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MPR News Staff

Humankind documentary about the future of libraries: 'The New Literacy'

A man points to a book that a young child is reading.
From left, Mohamed Nor Qeys, of Minneapolis, reads a children's book with his son Safwan Nor, 6, as a part of distance learning for the Minneapolis Public Schools district in April 2020.
Courtesy of Mohamed Nor Qeys 2020

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For National Library Week, Part 2 of the Humankind documentary about the evolution of libraries, called, “The New Literacy.”

  • Librarians, pediatricians and others weigh in on how reading enhances crucial brain development in the first years. Early literacy is important, and can start with the simple act of reading aloud to a very young child. Includes comments by Arthur Rolnick, formerly of the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank, now at the University of Minnesota.

  • Eric Klinenberg, New York University sociologist, author of “Palaces for the People,” said, “I can tell you about so many stories I heard from people who discovered something fundamental about themselves in a library, who grew more independent, more self-aware, more strong, more resilient, more interested in the world, more engaged as citizens because of time they spent in libraries."

  • How to sift fact from fakery online. How can we tell whether information is reliable? Librarians have a lot of expertise. Katherine Maher, CEO of the Wikimedia Foundation, said: "The role of libraries can be having conversations with communities not about what to think, but about how to think, and how to navigate what information is put in front of us.”

Use the audio player above to listen to the documentary.

The executive producer of Humankind is David Freudberg.