Prisoners

An article on why being a prison librarian is not so scary after all: So You Want To Become a Prison Librarian?

When I was on my desperate job hunt last spring before I knew which school I would be going to, I noticed an ad for a library assistant in the King County jail. It paid over $18/hr, just for an assistant position.

I suppose they have to pay more to get people in there. Even my own reaction to the idea of working in a prison library was at first fear. Would inmates ever get violent in the library? Would they create uncomfortable situations for the librarian . . . sexual comments, threatening comments, etc.?

The reality according to that article, and a woman in one of my online classes, seems to be that prisoners in libraries are quite well-behaved. If they don't stay that way, then they can lose their library privileges, for one thing. For another--I bet there are some prisoners who aren't well-behaved enough to have library privileges in the first place.

For the ones who do use the library, some for the first time in their lives, the recent Standardized Chapel Library Project came as a brutal kick in the face. The project is an effort by the Bureau of Prisons to keep books off of prison library shelves that could incite radical religious views. However, rather than pulling only books with radical points of view, the Bureau made a list of approved books and pulled all religious books that were not on it.

In prisons, libraries are places for people to heal. They are places where prisoners can learn new trades, be exposed to new ideas, even find healing in faith. For the Bureau to do this is not only counter-intuitive, it directly goes against the mission of a "correctional facility" . . . to correct. To help those who want it.

I am glad that there has been such an outcry from all people against this that the Standardized Chapel Library Project has been halted and books will be returned to the shelves. For although these men and women are in prison, it was a wise man who once said:

"If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John 8:31.5-32