« On the Road this Weekend | Main | It's Election Day... »

October 27, 2006

From the Senior Seminar

I had a fascinating discussion yesterday with the senior seminar about appearance vs. reality, and the prejudices and assumptions we bring to our acts of interpretation.

As a follow-up to that, and because I promised them that I would, here are two items that relate to that conversation.

First is an ad by Dove Soap that makes the bold claim, "No wonder our perception of beauty is distorted." It then immediately exhorts consumers to "Take part in the Dove Real Beauty Workshops for girls." You have to see it to believe it.

Second, here's the post from my old blog that discusses the library program in Sweden that allows patrons to check people out:

File this one under... "Please Do Not Reshelve"....

(Malmoe, Sweden) A library in a small community in southern Sweden has started a novel program to promote diversity and break down stereotypes.

In addition of borrowing books on different cultures the Malmoe Library is now offering people.

The living library project is called "Borrow a Bias." It allows townsfolk to borrow any of nine different minority people. Borrowers have 45 minutes to confront the prejudices in the library's outdoor cafe.

"You sometimes hear people's prejudices and you realize that they are just uninformed," said Ulla Brohed, the chief librarian and the person who conceived the idea.

The group includes a lesbian, a gay, an imam, a Muslim woman, a journalist, an animal rights advocate, a Dane, and a Romany or Gypsy and one other to announced later.

Although Sweden has civil rights protections for gays and recognizes same-sex couples with partner rights many Swedes, especially in smaller communities, have little knowledge of gay issues including the desire to marry and adopt children.

"It's a fun idea. Prejudice is something you have when you don't know each other. If you confront each other, then the prejudice is broken down," said Lilian Simonsen, the Dane who will be on loan.

A similar project is already underway in Copenhagen, Denmark.

I have to assume that the Danish program doesn't include a Dane, but who can say. Maybe they just hand patrons a mirror....

On a more serious note, what do you think the impact of something like this would be in the States? What would you add to the "collection"?

Additionally, teachers everywhere decry their students' aversion to actually going to the library. Why bother, students argue, when everything of importance can be found via Google? Would this increase or decrease student interest in libraries, do you think?

[Via 365Gay.com and a tip from Coeurlion]

Posted by reparent at October 27, 2006 2:57 PM