branch of the Chicago Public Library. When the George Cleveland Hall Branch Library opened in 1923 she was named head of the children's department there. This branch was the first to be located in the city's black neighborhoods and it served a diverse population representing all socioeconomic levels.
The library system helped Rollins continue her education. She enrolled in library training at Columbia College of the University of Chicago and remained a children's department librarian at Hall Library for 36 years. Serving the community in a caring, imaginative way, she guided two generations of young patrons to discover and love books and reading. Rollins organized events to draw people into the library and was dedicated to educating patrons on the contributions of black people. Storytelling sessions were a major part of her work, as she explained to an Illinois Libraries contributor: "Storytelling is a wonderful way of breaking down barriers, or getting acquainted with new people, and drawing groups and individuals together. Hearing a wonderful story well told, can bring escape from hunger, from drab surroundings, from hate and rejection, and escape from injustices of all kinds."

Advised Publishers

Rollins believed that children's programs could only be effective if the adults in the children's lives also took an interest. Encouraging and teaching parents and teachers to become involved with children and books, she organized a reading guidance clinic for families and maintained close contact with Patent-Teacher Association groups. Rollins's library programs often centered on black history. She felt a strong need to teach children about their heritage, but she was frustrated by the lack of books available on the topic during the 1930s. She found that when children asked for her help with a school paper about a black person, there were no appropriate books in the library. "For many years books about Negro children followed a stereotyped pattern," Rollins was quoted as remarking on the University of Mississippi Library web site. "The characters portrayed were the barefoot menial, or the red-lipped clown. Rarely did the Negro character in a story where there were other children ever take part in the story as equals. Illustrators, it seemed, could not resist presenting the quaint 'pickaninny' type."
Rollins wanted her young patrons to read books that honestly portrayed African Americans in all phases of life. "Children as they are growing up need special interpretations of the lives of other peoples," she maintained, "[and] must be helped to an understanding and tolerance. They cannot develop these qualities through contacts with others, if those closest to them are prejudiced and unsympathetic with other races and groups. Tolerance and understanding can be gained through reading the right books."
Rollins made it her mission to improve the image of blacks in children's books and to teach her young patrons about their heritage. She formed a Negro history club and a series of appreciation hours in which she taught children about the contributions of blacks. She researched and collected materials for her programs and made publishers aware of the need for books about African American culture and history. "I got to be quite a nuisance for the publishers, writing them letters on top of letters for more information," she told a contributor to American Libraries.
Her interest in African American books led Rollins to complete a research paper on the topic of blacks in children's books for one of her library classes at the University of Chicago. She became recognized as an evaluator of children's literature and became a member of the Chicago Public Library's advisory committee on book selection. Rollins transformed her research paper into a mimeographed list of books relating to blacks that was used by children's librarians. This list evolved into one of the first significant publications on African American literature for children. Published in 1941 by the National Council of Teachers of English as We Build Together, A Reader's Guide to Negro Life and Literature for Elementary and High School Use, the pamphlet includes introductory text about how to write and select books about blacks and an annotated bibliography of recommended books. We Build Together raised the level of consciousness among librarians, teachers, and publishers to the need for more honest portrayals of African Americans in children's literature. The landmark publication was revised in 1948 and 1967.

