“This intense desire to know the world”: Cultural competency as a personal and professional disposition in collection development practices

In a mixed methods dissertation study investigating the factors that influence the selection and collection development of multicultural children’s literature (Garrison, 2012), qualitative findings revealed the challenges public librarians face in their efforts to create culturally relevant collections for their increasingly diverse communities, often not representative of their own personal background, knowledge or experiences. Using a conceptual framework for cultural competence for library and information science professionals (Montiel Overall, 2009), this research highlights cultural competence and responsiveness in this sample of U.S. public librarians according to cognitive, interpersonal, and environmental domains. The experiences and reflections of these librarians support cultural competency as both a personal disposition and a professional disposition in collection development practices. The sociological nature of these findings holds implications and significance for library education in developing and promoting strong cultural competency in library students and practitioners.