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Introduction: This paper proposes a discussion on the relationship between critical information literacy, information mediation, and critical pedagogy regarding the social role of the librarian in the face of the unreliability of information on the network, facilitated by the, albeit uneven, use of social networks and instant messaging applications. Method: It presents a qualitative approach; the study was conducted through a literature review in the Base de Dados em Ciência da Informação (BRAPCI). Results: It presents discussions, reflections, and theoretical approaches regarding critical information literacy and information mediation, drawing inferences from the studies of Paulo Freire’s critical pedagogy along with the complex thinking of Edgar Morin. Conclusion: Interference emerges as a common point of action, highlighting the non-neutrality of information. It is hoped that this analysis can provide support to information professionals, especially librarians, for a reflective practice regarding the power structures that underpin the production and dissemination of information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article showcases an instructor-librarian collaborative model for teaching critical information literacy (CIL) skills in a higher education course by incorporating interactive workshops into a sequence of required course assignments. Using an asset-focused design, this assignment sequence allows students to first demonstrate their existing research strategies and then evaluate those strategies during workshop activities, applying the CIL principles they are learning. In this way, the approach recognizes students' existing strengths and builds upon them, while emphasizing self-reflection opportunities and an intentional research focus on diversity, equity, inclusion, and representation. Results from our one-year study are also highlighted. The suggested instructional strategies could be adapted to any course with research-related projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article showcases an instructor–librarian collaborative model for teaching critical information literacy (CIL) skills in a higher education course by incorporating interactive workshops into a sequence of required course assignments. Using an asset-focused design, this assignment sequence allows students to first demonstrate their existing research strategies and then evaluate those strategies during workshop activities, applying the CIL principles they are learning. In this way, the approach recognizes students’ existing strengths and builds upon them, while emphasizing self-reflection opportunities and an intentional research focus on diversity, equity, inclusion, and representation. Results from our one-year study are also highlighted. The suggested instructional strategies could be adapted to any course with research-related projects.

In an attempt to expand Information Literacy (IL) instruction beyond the one-shot, the Thompson Rivers University (TRU) Library established the English Library Instruction Pilot (ELIP) in 2023- 2024. Students involved in the project participated in a series of three tutorials. The outcomes of the tutorials were aligned to both their Introduction to Academic Writing (English 1100) class and the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy. In experimenting with the new model, we asked the following questions: • Did the ELIP programme help students succeed in their associated English 1100 courses? • Does more integrated instruction aid in relationship-building between the library and the TRU community? • How can we improve our instruction practices to better meet student needs? This paper discusses the formation of the programme, the results from our evaluation of it, and reflects on future directions and improvements. Through an examination of student assignments, a faculty feedback survey, and reflective journaling of librarian instructors, we conclude that the programme helped students complete the outcomes of their associated English 1100 class. It also contributed to relationship-building between the library and the university community and helped significantly improve existing teaching practices and materials in the library. The ELIP programme is unique in its departure from both the one-shot and credit course IL models, and we hope that our reflections will encourage other librarians to reflect and experiment with their instructional spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From checklists, to processes, to models, information literacy (IL) instructors have sought to better teach students how to evaluate the information they encounter, increasingly through critical information literacy (CIL) pedagogies. CIL engages high-impact pedagogical practices as students direct their learning through dialogue and problem-posing, but there are persistent barriers to implementing CIL pedagogies at scale. Drawing from motivational design can empower librarians to advance CIL and empower students to critically evaluate information. Although many evaluation pedagogies employ general motivational strategies, there is a gap in the literature exploring the application of one specific component of motivation: confidence. This conceptual and exploratory study aims to: 1) determine the connections between motivational design and IL pedagogy, specifically related to confidence-building strategies and critical approaches to evaluating information; and 2) map the integration of confidence-building design and CIL practices to provide suggestions for practical application. The researchers employ a crosswalk analysis to demonstrate how IL instructors can overcome barriers to implement CIL instructional practices through confidence-building design that illuminates students' abilities to learn and make a meaningful impact. In taking a confidence-building, critical focus to designing evaluation instruction, IL instructors reframe information evaluation as a participatory place for critical questioning, exploration, creative expression, and dialogue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rapid adoption of the open internet and social media technologies for information seeking and sharing has led to the utilization of these technologies as vehicles for the spread of computational propaganda, disinformation, and misinformation. Scholars have investigated multiple avenues to combat the cognitive failure that results in acceptance and sharing of widespread misinformation. The most promising identified thus far is a psychological concept known as inoculation theory. This method can be conceptualized as a misinformation vaccine that can increase critical evaluation of newly encountered information and thereby increase the probability that this information will not be cognitively integrated and subsequently further shares within an individual's information network. This review aims to thoroughly discuss and synthesize the literature on disinformation and how inoculation theory fits within already utilized pedagogical paradigms as a potential antidote for this pertinent issue through the lens of critical information literacy.

