It’s no surprise to many library workers that sexual harassment is prevalent in the field. “We know that our profession has had issues going back to the days of Melvil Dewey,” said Candice Benjes-Small, head of research at William & Mary Libraries in Williamsburg, Virginia.
Benjes-Small addressed dozens of attendees at “‘It’s Not Okay. It’s Not Normal’: Sexual Harassment of Librarians and Implications for the Field,” a July 1 program held at the American Library Association’s 2024 Annual Conference and Exhibition in San Diego.
Spurred by the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements, Benjes-Small and Jennifer Resor-Whicker, university librarian at Radford (Va.) University, along with several other researchers, surveyed public and academic librarians in 2018 and again in 2022 to assess the issue of sexual harassment in libraries.
Until then, much of the work had been done by psychologists, she said, and there had not been rigorous research about the topic specifically in librarianship.
“You can’t propose solutions until you measure the extent of the problem,” Benjes-Small said.
Results revealed that 75% of respondents had experienced this type of harassment from coworkers, patrons, or both. The researchers looked to see if there was a difference among rural, suburban, urban, and other types of libraries. There was not.
Among public librarians, 89.3% reported experiencing sexual harassment in the past five years of their career. For academic librarians, it was 77%. Those who have public-facing roles or are under the age of 40 were more likely to report being harassed.
“It was pretty much all the time, everywhere, everyone,” she said.
In the 2018 survey, Benjes-Small explained that the researchers were surprised not by the findings, but by the number of people who reached out unsolicited to share their personal stories. In the second survey in 2022, one out of every four respondents chose to write in the comment box at the end.
Many of the comments described numerous occasions of being asked out, given unwanted gifts, followed to their cars, asked for their phone numbers, and subjected to sexual innuendo, advances, or aggression, among other things.
The following themes emerged from those narratives: administrative response (or lack thereof), persistence, disengagement, power imbalances, patrons being prioritized over staff, fear, bearing witness, and normalization.
While most of these unwanted encounters happened in person, some also took place over the phone. Many respondents described sexual harassment as something “inescapable, inevitable, or frequent,” she said. “Expecting the victims of harassment to manage their own harassment … is fully insufficient.”
Witnessing harassment, too, can be traumatic, Benjes-Small said. Not being the direct victim “does not exempt one from the harm caused by it.”
While she acknowledged that the research is preliminary and has limitations—such as looking at only the past five years of a person’s career and not taking into account reference chats or social media behavior—the work is ongoing.
For those who need support for themselves or others, Benjes-Small recommended turning to RAINN (Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network), the nation’s largest anti-sexual violence organization. She and colleagues have also written articles on the topic.
Benjes-Small suggested that libraries adopt policy or codes of conduct around the issue if they haven’t already. The psychological and physical safety of employees is critical, she said: “It is the responsibly of an organization to build a climate that is intolerant of sexual harassment.”
