It all started on a stoop, one of those summer days in Baltimore where it was too hot to be inside with no AC, and it seemed like the heat had pushed the entire neighborhood out onto their front stoops. I grabbed a book and started reading to my nieces. After a few pages, other little heads started popping up on the other side of the book. So of course, I invited the neighborhood kids to join us.
When I was finished reading, the kids didn't want story time to stop. They asked me to read another book and then another one. After a few rounds, I had had enough. So I said, "You guys can read a book at home."
"We don't have any books at home," was their overwhelming response. It was a harsh reminder that there are children who don't have a single book at home.
So what did I do about it? I started reading to the neighborhood kids every weekend. I called it Stoop Storytime, and the process inspired me to begin working in the public library.
However, as a public librarian, I quickly realized that the kids that I saw coming into the library weren't the same ones I was reading to out on my front stoop. I began researching and learned about library barriers and something called book deserts. A book desert is an area or a community with limited access to books and reading materials.
I slowly realized that I wasn't going to meet my neighbors who need it most inside library's walls. So I quit my job and took to the streets, becoming a radical street librarian.
When I was putting this talk together, TED asked me, what exactly is a radical street librarian? I was like, well, I sort of made it up a few years ago, but it's a term I use to refer to anyone doing work to increase literary access outside of traditional settings.
As a radical street librarian, I'm making books appear in everyday places in extraordinary ways. I install free, public book vending machines, host street-corner story times, and pop up on the block with free bookstores, so kids who don’t have McDonald’s money don't have to worry about having book-fair money.
I deeply believe in books by any means necessary. So whether at a community basketball game, corner store, beauty supply, or front stoop, I utilize my expertise as a librarian to curate collections that reflect the kids reading them. This means books with characters that look like them, talk like them, go to the same places, speak the same languages.
Book deserts are often found in economically disadvantaged or rural areas, where bookstores and libraries are scarce. In higher-income communities, there are more books per child than in low-income communities. For example, in Philadelphia's Chestnut Hill, a study found that there were about 13 books for every child while in high-poverty communities of the same city, it found up to 300 children could share one book.
We know communities with high illiteracy rates are often plagued with poverty, poor health and unemployment, while their literate counterparts are healthier, with greater numbers of employment and higher household incomes.
So I know what you're thinking. "There are plenty of bookstores and libraries where I live." But here's the kicker: the presence of bookstores and libraries in a neighborhood doesn't necessarily disqualify it as a book desert.
Lower-income neighbors may lack the resources to purchase books from the bookstore or pay library fines. Residents may be working multiple jobs or facing hardships that make a trip to the library an additional stressor. Barriers like requirement of identification, proof of address, fines and fees, all while seemingly routine, can become substantial obstacles for families facing hardships. There's also historical barriers, such as anti-literacy laws and library segregation policies that have excluded Black communities for decades.
Librarians understand that the habit of visiting libraries is often generational tradition. Many of the parents we see currently bringing their kids into the library were once brought in by their parents when they were children, and so on and so forth. But for Black communities that faced arrest for reading, the impact of library segregation and anti-literacy laws lingers, and a hesitancy to visit libraries still exists to this day.
So what can be done about book deserts and book access? Research tells us that increasing access to appropriate print materials is an incredibly effective means of enhancing the reading achievement of economically disadvantaged children. To put it plainly, the more books a child has early access to, the more likely they are to succeed as readers.
Though I recently created the term, being a street librarian is nothing new. I'm inspired by the many mobile librarians who came before me. I'm just a little more hood with it.
(Laughter)
One of my favorite stories was born out of the Great Depression. The Pack Horse Library was created to deliver books to residents living in geographically isolated areas. The librarians packed books into feed sacks, saddle bags and even old pillow cases, and they traveled on horse, mule or foot into the mountains of rural Kentucky.
These book women traveled in rain, snow and heat, and because there weren't roads, they navigated through creek beds and along fence lines, often traveling up to 20 miles per day. Sometimes conditions were so harsh that a mule would succumb to -- the weather. One book woman continued to walk 18 miles without her mule to deliver a book to a child living in the mountain tops.
One of the most popular items in their library wasn't really a book at all, but something that the librarians pieced together, a scrapbook from the most popular titles. It contained quilt patterns, the latest fashion clippings, a recipe for opossum soup and children’s stories. The Pack Horse librarians embodied the street hood librarian spirit by creating custom books that met their community's needs.
Librarians haven't just relied on horseback either. We've employed elephants in the Elephant Mobile Library, ridden camels in Kenya to deliver books to nomadic tribes, and led dogs through the mountains of northern California. From bibliobikes in Augusta, Georgia, to Biblioburro in Colombia, libraries have taken diverse forms and adjusted to different cultures and landscapes. In China, there's a floating library made from converted fishing boats that serves as an island's first public library.
And in Baltimore, you'll find me, the radical street librarian, striving to deliver books to your front stoop. Since its inception, my initiative has delivered 5,000 books to children living in book deserts.
(Applause)
In case you're wondering how to be a street librarian, here's what you can do.
First, be radical. Share books in extraordinary ways and think outside the box. Perhaps host a block party book swap or a story time at a local laundromat.
Second, be street. Connect with your neighbors. Talk to people in your community.
And third, embody the spirit of a librarian. Get your library card, match books to readers by considering their interests and experiences.
I believe everyone is a reader. They just haven't found the right book yet.
(Applause)
And that's where librarians step in. Many want to read but don't know where to get started. And visiting the most magical place on Earth, the library, can be intimidating for non-library goers. We must meet them where they are and guide them along that journey.
There is an ancient African proverb that when an old man dies, a library burns. For neighborhoods where stories are passed down on front stoops, we must meet our neighbors where they are.
Thank you.
(Applause)