Review of Hicks, A., Lloyd, A., & Pilerot, O. (Eds.). (2023). Information literacy through theory. Facet Publishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both the COVID-19 pandemic and the acceleration of climate change illuminate how difficult it can be to make sense of information about wicked problems--that is, issues that are highly complex and have no simple or complete solutions (Rittel & Webber, 1973). One approach to grappling with wicked problems is to consider the information practices that different people, communities, or professions use to make sense of those issues. In this Perspectives piece, I explore possible ways to practice and teach about critical information literacy by looking to the views, experiences, and professional practices of two independent journalists who report on an urgent but still under-reported wicked problem: Long COVID. Betsy Ladyzhets and Miles W. Griffis are the co-founders of the website The Sick Times, which is dedicated to reporting on Long COVID and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Following highlights from their interviews with me about their work, I consider potential implications of these journalists' experiences for practicing and teaching critical information literacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social work education prioritizes the use of research to inform practice. As university students, prospective social workers have a wealth of research available to them as well as librarians to help them find, evaluate, and use that information. However, access to much of this research ends once the student graduates--at a time when it is most needed to inform their professional practice. To address this challenge, a librarian and a social work faculty member worked with one class of students in their final semester of a bachelor's degree in social work program to promote awareness of information privilege and barriers to access, to expand their understanding of authority to include marginalized voices, and to utilize an open pedagogy assignment as a means of proactively addressing these challenges. This article describes what was learned from this effort, including the results of surveys conducted with students before and after instruction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Library guides can help librarians provide information to their patrons regarding their library resources, services, and tools. Despite their perceived usefulness, there is little discussion in designing library guides pedagogically by following a set of assessment standards for a quality-checked review.

Review of Hicks, A., Lloyd, A., & Pilerot, O. (Eds.). (2023). Information literacy through theory. Facet Publishing.

Objective: User surveys show that children are consuming and producing content in digital informational environments that sometimes disregard and other times exploit their vulnerabilities or needs. These are environments where a new type of economic system operates, which seeks to modulate people's behavior by monetizing data through continued surveillance. In this sense, the objective of this paper is to present grounds and proposals about why and how childhoods need to be acknowledged by Information Science. Methods: This article uses theoretical research based on literature as a method. Here, Benjamin's critique of metaphysical and instrumental approaches is taken as a starting point, and the child is seen as a social being under construction, with its own languages, cultures and knowledge. The issue is approached based on the view of the child as a subject who, since its early years, is determinant and historically determined. Childhood is seen as an important part of a historical moment. Results: As a result of our theoretical analysis, we highlight possibilities of using critical information theory to compose diagnoses and propose the path of critical information literacy that, hand in hand with critical theory and critical pedagogy, aims to provide children with a critical awareness in favor of their autonomy as an individual. Conclusions: this study concludes that Information Science has important conceptual bases and sufficient analysis tools to support the development of emancipatory practices for contemporary childhoods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This think-piece critically examines (critical) information literacy ((C)IL) and its teleological essence. Despite substantial scholarly inquiry and progress, IL remains invisible and undervalued beyond academia. IL silos and CIL's embeddedness within critical pedagogy and its focus on epistemological issues hinder its theoretical development, reduce it to an academic abstraction and undermine its salience and emancipatory goals. A multidisciplinary/multidomain approach is needed, leveraging insights from critical (social) theories and engaging with the ontological, to facilitate a novel understanding of IL and transform it into real-life action literacy for positive social change. The paper concludes by interrogating assumptions about (C)IL's benefits, highlighting potential inadvertent disempowering effects, and issues a call to consider it a dynamic concept that evolves by accounting for sociopolitical realities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This think piece examines the recent literature surrounding critical information literacy, the criticisms within this that the theory has not centered anti-racism within its scholarship, and the challenges toward its implementation. It concludes that more time and space should be given to IL practitioners to explore CIL, and how we should foreground Critical Race Theory and openly acknowledge white supremacy within our praxis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

