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Cruising the Library: Perversities in the Organization of Knowledge
Cruising the Library offers a highly innovative analysis of the history of sexuality and categories of sexual perversion through a critical examination of the Library of Congress and its cataloging practices. Taking the publication of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick's Epistemologies of the Closet as emblematic of the Library's inability to account for sexual difference, Melissa Adler embarks upon a detailed critique of how cataloging systems have delimited and proscribed expressions of gender, sexuality, ethnicity, and race in a manner that mirrors psychiatric and sociological attempts to pathologize non-normative sexual practices and civil subjects.
Taking up a parallel analysis, Adler utilizes Roderick A. Ferguson's Aberrations in Black as another example of how the Library of Congress fails to account for, and thereby "buries," difference. She examines the physical space of the Library as one that encourages forms of governmentality as theorized by Michel Foucault while also allowing for its utopian possibilities. Finally, she offers a brief but highly illuminating history of the Delta Collection. Likely established before the turn of the twentieth century and active until its gradual dissolution in the 1960s, the Delta Collection was a secret archive within the Library of Congress that housed materials confiscated by the United States Post Office and other federal agencies. These were materials deemed too obscene for public dissemination or general access. Adler reveals how the Delta Collection was used to regulate difference and squelch dissent in the McCarthy era while also linking it to evolving understandings of so-called perversion in the scientific study of sexual difference.
Sophisticated, engrossing, and highly readable, Cruising the Library provides us with a critical understanding of library science, an alternative view of discourses around the history of sexuality, and an analysis of the relationship between governmentality and the cataloging of research and information--as well as categories of difference--in American culture.
Taking up a parallel analysis, Adler utilizes Roderick A. Ferguson's Aberrations in Black as another example of how the Library of Congress fails to account for, and thereby "buries," difference. She examines the physical space of the Library as one that encourages forms of governmentality as theorized by Michel Foucault while also allowing for its utopian possibilities. Finally, she offers a brief but highly illuminating history of the Delta Collection. Likely established before the turn of the twentieth century and active until its gradual dissolution in the 1960s, the Delta Collection was a secret archive within the Library of Congress that housed materials confiscated by the United States Post Office and other federal agencies. These were materials deemed too obscene for public dissemination or general access. Adler reveals how the Delta Collection was used to regulate difference and squelch dissent in the McCarthy era while also linking it to evolving understandings of so-called perversion in the scientific study of sexual difference.
Sophisticated, engrossing, and highly readable, Cruising the Library provides us with a critical understanding of library science, an alternative view of discourses around the history of sexuality, and an analysis of the relationship between governmentality and the cataloging of research and information--as well as categories of difference--in American culture.
223 pages, Hardcover
First published April 3, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
May 9, 2018
let’s go down to the library and i’ll show you what i can do.
November 12, 2020
There were many things about this book that I really enjoyed, but I can't stop thinking about how irresponsible it is to compare libraries to prisons, as if libraries are prisons. The panoptic model of surveillance certainly exists throughout the history of the information professions, but jeez, just because libraries enforce norms regarding patron behavior does not a prison make. I often caught myself getting frustrated with this book in its later, more theoretical half, thinking its not that deep. As a public librarian, thinking about the finer points of classification and its implications on browsing and the imagined bodies of literature an item may or may not belong to or be collocated with, is a luxury. Half the time, I'm answering "where are the self help books about relationships," religion, parenting, school testing, etc. Even attempting to explain the inherant racism of the Dewey Decimal System and the fact that our pervert boy Melville got himself yeeted #MeToo-style from the ALA IN LIKE THE NINETEEN TEENS is impossible because the patron is trying to wrangle their kids home after a long day of work. I think academic writing is super funny because they get to say shit like "library users are masochists," and mean some super deep shit, but I'm here thinking "library users are masochists" because they have to put up with a really difficult system from their public library and they often don't have other choices, so they do, they get on the phone and ask why their account is blocked, why their holds are late, why their shit is damaged, and librarians are masochists too, but we all knew that. We sit and we take it.
That Nicholson Baker quote keeps fucking me up: "The library has gone astray partly because we trusted the librarians so completely." In part because yes, in part because it renders invisible the administrators who make so many decisions.
That Nicholson Baker quote keeps fucking me up: "The library has gone astray partly because we trusted the librarians so completely." In part because yes, in part because it renders invisible the administrators who make so many decisions.
October 19, 2016
Taking a Foucauldian approach, this book explores how the supposedly 'neutral' Library of Congress classification system serves to discipline and police categories of knowledge, especially - though not only - knowledge of sex, sexuality and the 'perverse' or 'obscene'.
