The World Café (TWC) approach is designed to encourage participants to share ideas, think creatively and learn together. The rationale is to stimulate creativity and collaboration among participants by organizing group conversations in a comfortable and relaxed environment. Participants take turns discussing and sharing ideas in small groups, and their opinions and ideas are recorded on a tablecloth or paper. Participants then move to different groups to share their reflections with others and enrich and expand each other's perspectives. This process is repeated multiple times, fostering in-depth dialogue and exchange.
In the article "Using the World Café Methodology to support community-centric research and practice in library and information science " , the Vanessa L. Kitzie research team of the School of Library and Information Science at the University of South Carolina used The World Café (TWC) method to integrate public libraries into Library librarians and LGBTQIA+ community leaders came together to discuss health information barriers faced by the LGBTQIA+ community and collective strategies for leaders and librarians to address these barriers. TWC research methods were summarized and Reflect.
Main research questions and conclusions of the paper
RQ 1: How do public libraries work with local LGBTQIA+ communities to provide adequate health information support?
- Training Services : Public libraries should continue to provide LGBTQIA+-related health information
- Outreach Services : Participate in community events such as pride parades, advocate for LGBTQIA+ issues such as the health care referendum, and actively support LGBTQIA+ events such as drag story time, and by wearing an LGBTQIA+ identification badge or Stickers and other social signaling to participate
- Reference Services : Public libraries can create a centralized digital portal for sharing health resources in local communities and share relevant health information resources among local communities. At the same time, changes in these health resources are updated and maintained in a timely manner. In addition, "Rainbow Grades" can be established on the website to rate the characteristics and services of medical facilities and provide them to community members as a reference for choosing medical service providers.
- Collaboration Services : Cooperation between public libraries and the “LGBTQIA+” community; cooperation between public libraries and public libraries, librarians can visit other branches to learn how they affirm “LGBTQIA+” identities, and think about how to translate these efforts into measures that work for their communities
- Leadership Services : Library leaders must support LGBTQIA+ visibility and inclusion efforts. At the same time, relevant measures must be taken to deal with individual behaviors that do not support "LGBTQIA+".
RQ 2: What are the advantages and disadvantages of the TWC research method during this research?
Advantage:
- Ability to generate feasible ideas and action plans
- Allowing librarians to shift focus from their own lack of knowledge and information to critical reflection on service frameworks to promote more inclusive and adaptive library services.
- Information community building can be strengthened through social activities and connections
- Leveraging collective knowledge and information sharing among participating community networks can facilitate collaborative knowledge exchange among diverse stakeholders
Disadvantages:
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Failure to take into account power imbalances
The TWC research method assumes that the researcher can unilaterally define the stakeholders related to a specific topic, while ignoring the participants' own definition of their own interests and needs. This may lead to researchers being too dominant in the design and implementation of the project and neglecting the involvement of other stakeholders, such as medical professionals.
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suppress dissent
TWC favors a positive frame when discussing issues and ignores possible negative impacts and challenges, which may inhibit direct challenge and discussion of existing structural oppression. This positive framing may not truly address the broader systemic exclusion issues faced by the “LGBTQIA+” community.
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lack of reflection
Researchers are not fully aware of how their identities and experiences influence their perceptions and understanding of issues. This lack of reflexivity may result in researchers inadvertently strengthening the framing of the defect model and failing to achieve the goal of reflection.
references
- Vanessa L. Kitzie, Jocelyn Pettigrew, Travis L. Wagner, A. Nick Vera. (2020) . Using the World Café Methodology to support community-centric research and practice in library and information science, Library & Information Science Research,
Volume 42, Issue 4. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lisr.2020.101050.