"Information Literacy is empire," so goes this piece that reflects on the past and present to consider a future of IL as a learning paradigm and pedagogical framework. In sketching out the temporo-spatial and socio-cultural dimensions and consequences of IL, we critically interrogate its normative and disciplinary aspects while positioning and examining it as a product and project of empire. Following from such a premise, we detour through an exploratory meandering of alternative lenses and paths for IL that engage with and support the information worlds and knowledge systems of marginalised communities that have been subjected to epistemological violence through various interlocking logics of dispossession, domination, commodification, and control. This piece, which is really an invitation that is also a story--a groove, moving off vibrations of theories and concepts from critical library and information studies, decolonial imaginaries, fugitivity, and abolitionist modalities gestures towards a decolonial and liberatory vision of IL that is plural, expansive, speculative, collective, improvisational, and oriented towards the liberation and freedom of all beings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is important to align what we teach with how we teach information literacy (IL), otherwise we may inadvertently engage with what Hipple et al. (2021) identify as the pedagogy of hypocrisy through neoliberal pressure in higher education. This occurs when there is a misalignment between the values and principles behind what we teach and the pedagogical approaches we take when teaching. For example, when teaching IL concepts that intend to engage with social justice themes around access privilege and information, the pedagogy of hypocrisy can occur when we simply demonstrate how to access library resources on the library's website, without engaging in critical conversations about systems that contribute to inequities in access within society. To counter this, Hipple et al. (2021) suggest that those who teach must critically reflect on who they teach for, examine how they use and activate (or co-opt) social justice language, and name dominant and oppressive structures. This paper builds on Hipple's argument to suggest ways of recognising the pedagogy of hypocrisy within IL practices, and argues that this recognition is key to countering hegemonic ideologies within LIS teaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Librarians have long been at the forefront of information literacy (IL), helping to develop and codify definitions and standards and advocating for its importance across situations and domains. The explosion of attention to mis- and disinformation in recent years has highlighted the need for these skills and competencies. At the same time, critics have raised and lamented the focus on processes and tasks over critical thinking and questioned the efficacy of IL instructional programs. The current landscape of IL seems to be defined by a continuous evolution of the concept, along with calls for more interdisciplinary research and attention to the psychological and neuroscience aspects of information evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study demonstrates that a library instruction observation instrument can effectively foster critical self-reflection among academic library faculty and staff on their teaching practices. The paper outlines the instrument's design, which gathers low inference observations on instructors' use of questioning as a pedagogical strategy based on recommendations from the LIS and education literature. To test and refine the instrument's design, the instructors' utilised the instrument to collect data from classes taught by five participating instructors, who, during postobservation interviews, engaged in thoughtful reflections on their class planning, student participation, and teaching philosophy. They also provided valuable critiques of the usefulness of the instrument. Through analysing the observee reflections and the data from the observation instrument, this study aims to provide academic libraries with a method to incorporate an observation instrument in a peer observation program. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although critical information literacy, critical pedagogy, and online library instruction are commonly discussed in the library and information science literature, they are rarely discussed together. This qualitative interview study with academic librarians conducted in 2022 identifies opportunities and challenges of teaching critical information literacy online. Findings suggest that critical information literacy and critical pedagogy can be integrated into online library instruction through online workshops, digital learning objects, and online credit-bearing courses. However, librarians face challenges implementing critical pedagogy online related to the lack of dialogue and co-creation of knowledge between students and instructors, limitations of the one-shot model of library instruction, which is often replicated online, limited engagement during asynchronous learning, and limitations of educational technology. Additional research is needed to establish frameworks and best practices for teaching critical information literacy and implementing critical pedagogy in online library instruction.

