2015 Essays

Beyond the Threshold: Conformity, Resistance, and the ACRL Information Literacy Framework for Higher Education

Beilin, Ian G.

The recently adopted ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education has generated much critique and discussion, including many important reflections on the nature of information literacy and librarianship itself. This article provides a brief consideration of some of these responses and as well a critique of the Framework from the perspective of critical information literacy. It argues that although the Framework demonstrably opens up possibilities for an information literacy instruction that encourages students to question the power structures and relations that shape information production and consumption, it nonetheless rests on a theoretical foundation at odds with that goal. It urges librarians to embrace the Framework yet also resist it, in the tradition of critical librarians who have practiced resistance to the instrumentalization of the library for neoliberal ends.