{"id":6008,"date":"2018-02-27T13:09:22","date_gmt":"2018-02-27T21:09:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bclaconnectrev.wpengine.com\/perspectives\/?p=6008"},"modified":"2025-01-22T11:26:06","modified_gmt":"2025-01-22T19:26:06","slug":"working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/","title":{"rendered":"Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left\">According to Welcome BC, \u201calmost 30 percent of British Columbians immigrated to B.C. from another country. Just under one-quarter of the people in B.C. are a visible minority. Another five percent of the population is Indigenous.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn1\" name=\"_ftnref1\"><sup>[1]<\/sup><\/a> If we translate that quote into numbers we find that it\u2019s about 1.5 million, 1.2 million and 240,000 respectively. Many of them are library users already, but many more are yet to find us.<\/p>\n<p>Canada is a welcoming country. However, a good portion of those immigrants and minorities face several barriers in their everyday lives, including, but not only, limited language skills, lack of jobs, poverty, cultural difficulties and racism.<a href=\"#_ftn2\" name=\"_ftnref2\"><sup>[2]<\/sup><\/a> Libraries are committed, of course, to help them overcome and eliminate those barriers with staff support, collections and welcoming spaces. The reality of how well we\u2019re doing it, however, can be complicated.<\/p>\n<p>Library staff face many challenges when it comes to connecting with and serving those communities. The challenges are present in many forms:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>What\u2019s the best way to communicate with someone who doesn\u2019t speak English?<\/li>\n<li>How to interact with a man who doesn\u2019t want to shake my hand?<\/li>\n<li>How do I tell a woman she is welcome to stay as long as she wants if this is her first time in a library?<\/li>\n<li>What\u2019s the best strategy to reach out to a community that\u2019s not using the library?<\/li>\n<li>How do I help a fellow human being that\u2019s struggling with life but can\u2019t understand me?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/msc\">BCLA Multicultural Services Committee<\/a> works towards improving service to those communities in BC. We provide training to library staff, recommendations for developing collections in languages other than English, discuss and share information regarding multicultural services and collections in our libraries and, whenever possible, provide help, support, resources and experience to libraries working with multicultural communities.<\/p>\n<p>We also embark in special projects. We are about to launch, for example, a Racism in Libraries survey that, ideally, will help us capture a wide picture of incidents in and around libraries and their staff and patrons. The survey will go out in the Spring of 2018 and findings will be shared later in the year.<\/p>\n<p>If you want to know more about the BCLA Multicultural Services Committee, visit our <a href=\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/msc\/\">website<\/a>. New members are always welcome. To join or for more information, connect with our committee chairs, Jessica Whu at jessica.whu@vpl.ca or Jorge Cardenas at jorge.cardenas@bpl.bc.ca.<\/p>\n<p>&gt;<strong>Jessica Whu<\/strong> is the Web Librarian at Vancouver Public Library.<\/p>\n<p>&gt;<strong>Jorge Cardenas<\/strong> is the Community Outreach Librarian at Burnaby Public Library.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref1\" name=\"_ftn1\"><sup>[1]<\/sup><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.welcomebc.ca\/Choose-B-C\/Explore-British-Columbia\/Multicultural-B-C\">https:\/\/www.welcomebc.ca\/Choose-B-C\/Explore-British-Columbia\/Multicultural-B-C<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref2\" name=\"_ftn2\"><sup>[2]<\/sup><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.td.com\/document\/PDF\/economics\/special\/ff0212_immigration.pdf\">https:\/\/www.td.com\/document\/PDF\/economics\/special\/ff0212_immigration.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to Welcome BC, \u201calmost 30 percent of British Columbians immigrated to B.C. from another country. Just under one-quarter of the people in B.C. are a visible minority. Another five percent of the population is Indigenous.\u201d[1] If we translate that quote into numbers we find that it\u2019s about 1.5 million, 1.2 million and 240,000 respectively. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[203,200],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-issue-1-the-social-issue","category-volume-10-2018"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee - BCLA Perspectives<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee - BCLA Perspectives\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"According to Welcome BC, \u201calmost 30 percent of British Columbians immigrated to B.C. from another country. Just under one-quarter of the people in B.C. are a visible minority. Another five percent of the population is Indigenous.\u201d[1] If we translate that quote into numbers we find that it\u2019s about 1.5 million, 1.2 million and 240,000 respectively. [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"BCLA Perspectives\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-02-27T21:09:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-01-22T19:26:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Angie Ayupova\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Angie Ayupova\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/\",\"name\":\"Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee - BCLA Perspectives\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2018-02-27T21:09:22+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-01-22T19:26:06+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#\/schema\/person\/7dd99a433ef051122f6f630057150b16\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/\",\"name\":\"BCLA Perspectives\",\"description\":\"A publication of the BC Library Association.\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#\/schema\/person\/7dd99a433ef051122f6f630057150b16\",\"name\":\"Angie Ayupova\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c13aef5e91130592a9d1008f4b2f9b8f?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c13aef5e91130592a9d1008f4b2f9b8f?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Angie Ayupova\"},\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/author\/angie-2\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee - BCLA Perspectives","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee - BCLA Perspectives","og_description":"According to Welcome BC, \u201calmost 30 percent of British Columbians immigrated to B.C. from another country. Just under one-quarter of the people in B.C. are a visible minority. Another five percent of the population is Indigenous.\u201d[1] If we translate that quote into numbers we find that it\u2019s about 1.5 million, 1.2 million and 240,000 respectively. [&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/","og_site_name":"BCLA Perspectives","article_published_time":"2018-02-27T21:09:22+00:00","article_modified_time":"2025-01-22T19:26:06+00:00","author":"Angie Ayupova","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Angie Ayupova","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/","url":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/","name":"Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee - BCLA Perspectives","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#website"},"datePublished":"2018-02-27T21:09:22+00:00","dateModified":"2025-01-22T19:26:06+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#\/schema\/person\/7dd99a433ef051122f6f630057150b16"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2018\/02\/27\/working-in-a-cultural-mosaic-the-bcla-multicultural-services-committee\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Working in a Cultural Mosaic: The BCLA Multicultural Services Committee"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#website","url":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/","name":"BCLA Perspectives","description":"A publication of the BC Library Association.","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#\/schema\/person\/7dd99a433ef051122f6f630057150b16","name":"Angie Ayupova","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c13aef5e91130592a9d1008f4b2f9b8f?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c13aef5e91130592a9d1008f4b2f9b8f?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","caption":"Angie Ayupova"},"sameAs":["http:\/\/bclaconnect.ca"],"url":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/author\/angie-2\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6008\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}