This piece introduces the Des Moines University Library’s Research and Scholarly Communication Peer Associate Program, focusing on the curriculum of a five-day summer institute developed for graduate medical and health sciences students and rooted in a critical information literacy framework. The authors outline the institute’s philosophy and approach and provide readers with key content areas, materials, activities, and homework prompts. Initial program assessment is discussed, and the authors share their thoughts on how the program might continue to evolve to meet the changing needs of students. The article concludes with reflections from two peer associates who participated in the program during the 2022–2023 academic year.

Libraries have long been involved in conversations around book banning and censorship. The American Library Association noted that librarians and information workers in 2022 witnessed the most documented attempts at banning books ever recorded. This is in lockstep with contemporary examples of legislative efforts to censor, ban, and by extension criminalize information. The criminalization of information is one that has a direct impact on library users as well as academic freedom. In an effort to best support scholars at all levels in the University, academic teaching librarians will need to develop strategies to approach the information classroom. Understanding that book bans and censorship are a form of criminalization allows us to be in conversation with scholarship that focus on how to combat criminalization such as abolitionist pedagogy. This article introduces core concepts of abolitionist pedagogy as a means to create new educational justice pathways and to interrupt information criminalization.

This piece introduces the Des Moines University Library's Research and Scholarly Communication Peer Associate Program, focusing on the curriculum of a five-day summer institute developed for graduate medical and health sciences students and rooted in a critical information literacy framework. The authors outline the institute's philosophy and approach and provide readers with key content areas, materials, activities, and homework prompts. Initial program assessment is discussed, and the authors share their thoughts on how the program might continue to evolve to meet the changing needs of students. The article concludes with reflections from two peer associates who participated in the program during the 2022-2023 academic year. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although critical information literacy, critical pedagogy, and online library instruction are commonly discussed in the library and information science literature, they are rarely discussed together. This qualitative interview study with academic librarians conducted in 2022 identifies opportunities and challenges of teaching critical information literacy online. Findings suggest that critical information literacy and critical pedagogy can be integrated into online library instruction through online workshops, digital learning objects, and online credit-bearing courses. However, librarians face challenges implementing critical pedagogy online related to the lack of dialogue and co-creation of knowledge between students and instructors, limitations of the one-shot model of library instruction, which is often replicated online, limited engagement during asynchronous learning, and limitations of educational technology. Additional research is needed to establish frameworks and best practices for teaching critical information literacy and implementing critical pedagogy in online library instruction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the authors explore whether academic libraries are truly capable of implementing a critical information literacy (CIL) praxis and if there are inherent threats to critical librarianship when incorporating CIL into the curriculum. The survey instrument in this study gathered data from 92 academic library instructors based within the United States. The study identified that 41% of question respondents had received negative comments or criticisms about including CIL in their library curriculum through various formats: online modules, one-shot instruction, courseembedded units, and credit-bearing courses. In addition, 29% of question respondents felt that pushback from academic teaching staff, other librarians/administration, and students threatened the integrity of CIL. This research helps to illustrate the fragility of CIL and how librarians have faced pushback when critical content is incorporated into the information literacy (IL) curriculum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The "critical" element present in many critical information literacy (CIL) studies shows a commitment to the practical challenge of the power structures that shape current information regimes. In this article, we argue that it is necessary to analyse how such power structures, organised under a capitalist social order with neoliberal contours, benefit from disinformation, scientific denialism and class, race and gender oppression. In addition to discussing how philosophical notions of language and postmodern relativism appear in the present time, our main theoretical objective is to highlight some thoughts of Hegel, Marx and Bloch on the notions of dialectics, praxis and concrete utopia, aiming to contribute to strengthen the critical element that names and distinguishes CIL as a field of inquiry in library and information studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 21st century has been riven by information challenges, from mis/disinformation campaigns, fake news, and propaganda to online conspiracy theories. At a time when more people are literate than perhaps at any other time in history, we still see the rise and viral global spread of unhinged conspiracy theories across the web. The existence of such crowd-sourced conspiracy theories presents unique challenges for scholars and teachers of information literacy (IL), who face intractable challenges in inculcating healthy information practices. This is especially visible when we compare current IL frameworks with principles espoused within these conspiratorial movements. The online conspiracy theory QAnon demonstrates a particularly thorny problem for IL efforts because QAnon operates according to many of the same principles espoused in literacy frameworks. Since its inception in 2017, QAnon has become one of the most complex online conspiracy theories precisely because it relies on a complex set of informational practices enacted by thousands of followers known as anons. In this article, I argue that internet conspiracies such as QAnon weaponise IL through incitement to "do your own research". I apply a qualitative approach to compare established principles advocated by the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) to social media posts by Q and his anons to demonstrate the striking similarity in orientation toward questions of authority, context, literacy and research. In my analysis, we need new models for IL to combat conspiracism through a better understanding of the political contours of information ecosystems precisely because these similarities preclude effective engagement, and I conclude by gesturing toward future interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study is to contribute to a pragmatic understanding of critical information literacy (CIL) by positioning it as a context-specific interpersonal practice. Using phenomenography to explore how information work is experienced by social workers in social and health care settings, this paper provides an example of critical information practice that can be used to operationalise and activate CIL as a theory and inform approaches to critical pedagogy. CIL as a concept is generally theorised, practiced, and taught in academic contexts, and relatively few examples of how theory can be defined and put into practice outside a classroom setting are available. This study builds on our understanding of CIL by exploring professional information practice and suggests a model for teaching to engage learners in connecting information to action in social systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we connect critical librarianship and its practices of information literacy (IL) with working-class experiences of higher education (HE). Although the research literature and professional body of knowledge of critical information literacy (CIL), is one of the most theoretically-developed areas of wider critical librarianship (Critlib) movement, working-class knowledge and experiences remain underrepresented. One reason for this is that the values, behaviour and assumptions of library and HE workers are shaped by a HE system which inculcates middle-class values and cultural capitals within students, and stigmatises working-class students as lacking or in deficit. Hegemonic, or noncritical, IL proselytises middle-class values and assumptions about academic practices and skills development including the notion of an ideal student with behaviour and markers of identity which reflect those most privileged by wider society. In contrast CIL, framed as the socially-just practice of IL is theoretically well-placed to support working-class library workers in destabilising this alongside middle-class accomplices. Employing Yosso's (2005) concept of community and cultural wealth (CCW), we analyse how library workers can recognise working-class cultural wealth within the context of CIL and wider working practices. As such narrative accounts are lacking in the literature, we utilise collaborative autoethnography (CAE) (Chang et al., 2013) to consider and interpret our own experiences of libraries when we were university students ourselves, and more recently as HE workers of working-class heritage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the author explores the prospect of, and the rationale for, the critical workplace information literacy (CWIL) construct, by situating it at the junction of critical information literacy (CIL) and workplace information literacy (WIL), the two hitherto discrete frameworks and subdomains of information literacy (IL). This preliminary attempt at the conceptualisation of a new construct was guided by the question of what role CIL can play in empowering workers to attain decent work. The author frames the conceptualisation around the 'decent work' (DW) concept, as a normative goal of the critical workplace information literacy construct, and discusses the rationale for it in the framework of the discussion on the decent work deficits in the contemporary work and information environment. Freire's critical hermeneutics and dialectics of voice and empowerment are drawn upon. The paper argues positively for the role of CIL in attaining decent work and for the need for a new construct that would help fill the knowledge and discursive gap in IL and its subdomains and overcome the current silos in the IL community. The author concludes that developing a concept requires a broad deliberative process informed by both theoretical and empirical research, and gives suggestions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While significant progress has been made in broadening information literacy's (IL's) scope, its conception of the user and their relationship to information remains painfully limited. This is particularly evident when the affective or emotional factors of information seeking behaviour are considered. Thus far, IL's models and discourses have failed to acknowledge emotion's fundamentally disruptive nature and have either ignored, repressed, or misrepresented users' emotions. This has resulted in a deeply limited and inaccurate conception of the user's information needs, and this has a particularly harmful impact on marginalised users and users engaging with affectively fraught information. This article seeks to address this oversight, initially by outlining the origins of IL's repression of emotion and then examining the consequences of this repression in the standardised IL models; specifically in Carol C. Kuhlthau's Information Search Process and the ACRL's Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education. Subsequently, this essay will examine several critical models of librarianship and IL--including Holocaust librarianship and Indigenous conceptions of relationality--in order to illuminate models of IL that adopt a relational perspective that enables an engagement with the affective elements of the user's information needs. Finally, this essay will suggest that these relational perspectives facilitate the adoption of an ethics of care that helps address the insufficiencies inherent to our current conceptions of IL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Brief: Conflicting narratives about the COVID-19 pandemic, including dominant ones that minimize the continued harms of COVID, illustrate the complexities and the importance of information literacy. More specifically, these narratives point to the value of critical information literacy, which asks us to interrogate the ways that power and social structure influence what information is created and circulated and how we interact with and respond to it as individuals and collectives.