Adler analyses in detail how the system and processes that underpin libraries and librarianship take on an ideological role in terms of how books and the knowledge they contain are classified, hierarchised, collocated and, sometimes, excluded from the main stacks of the library itself (and we should remember here that Library of Congress classification has an effect on all other US and some other libraries). She starts with a consideration of Eve Kosofsky Sedgewick's Epistemology of the Closet and the way in which it was codified, and expands her thinking out of there. One of the best and most stimulating chapters is the one on the Delta Collection, the collection of withdrawn publications, which has profound political and cultural implications, not least for the historicised construction of the American subject. (And many other national libraries have a similar 'hidden' collection - such as the one in the British Library that we have to seek permission to access).
This is an academic book, one which relies on and speaks back to work in fields of epistemology and cultural history, so if you haven't read thinkers like Foucault and Sedgewick, this probably isn't very accessible. If you have, this is a thoughtful excavation of the hidden ways in which power and authority circulate to discipline and police culture.
Thanks to the publisher for an ARC via NetGalley
Adler analyses in detail how the system and processes that underpin libraries and librarianship take on an ideological role in terms of how books and the knowledge they contain are classified, hierarchised, collocated and, sometimes, excluded from the main stacks of the library itself (and we should remember here that Library of Congress classification has an effect on all other US and some other libraries). She starts with a consideration of Eve Kosofsky Sedgewick's Epistemology of the Closet and the way in which it was codified, and expands her thinking out of there. One of the best and most stimulating chapters is the one on the Delta Collection, the collection of withdrawn publications, which has profound political and cultural implications, not least for the historicised construction of the American subject. (And many other national libraries have a similar 'hidden' collection - such as the one in the British Library that we have to seek permission to access).
This is an academic book, one which relies on and speaks back to work in fields of epistemology and cultural history, so if you haven't read thinkers like Foucault and Sedgewick, this probably isn't very accessible. If you have, this is a thoughtful excavation of the hidden ways in which power and authority circulate to discipline and police culture.
Thanks to the publisher for an ARC via NetGalley
April 3, 2019
I loved, loved, loved this book. By applying Foucaultian logic to the Library of Congress (both the classification scheme and the physical organization of the national library) the author points out the ways in which "perverse" subjects are either classified in a way which marks them largely irretrievable, or changes the subject orientation to mirror a more homogenized, appropriate discipline. What made this book different from all the other case studies of bias in library schemas was that the author promotes a re-amalgamation of the strengths of LOC classification with localized, inter-textual standards that promote cross-referencing and critical awareness. Citing Foucault's The Order of Things, she points out that it is both an exercise in absurdity and necessity to apply categories to things - because of course nothing will apply to everything, and if nothing is ever applied then chaos is allowed to take over. She also points out that practices of classification are now a corporate agenda, with companies like Amazon, Facebook, and Google calling the shots in terms of metadata, categorization, and behavior-based filtering. By minimizing the giants of influence in regards to access and standardization, and allowing equal growth of local and minority-based practices of indexing, the future still might be grim but at least we'll (hopefully) be having a better dialogue about it. Particularly, the concept of categorization by relatability and relevancy in favor of identity will promote collaboration and connection across disciplines, instead of separatism and distrust of the unfamiliar.
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December 30, 2021I’ll write a serious review when I return from vacay but right now the only thing I have written down is “rhizomatic taxonomy systems - mushroom based taxonomy??”
Also I’d like to vehemently disagree w the reviewer above me who thinks this book has no bearing on public librarianship - you are participating in the same purposeful concealment of systems in favor of alternately valorizing (librarians) and situating blame (fixation on Dewey the person instead of his literal system…) based on identity politics which is exactly what Adler critiques. Xoxo a teen librarian @ a public library who still finds it relevant to think about theory even when I’m answering questions about Disney channel original movie DVDs
Also I’d like to vehemently disagree w the reviewer above me who thinks this book has no bearing on public librarianship - you are participating in the same purposeful concealment of systems in favor of alternately valorizing (librarians) and situating blame (fixation on Dewey the person instead of his literal system…) based on identity politics which is exactly what Adler critiques. Xoxo a teen librarian @ a public library who still finds it relevant to think about theory even when I’m answering questions about Disney channel original movie DVDs
January 26, 2017
When I was of college age in the early 1970s, a friend was taking a class called 'Deviant Behavior.' It explored various groups from homosexuals to the Gray Panthers. I asked her who defined the norm? She looked at me as if I had two heads, and she never really understood the question.
In my asking, though, I had unwittingly placed my finger on the difficulty. If you have the power to define what is 'normal,' you have the power to label anything else as deviant. The Library of Congress took it one step further when it came to sexual behavior, pathologizing anything but heterosexual behavior as perverse and deviant.
