Untangling the Diversity Narrative: Challenging the Proliferation of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Initiatives
Facilitated Discussion | Tuesday, June 10th, 2025 | 3:00pm – 4:00pm EST
This facilitated conversation will discuss how the core principles of equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) have been co-opted by academic institutions in North America to promote their interests, rather than the marginalized communities they claim to support. While the backlash to EDI has understandably been met with alarm, this is an opportunity to create space for meaningful, anti-oppressive dialogue. This conversation will engage with critical frameworks illustrating how EDI has become the dominant lenses through which institutions understand heterogeneity and social stratification, and explore pathways towards dismantling oppressive systems that do not rely on institutionalized EDI.
[This discussion will not be recorded.]
Presenter: Tina Liu
Tina Liu is a Cataloguing Librarian at McGill University. She has been the recipient of grants and scholarships from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Canadian Association of Research Libraries, and was an ALA Spectrum Scholar. Her research interests include critical librarianship and critical cataloguing, contemporary digital documentation practices, and representations of diasporic and marginalized communities in library collections.