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Cilj rada je prikazati ulogu pismenosti iz privatnosti kao relativno novog koncepta u prevladavanju digitalnog jaza, povezati prevladavanje digitalnog jaza s ulogom knjižnica u postizanju više razine kritičke informacijske pismenosti, te smjestiti digitalnu uključenost i pismenost iz privatnosti u širi teorijski okvir. U tu svrhu u radu se istražuju ishodišni pojmovi društvene isključenosti i društvene uključenosti, digitalne podjele i digitalne uključenosti. Zatim, razmatra se uloga kritičke informacijske pismenosti u informacijskom društvu i tzv. “društvu platformi” te se naznačuje uloga knjižnica u opismenjavanju iz područja privatnosti s ciljem smanjenja digitalnog jaza i povećanja digitalne uključenosti. Digitalni jaz jedna je od najvećih prepreka društvu znanja, a isključenost iz informacijskog društva predstavlja problem svjetskih razmjera. U radu se objasnilo kako su knjižnice prikladna mjesta za borbu protiv društvene izoliranosti te imaju važnu ulogu u jačanju društvene kohezije. Također se prikazalo kako su ljudi s nižim razinama obrazovanja, kao i oni s nižim primanjima, više izloženi riziku digitalne isključenosti, a pomoć u izlazu iz takvog problema može se naći u opismenjavanju iz područja privatnosti. = The aim of this paper is to present the role of privacy literacy as a relatively new concept in bridging the digital divide, to link the bridging of the digital divide with the role of libraries in achieving a higher level of critical information literacy, and to place digital inclusion and privacy literacy in a broader theoretical framework. For this purpose, the paper researches the basic concepts of social exclusion and social inclusion, digital divide and digital inclusion. Furthermore, the role of critical information literacy in the information society and the so-called platform society is taken into consideration; and the role of libraries in privacy literacy is indicated, with the aim of reducing the digital divide and increasing digital inclusion. The digital divide is one of the biggest obstacles to the knowledge society, and exclusion from the information society is a global problem. The paper explains that libraries are suitable places to combat social isolation and that they play an important role in strengthening social cohesion. It has also been shown that people with lower levels of education, as well as those with lower incomes, are more at risk of digital exclusion, while help in getting out of such a problem can be found in privacy literacy.

Objective. The aim of the research was to examine the activist and emancipatory potential of information literacy in the context of workers' rights, to examine patterns, levels and diff erences in self-assessed level of information about workers' rights and information behaviour depending on trade union membership, and the readiness to fight actively for the protection and improvement of workers' rights. Approach/methodology/design. The research, conceived at the intersection of critical information literacy and workplace information literacy, was carried out using quantitative methodology and survey method, on a nationally representative sample of employed persons in the Republic of Croatia with N= 500 respondents. An online questionnaire consisting of 50 primarily closed questions was used as a research instrument. Results. The workers who better self-assess their being informed of labor rights more frequently state their workers' rights have not been violated, and they are more willing to struggle for their protection and improvement. Trade union membership has been proven to be a significant predictor of a better self-assessment of being informed about workers' rights. The non-members better self-assess their information competencies. All workers equally independently seek and receive information; the most frequent sources of seeking and cross-checking information are formal and informal internet sources. The workers actively seek information on their workers' rights when they suspect their rights have been violated. The main problems in being informed are frequent changes of laws and regulations, a perception of not receiving complete and true information, and a perception of the conscious withholding of information. These problems are more frequently perceived by non-union members. Research limitations. The method of survey and the instrument of online questionnaire excluded the computer illiterate respondents and those with no Internet access, which affected achieving the nationally representative sample. The self-assessment scales are an unreliable indicator of the respondents' objective level of being informed. Practical implications: The findings can be indicative for conceptualizing public policy measures including information literacy instruction programmes aimed at improving the information literacy of workers and their workers' rights and redefining the roles of labour market actors. Originality/ value. There are no known research studies of information literacy in relation to workers' rights in literature; therefore, this research contributes to building knowledge in the context of the topic and indicates new research avenues for information literacy and theoretical frameworks of critical information literacy and workplace information literacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inspired by a workshop on incorporating improvisational techniques into classroom pedagogy, the in-class game Research Roulette was conceived as a way to incorporate improv and physical movement, with the specific goal of bringing a playful element into information literacy sessions. What shifts when the stated goal in a library workshop is to have fun and explore, instead of the prescriptive set of instructions of a more traditional bibliographic instruction? What happens when we move on from games and invite actual play? For students whose primary goal in a classroom or educational setting is to complete the work and do well, incorporating a playful element can be destabilizing. This article will explore the ways in which play, critical pedagogy, and information literacy intersect in the library classroom environment.