Subject headings, including homosexuality or fetishm, cross-dressing or drag queens, would be found grouped under the head of paraphilias, a medical term used by psychiatrists to label deviant behavior. Even literary works, which had nothing to do with medicine were classified there. The books themselves might be kept in the Delta Collection, with access limited to law-enforcement personnel or legislators involved in obscenity laws.
The power of an organization such as the Library of Congress is explored. The struggles of people, ordinary people, living ordinary lives accepted today as 'normal,' to be accepted by the Library of Congress, make up the bulk of this fascinating and readable book.
ARC from Netgalley.
In my asking, though, I had unwittingly placed my finger on the difficulty. If you have the power to define what is 'normal,' you have the power to label anything else as deviant. The Library of Congress took it one step further when it came to sexual behavior, pathologizing anything but heterosexual behavior as perverse and deviant.
Subject headings, including homosexuality or fetishm, cross-dressing or drag queens, would be found grouped under the head of paraphilias, a medical term used by psychiatrists to label deviant behavior. Even literary works, which had nothing to do with medicine were classified there. The books themselves might be kept in the Delta Collection, with access limited to law-enforcement personnel or legislators involved in obscenity laws.
The power of an organization such as the Library of Congress is explored. The struggles of people, ordinary people, living ordinary lives accepted today as 'normal,' to be accepted by the Library of Congress, make up the bulk of this fascinating and readable book.
ARC from Netgalley.
April 2, 2020
really great book about classification, organisation of knowledge, and gender/sexuality. essentially my 3 main interests in one. might print the whole thing off and decorate the library with it when we're finally allowed back to work.
April 14, 2018
This was an interesting read. I work in a library and have never encountered anything like this, so perhaps times have changed. Anyway, Having discovered Erotica as a subject heading shortly after having began work at the library, it surprised me that professional co-workers were clueless to the genre! That was the real early 90's! Times have seriously changed sine then! But I never really gave any thought to the Library of Congress actually "hiding" away material it though no one should have access to , that's rather distasteful. Kind of infringes on freedom of information and smacks of Big Brother.... Unsettling...makes me wonder what else they keep under wraps to "protect" us..
Great read for anyone interested; lots of into.
Great read for anyone interested; lots of into.
November 21, 2016
I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley.
I want to preface this review by saying I was interested for the organization of knowledge rather than LQBTQ specifics. I am not at all familiar with that literature so this was a bit more challenging for me than the average reader of this book. Prof Adler writes a wonderfully compelling story and history of classification in the library especially the Library of Congress Classification system and how it shapes and segregates our reading and serves as a reflection of cultural norms that we may no longer in fact support. Truly fascinating read even for those unfamiliar with the body of literature described as a guiding example.
I want to preface this review by saying I was interested for the organization of knowledge rather than LQBTQ specifics. I am not at all familiar with that literature so this was a bit more challenging for me than the average reader of this book. Prof Adler writes a wonderfully compelling story and history of classification in the library especially the Library of Congress Classification system and how it shapes and segregates our reading and serves as a reflection of cultural norms that we may no longer in fact support. Truly fascinating read even for those unfamiliar with the body of literature described as a guiding example.
August 24, 2018
Gave it a skim - there's a lot of post-structuralist hemming and hawing, especially in the introduction, and I just couldn't bear to read it in-depth. But I think it'll be very useful in library school when I'll need the historical narratives and detailed thematic examination.
April 11, 2018
My new favorite LIS text by a landslide.
February 21, 2021
Really speaks to lens of sex/gender and how they transform not only disciplines, but the system that catalogs and places books on the shelves of libraries.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 10, 2024
Because it's about libraries it gets an extra star but really tough read where the exact same thing is repeated over and over and here some more examples of the exact same thing over and over. . ...
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December 5, 2016A fascinating study of cataloguing bias against LGBTQ items and patrons that for its heavily academic approach, relying a lot on Foucault, is a surprisingly easy read (although, as one reviewer pointed out - it would've helped significantly to be a little familiar with Foucault and/or Sedgwick). This book builds upon Adler's fascinating body of work quite well, and a must for anyone that is interested in the intersection between LGBTQ and Library and Information Studies. It also makes me want to go back and read Sedgwick's Epistemelogy of the Closet again!
February 6, 2017
I previewed this book as an e-book from NetGalley.
This niche academic work on cataloging and the history of sexuality was super interesting. I think it's probably a little hard to decipher if you do not have a background in libraries, philosophy, and gender studies but if you stick with it I found the questions raised and information discovered to be well worth the effort.
This niche academic work on cataloging and the history of sexuality was super interesting. I think it's probably a little hard to decipher if you do not have a background in libraries, philosophy, and gender studies but if you stick with it I found the questions raised and information discovered to be well worth the effort.
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March 2, 2018025.433 A2377 2017
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews