University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

A Statistical Essay on Diversity in the Library Professions Compared to Other Occupations in the United States

Buchel, Olha; Coleman, Anita S.

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/122977

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Title
A Statistical Essay on Diversity in the Library Professions Compared to Other Occupations in the United States
Author(s)
  • Buchel, Olha
  • Coleman, Anita S.
Issue Date
2022-11
Keyword(s)
  • Diversity in Librarianship
  • Diversity in LIS
Date of Ingest
2024-05-06T11:55:38-05:00
Geographic Coverage
United States of America
Abstract
Exploratory analysis is a major benefit of data science and a promising way to investigate diversity. Using data from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, occupational segmentation by racial groups was examined in order to discover the full story behind the lack of diversity often reported in library occupations. The story of diversity is more complex than simple racial ratios for library occupations alone can reveal. This paper combines aspects of data analytics with complexity science to understand the library professions in the context of other occupations in the United States, specifically where they stand in terms of racial and ethnic diversity and statistical variances. Complexity profiles uncover diversity relationships and associations among the occupations. The findings show that librarians and library assistants belong to large groups of other occupations that have similar racial ratios; they do not stand out as outliers in terms of their ratios of races. Data used and additional interactive information visualizations are available on GitHub.
Publisher
Johns Hopkins University Press
Has Part
https://librarytrends.github.io/data_science_for_libs/
Series/Report Name or Number
Volume 71, Issue 2, November 2022
Type of Resource
text
Genre of Resource
article
Language
eng
Copyright and License Information
Copyright 2022 University of Illinois Board of Trustees

Owning Collections

Library Trends 71 (2) November 2022: Seventieth Anniversary Celebration Issue of Library Trends: Influence, Reach, Visibility, and Engagement [Restricted Access] PRIMARY
The journal Library Trends, now in its seventieth year, has since its inception in 1952 been produced by the School of Information Sciences, formerly the Graduate School of Library and Information Science (GSLIS), at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. The quarterly journal is currently published by Johns Hopkins University Press. This 71 (2) issue celebrates the contributions the journal has made to library and information science (LIS) internationally.