Earned National Recognition

Her 1941 publication earned Rollins a national reputation as an authority on African American children's books. Publishers, becoming aware of the stereotypes they presented in their books, began seeking Rollins's and other black librarians' and teachers' advice. Many publishers and authors sent manuscripts to Rollins for evaluation, and she was asked to serve on the editorial advisory boards of World Book Encyclopedia, American Educator, and Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books. She chaired the Jane Addams Book Award committee for the Women's International League for Peace and Justice in 1964-1965 and in 1962 traveled to Oslo, Norway, to present the award to Aimee Sommerfelt, author of The Road to Agra.
Many universities and professional associations invited Rollins to teach, write, and lecture on African American books. She contributed articles to many journals, including American Childhood, Illinois Libraries and Junior Libraries. She lectured at Fisk University, Morgan State College, the University of Mississippi, Rosary College, San Francisco State College, and the University of Chicago, and taught a class in children's literature at Roosevelt University in Chicago.
Rollins also became involved in professional associations. She was active in the Illinois State Library Association, the Catholic Library Association, and the American Library Association (ALA). She worked on many ALA committees and became the association's first black president in 1957. In 1972 she was the first African American to receive an honorary lifetime membership in the ALA.
Rollins retired in August 1963 at the age of 66. She had been involved with books her entire life and had met many authors in her role as a children's librarian. In retirement she began writing books of her own, among them juvenile biographies of black men and women. Among her books are They Showed the Way, 1964; Famous American Negro Poets for Children, 1965; Famous Negro Entertainers of Stage and Screen, 1967; and Black Troubadour, Langston Hughes, 1971. Her biography on Hughes was inspired by her own friendship with Hughes, whom she had met during the 1930s at a Works Project Administration-sponsored writer's project hosted by her library.
In 1963 Rollins wrote Christmas Gif': An Anthology of Christmas Poems, Songs, and Stories Written by and about Negroes. The title, Christmas Gif', was based on a holiday tradition celebrated by her family that originated in the days of slavery. The book includes selections from Hughes, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Booker T. Washington, and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gwendolyn Brooks, who had been a patron at the George Cleveland Hall Branch Library as a child.

Received Many Awards

Rollins's role in elevating the status of African Americans in children's books earned her many awards from library, education, and humanitarian organizations. She received the American Brotherhood Award from the National Conference of Christians and Jews in 1952, the Library Letter Award from the ALA in 1953, and the Grolier Foundation Award from the ALA in 1955. She also received the Good American Award of the Chicago Committee of One Hundred in 1962, the Children's Reading Round Table award in 1963, and the New Jersey Library and Media Association's Coretta Scott King Award in 1971. In 1974 Columbia College, Chicago awarded Rollins a doctorate of humane letters, and three years later the Chicago Public Library dedicated a room in her name at the Carter G. Woodson Regional Library.
Rollins died in Chicago on February 3, 1979. She was 81 years old. In her memory, the School of Library and Information Science at North Carolina Central University presents the biennial Charlemae Hill Rollins Colloquium, while the ALA's Library Service to Children division presents the Charlemae Rollins President's Program at its annual summer conferences.
The research Rollins conducted in her lifetime included studies of Head Start, African American bibliography, and segregation. Her papers and journals are housed at the African-American Resources Program at the School of Library and Information Sciences, North Carolina Central University.

Books

Contemporary Black Biography, Volume 27, Gale, 2001.
Notable Black American Women, Gale, 1992.

Periodicals

American Libraries, September, 1973. Public Libraries, Fall 1982.

Online

"The Black Experience in Children's Literature," http://www.lib.usm.edu/~degrum/blackexperience/homepage.html (February 19, 2003). □


Charlemae Hill Rollins (1897-1979)
http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3404708294.html

O primeiro negro a fazer parte do conselho da ALA

Professional background

E. J. Josey was Professor Emeritus, Department of Library and Information Science, School of Library and Information Sciences, University of Pittsburgh. Prior to his University of Pittsburgh appointment, he had been with the New York State Education Department since 1966, in its Division of Library Development, when he was first appointed Associate in the Bureau of Academic and Research Libraries and he was promoted to Chief, Bureau of Academic and Research Libraries in 1968, and held that position until 1976 when he was appointed Chief, Bureau of Specialist Library Services, New York State Library. Prior to coming to New York State, he served as Director of two college libraries. From 1955 to 1959, he was Director of the Library of Delaware State College, Dover, Delaware, and from 1959-1966, he was Chief Librarian and Associate Professor at Savannah State College in Savannah, Georgia. He also served on the staff of Columbia University Library, Free Library of Philadelphia, the New York Public Library, and prior to his position at Delaware State College, he served as Instructor of Social Sciences and History from 1954-1955 at Savannah State College.

 Memberships

Active in the field of human rights, he was a life member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and served as President of Albany, New York Branch from 1982-86. He also served as President of the Albany Branch of the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History. Active in community affairs, he also served as a member of the Board of Directors of the Albany County Opportunity, Inc., the local anti-poverty agency for four years.
A member of the American Library Association for 48 years, at the 1964 annual conference, he authored the resolution forbidding Association officers and staff from participating in state associations that deny membership to black librarians. This action led to the integration of the library association of several Southern states, and he became the first black librarian to be accepted as a member of the Georgia Library Association. In The Black Librarian in America (1970) Josey recalled the 1964 annual conference:
"Much to my chagrin, the Mississippi Library Association was honored there for its National Library Week Activities. I exploded! I was seething with anger, for I remembered that three civil rights workers-Andrew Goodman, James Chaney, and Micheal Schwerner had been murdered and lay dead and buired somewhere in Mississippi, their bodies not yet discovered. I also remembered that the Mississipi Library Association had withdrawn from ALA rather than give membership to Negro Librarians."

He was first elected to the ALA Council, the policy making body of the Association in 1970 and served until the summer of 2000, a period of 29 years. In 1979, he was elected to a four-year term on the ALA Executive Board.

From 1980-82, he served as Chair of the Cultural Minorities Task Force of the National Commission on Libraries and Information Science. Having served on numerous ALA Committees, he chaired the ALA Committee on Pay Equity, the ALA Committee on Legislation, and the ALA International Relations
Committee several times. He served as President of ALA in 1984-85.

In the spring of 1987, he was elected to a 4-year term on the Board of Directors of the Freedom to Read Foundation and chaired the ALA International Relations Committee from 1987 to 1990. From 1990 to 1994 he served as the Chair of the ALA Legislation Committee. He returned to chair the ALA International Relations Committee for the next two years. In May and June, 1987, Professor Josey lectured in three African countries, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, and Zambia under the auspices of the United States Information Agency.

Civil Rights activities

During the early 1960s, he participated in the Civil Rights struggle in Savannah (see The Black Librarian in America, pp. 308-11). He served on the Executive Board of the Savannah Branch of the NAACP as well as the Executive Board of the Albany, NY Branch of the NAACP.

In 1964 he carried the Civil Rights struggle into the American Library Association. In spite of the 1954 United States Supreme Court decision, which encouraged desegregation of libraries and ALA chapters, the ALA was slow in implementing integration of all of its southern chapters until Josey offered his resolution at the 1964 Conference which prevented ALA officers and staff members from attending segregated state chapter meetings. The four remaining segregated chapters that denied membership to African American librarians at that time were Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Mississippi; and they integrated immediately. He is well known for his uncompromising opposition to any form of discrimination whether it is racial, gender, age or sexual orientation.

 

Awards

The recipient of many awards, the American Library Association History Round Table presented him with its Journal of Library History Award for research on Edward Christopher Williams, the first African American to graduate from library school in 1900.

Under his leadership, the Savannah State University Library received the 1962 and 1964 John Cotton Dana Award.

In 1967, he returned to Savannah State University to be honored with the Savannah State University Award.

In 1980, he received the American Library Association's most coveted award, the Joseph W. Lippincott Award. The citation of the award read in part:

"His fervent advocacy was a major factor in eradicating racial discrimination from many library facilities and services, and from a number of professional associations. As founder of the Black Caucus in ALA, and as its leader throughout the group's formative years, he gave a new strength, unity, purpose and hope to many minority members of our profession."

He has received a number of awards from the NAACP. In 1965, he received the NAACP National Office Award for Work with Youth. In 1966, he received the Georgia NAACP Conference Award. In 1983 and in 1986, he was honored bv an award from the Albany Board of the NAACP.

On May 1, 1981, he received the first annual Award for Distinguished Service in Librarianship from the School of Library and Information Science, State University of New York at Albany.

On November 10, 1982, he received the Library Association of the City University of New York Award for his outstanding contribution to American Librarianship and for his support of Libraries and Librarians of the
City University of New York.

In 1984, he received the following awards: Martin Luther King, Jr. Award for Distinguished Community Leadership, SUNY, Albany; District of Columbia Association of School Librarians Award for Contributions to Librarianship; Award from the New Jersey Black Librarians Network; African Library Award from the Kenya Library Association; Award for Contribution to International Librarianship from the Afro-Caribbean Library Association, England, and in 1985 Honorary Membership in the Virgin Islands Library Association was bestowed upon him.

