Expanding Access to Audiobooks

This Saturday, I'll be making a speech to the Hawaii Library Association conference. It will be titled "Expanding Access to Audiobooks".


Libraries that serve the print disabled (which includes the blind, visually impaired, and those with physical disabilities which make it difficult to hold a print book) loan out audiobooks for those patrons.


However, federal law has limitations on the lending policies.


So here is my letter to Congress about that issue.

The Pratt-Smoot Act of 1931 (and its various amendments) allows the National Library Service for the Blind & Physically Handicapped (also known as NLS) to loan out audiobooks to eligible patrons.  The eligibility requirements includes any of the following conditions

• blindness
• visual impairments
• deaf blindness
• physical disabilities that make it hard to hold a print book
• reading disability caused by organic dysfunction

The following conditions that are not eligible to receive audiobooks from NLS include

• developmental disabilities
• intellectual disabilities
• illiteracy due to a lack of education

People living with such conditions should  NOT be isolated from information that is easily accessible to everyone else.

People living with such conditions may have difficulty reading a print book or reading from a computer screen  could benefit from access to audiobooks.

However, it would take an act of Congress to change the eligibility requirements to receive audiobooks from NLS.

I would want Congress to do the following

• open eligibility of NLS provided audiobooks to those struggling with illiteracy, intellectual disability, developmental disability, emotional illness, mental illness and any other disability that makes it difficult for a person to use a print book

• change the NLS official name to National Library Service for People with Disabilities to reflect such changes

• change the terms listed in Pratt-Smoot Act (and amendments) and NLS materials to better reflect modern terminology related to disabilities (ie. use "intellectual disability" instead of "mental retardation", use "physical disability" instead of "physical handicap")

Please introduce bills in Congress that address such issues.

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The letter and the speech is an extension of my work for my LIS 699 Project: Library Resources for the Blind and Visually Impaired.


You can check out my writings for that project at http://pwegesen.wix.com/pablowegesendlis#!lis-699-projects/cdgt

Laws are enforced by violence

Remember, laws aren't just a set of moral codes, they are rules enforced by violence.

I don't like cigarettes (or alcohol or any of those other drugs) however, when there is a law against selling untaxed cigarettes, how do you think that's going to be enforced?

It got enforced by an angry officer who placed a deadly chokehold on a person accused of selling untaxed cigarettes! (ie. Eric Garner case)

Huffington Post

Eric Garner being choked by a police officer

Be careful with advocating for certain laws, and think about how they'll be enforced before advocating for more laws!

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Learn more about the Eric Garner case  at

"The Policies that killed Eric Garner" by Nick Gillepsie

 http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/12/03/the-policies-behind-eric-garner-s-death.html

"Grand Jury Declines To Indict NYPD Officer In Chokehold Death Of Eric Garner"  by Chrisotpher Mathias

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/03/eric-garner_n_6263656.html

where am I from again?

Because I'm neither Polynesian nor Asian, some people assume I'm not from Hawaii


Here is my facebook post from today

even after all this history, some still have the nerve to ask me "where you're really from" after I tell them where I'm really from!

“Hispanic Firsts” in Hawaii:

First Hispanic: Don Francisco de Paula Marin, a Spaniard, became a resident of Honolulu in 1794. He soon went to work for King Kamehameha I as his business manager, “doctor,” translator, and vintner (he made wine).

First Mexicans: In 1830, King Kamehameha III (Kauikeaouli) brought in 200 Mexican vaqueros (cowboys) from California to teach the Native Hawaiians the art of cattle ranching. The Hawaiian word for cowboy – paniolo – is believed to derive from the Spanish word for the kerchiefs the vaqueros wore – pañuelo.

First Puerto Ricans: Between 1900–1901, the Hawaii Sugar Planters Association brought in 5,000 Puerto Ricans to work on Hawaii’s plantations. They came because in August 1899 a powerful hurricane – San Ciriaco – had devastated Puerto Rico and thousands of agricultural workers were unemployed.

Thanks to Hawaii Hispanic News for telling the world that Hispanics are NOT new to Hawaii, they've been around a long time.

It's just that they didn't come in with as big numbers like the Asians did! 

 

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As for my German side, I remember in the  LIS 663 class (Basic Database Searching), one classmate who was into genealogy research was trying to use the ancestry databases to find out who was the first Wegesend to come to Hawaii.

I did try Ancestry.com, but didn't want to continue after the Free-Trial period. And I got distracted by other things.

But with the LIS 693 class (Resources in Hawaiian and Pacific Librarianship)  going over genealogy websites, my curiosity peaked again. 

And then we took a field trip to the Hawaii State Archives

That's right, some of my ancestors were in Hawaii over a century ago!

Some of my ancestors were in Hawaii before the US took over!


My mom's side of the family is all locals. One of my uncles married a Native Hawaiian woman, and their kids are raised in Waianae!  That's right, you can't get any more "local" than some of my cousins!

Yeah, my dad (who has a different last name from me) came from Mexico. He's been in Hawaii over 40 years already!  Longer than I've been alive!



So who wants to continue insisting I came from somewhere else again?