In the past seven years, student-led decolonisation movements have taken root in UK universities. Decolonising the university is an intellectual project, asking critical questions about the content of curricula, disciplinary canons and pedagogical approaches. It is simultaneously a material one, challenging the colonial legacies that manifest in institutional spaces, cultures and financial decisions, students' experience and staff labour conditions (Cotton, 2018, p. 24). Academic libraries have recognised their role in addressing how 'coloniality survives colonialism' (Maldonado-Torres, 2007, p. 243), in particular through the diversification of collections and resources. However, libraries have neglected to interrogate their educational potential for decolonisation, specifically in exercising information literacy (IL) teaching and approaches. This qualitative research examines IL through a decolonial lens with an eye to both its colonial attributes and its potential for decolonising the curriculum. Interviews with five academic researchers are used to explore the potential for critical information literacy (CIL) in decolonial work and ask what IL might look like from a decolonial perspective. The findings of the interviews are structured according to Icaza and Vázquez's framework of three core processes for decolonising the university; they reveal that CIL might usefully facilitate positionality, practice relationality and consider transitionality. In turn, these findings lead to a set of recommendations for unsettling IL and generating the potential for decolonisation. The relationship between CIL and decolonising the curriculum is as yet unexplored and academics' engagement with and opinions on CIL have rarely been examined. This research therefore offers some novel contributions for IL practitioners and researchers in relation to both teaching/learning and research. It also contributes some points of departure for a more a powerful and holistic decolonial pedagogy in the university. A more fitting approach than traditional IL, critical information literacy can become a key part of scaffolding a decolonising approach to learners' navigation of information and processes of knowing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper synthesizes theory and research on confirmation bias (CB), curiosity, and news/information literacy education with the goal of understanding how helping students critique their tendency to engage in CB spurs curiosity and critical consciousness about learning. Curiosity about the self is spurred when people realize their CB tendencies. Curiosity about the larger social world is spurred when students learn how CB affects the way they look at the world. A flipped classroom approach reflects the work of Paulo Freire, who argued critical education should be experiential with faculty playing a facilitating, rather than an “expert” role. Cet article présente une synthèse de la théorie et de la recherche sur les préjugés de confirmation, la curiosité et la littératie des nouvelles/des informations avec pour objectif la compréhension de la manière dont on peut aider les étudiants à critiquer leurs tendances à participer pour stimuler la curiosité concernant les préjugés de confirmation et la conscience critique relativement à l’apprentissage. La curiosité à propos de soi est stimulée quand les gens se rendent compte de leurs tendances à avoir des préjugés de confirmation. La curiosité à propos du monde social plus vaste est stimulée lorsque les étudiants apprennent comment les effets des préjugés de confirmation affectent la manière dont ils voient le monde. Une approche basée sur la salle de classe interactive reflète le travail de Paulo Freire, qui estime que l’éducation critique devrait être basée sur une expérience et où les professeurs tiennent un rôle d’animateurs et non pas d’«experts ».