In 1985, for his contribution to the Profession and his leadership as ALA President, a Capital Tribute was presented in Washington, D.C., by Congressman Major Owens and the Congressional Black Caucus Brain Trust; New York State Legislative Resolution; Ohio House of Representatives Resolution; and a U.S. Congressional Resolution.

In 1986 he received the New York Library Association Award for significant contributions to special populations in New York State.

In 1991, the American Library Association bestowed upon him its ALA Equality Award.

In 1996, the American Library Association honored him at its 50th Anniversary of the ALA Washington Office for his contribution to the Legislative Program. The Pennsylvania Library Association honored him with its Distinguished Service Award.

In 1998, Forest Press and OCLC bestowed upon him the John Ames Humphrey Award, "in recognition of significant contributions to international librarianship."

In 2002, the American Library Association bestowed upon him its highest award, Honorary Membership in the Association.

Scholarships

The Black Caucus of the American Library Association established its first independent scholarship fund in his honor. The E. J. Josey Scholarship Award is given annually to African American citizen of the United States or Canada pursuing a degree in an ALA accredited Library and Information Science program in the U.S. or Canada. Upon his retirement from the University of Pittsburgh's School of Information Science in 1995, he was named Professor Emeritus and a scholarship was named in his behalf: E. J. Josey Endowment Scholarship for Minorities. This scholarship is awarded annually to an enrolled African American graduate student in the Department of Library & Information Science who demonstrates potential for academic excellence and leadership in the profession.

Publications

The author of more than 400 articles in library, educational, and history journals, he has also authored and edited twelve books in the field of library science which include:

The Black Librarian in America, Scarecrow Press, 1970. (This was the first book published which dealt exclusively with issues related to Black librarians in the United States.)
What Black Librarians are Saying, Scarecrow Press, 1972.

New Dimension for Academic Library Service, Scarecrow Press, 1975.

A Century of Service: Librarianship in the United States and Canada, co-editor with Sidney Jackson and Elinor Herling, ALA, 1976.

Opportunities for Minorities in Librarianship,co-editor with Kenneth Peeples, Jr., Scarecrow Press, 1977.

Handbook of Black Librarianship, co-editor with Ann Allen Shockley, Fisk University Library, Libraries Unlimited, 1977.

The Information Society: Issues and Answers, Oryx Press, 1978.

Libraries in the Political Process, Oryx Press, 1980.

Ethnic Collections, with Marva L. DeLoach, Neal-Schuman Press, 1983.

Libraries, Coalitions and the Public Good, Neal-Schuman Press, 1987.

Politics and the Support of Libraries with Dr. Kenneth Shearer, November, 1990.

The Black Librarian in America Revisited, Scarecrow Press in January 1994.

Handbook of Black Librarianship. 2nd ed. E.J. Josey and Marva L. DeLoach, eds. Lanham, Md., Scarecrow Press, 2000. (See item 6)

He served as Editor of The Bookmark from 1976-86. In the fall of 1986 he relinquished the editorship of  
The Bookmark and served as its co-editor for the next five years. Currently, he is contributing editor, Afro-Americans in New York Life and History and serves on the Educational Advisory Committee of the Multicultural Review.

Honors and degrees

He holds earned degrees from Howard University, Columbia University, and the State University of New York at Albany.

In 1973, Shaw University conferred on him an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree. The University of

Wisconsin–Milwaukee conferred the Doctor of Public Services (D.P.L.) Honoris Causa on May 16, 1987, North Carolina Central University honored him with the Doctor of Humanities, Honoris Causa on September 29, 1989, and Clark Atlanta University bestowed upon him the Doctor of Letters Degree (D.Litt.) on May 22, 1995. Clarion University of Pennsylvania honored him with the Doctor of Humane Letters on December 15, 2001.

In September 1992, a festschrift, E. J. Josey: An Activist Librarian, Scarecrow Press, edited by Ismail Abdullahi, was published in his honor.

.E. J. Josey, (January 20, 1924 - July 3, 2009) was an American activist and librarian.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._J._Josey