This paper starts from the need to face the social production of ignorance in the contemporary environment of hyperinformation favored by the infotelecommunications complex, which undermines the emergence of consciences and collective emancipatory actions. Based on Marx's famous metaphor about the need to pull out the imaginary flowers from the shackles, which poetically synthesizes the dialectical relationship between base and superstructure, we highlight the decisive role of the struggle for the capture of taste, understood as an expression and measure of the use value of goods, material and symbolic, and at the same time as a sensitive substrate of ideologies, in the current context of the advance of the extreme right around the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We are living in a reality in which the practices of access and use of digital information are saturated with disinformation, fake news, and hate speech that are met with no serious repercussions at either the political or the social level. Critical information literacy, as a movement of information activism with theoretical and practical components, is shown to be an opportunity to contribute to the construction of an informed and ethical society. We present an overview of critical information literacy from its origins, focusing on the educational field and professional practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Library guides can help librarians provide information to their patrons regarding their library resources, services, and tools. Despite their perceived usefulness, there is little discussion in designing library guides pedagogically by following a set of assessment standards for a quality-checked review. Instructional designers regularly use vetted assessment standards and a peer review process for building high-quality courses, yet librarians typically do not when designing library guides. This article explores using a set of standards remixed from SUNY's Online Course Quality Review Rubric or OSCQR and a peer review process. The authors used a case study approach to test the effectiveness of building library guides with the proposed standards by tasking college students to assess two Fake News guides (one revised to meet the proposed standards). Results indicated most students preferred the revised library guide to the original guide for personal use. The majority valued the revised guide for integrating into a learning management system and perceived it to be more beneficial for professors to teach from. Future studies should replicate this study and include additional perspectives from faculty and how they perceive the pedagogical values of a library guide designed following the proposed rubric. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes to discuss the problem of Fake News, its root problem disinformation and the path to resist it, critical information literacy. It initially distinguishes the concepts of fake news and disinformation through the views of authors as Allcott & Gentzkow (2017), Chomsky (2014), Serrano (2010) and Volkoff (1999). Our perspective considers that none of these phenomena are new or recent, and we do not consider the “combat” of fake news to be a simple task, considering that it involves issues related to the limits of freedom of speech and media censorship. Fake News are understood as intentionally and verifiably false articles created to manipulate people and disinformation as a bigger ensemble of techniques to manipulate public opinion for political gain with perverted (but not only false) information. One way to deal with these matters goes through a more complex process: the development of critical information literacy in the society as a whole. This concept is studied from the work of Downey (2016), Elmborg (2012), Freire (1967;1970) and others. Freire’s critical pedagogy helps the self-construction of subjects aware of their position and their social role, and it is a basic key for the formation of autonomous, critical and responsible individuals. Based on that, critical information literacy is a state of vigilance towards information that enables people to understand that information is socially constructed and to use it to produce new information in a creative and contextualized way. It concludes that critical information literacy is a consistent tool of resistance to Fake News as it allows people not only survive the informational flood but mainly to build a more ethical society in the use of information.

Critical librarianship, which critiques the role of libraries and information professionals in maintaining systems of oppression, has been growing in popularity in the profession, and instructors in Library and Information Science (LIS) have begun to address critical librarianship in their coursework. While critical pedagogy and critical librarianship have influenced approaches to LIS education, the intersection of these two has not been as thoroughly addressed. Additionally, the literature on critical information literacy focuses largely on library instruction. This case study explores a critical pedagogy approach in a critical librarianship class that prepares students for critical information literacy instruction. The instructor implemented student-led presentations and discussions, self-grading, and collaboratively setting course expectations. Student responses were overwhelmingly positive, and student performance in the course indicated the approach and content of the course were effective.

Labeling information is a precarious and risky enterprise. Catalogers have the task of fitting unique concepts within established and rigid language frameworks while also minimizing personal bias. The way information literacy librarians interact with labeled information also influences how users interact with information. Labeling moves beyond the role of categorizing, it also contributes to meaning making and knowledge building. Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations serves as a philosophical footing to illustrate how the labeling of things, in this case information, shapes the way we give things meaning. Critical librarianship and philosophy of information theory add to the discussion by considering how personal perspective, power, and bias to manipulate the game of naming information that takes place in the information literacy classroom. This paper is an invitation for librarians to reflect upon the relationship between labeling and how all users of information engage with labels and subsequently create meaning and knowledge.