What We're Reading: Algorithms of Oppression

Title: Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism
Author: Safiya Umoja Noble
Genre: nonfiction
Read Great Things Category: a controversial book (maybe), a book suggested by a Durham Tech librarian

Why did you choose to read this book?
Dr. Noble's book made waves in the library world when it came out in 2018. I was aware of the book's premise--that Google's search algorithms result in innocuous keyword searches (e.g., black girls) turning up offensive search results--and wanted to know more about the topic.

Beyond just obvious racial stereotypes, Google's search algorithms are also implicated in the radicalization of an impressionable man who went on a killing spree and disseminating false and misleading political information, among a host of other examples.

What did you like about it?
Dr. Noble refers to internet searching as decontextualized: search terms yield search results without taking into account the meanings of the search terms. She tells a compelling story in the book's "Introduction": while searching the internet for activities that might engage her stepdaughters and nieces in 2011, she entered the search phrase black girls into Google. The top search result was to a pornography website; other first-page search results included unfavorable stereotypes of Black women, and so on. Dr. Noble was not looking for racist or pornographic information, but, because of the interaction between Google's search algorithms, page ranking practices, and so-called search engine optimization (SEO) efforts undertaken by organizations, that's what her search retrieved. (Google has since revised its algorithm and black girls retrieves other kinds of search results as of the completion of the book.)

The book is also an example of scholarly nonfiction, which is a kind of writing that Durham Tech students are expected to discover, read, and digest. Scholarly writing can be difficult to read because of the style. I think Algorithms of Oppression's chapter "Introduction" is a great introduction to scholarly writing--including lots of endnotes--and introduces a very engaging topic.

Ultimately, the book falls short on specific solutions to the problem, but Dr. Noble does an excellent job of explaining the myriad complicated factors that come into play when you type a few words into a search box and hit Enter.

With what feeling did the book leave you?
Throughout the book Dr. Noble makes the case for internet search indexing to be performed as a public service by trusted agencies (she includes libraries), with accountability for their practices, rather than by for-profit companies, who are more interested in receiving advertising revenue than in helping people find and understand information online. I felt buoyed by Dr. Noble's highlighting the important role that librarians have to play in helping people find and make sense of information they seek online. I also felt like deleting my Gmail account, not wanting Google to capitalize off its continued extensive, automatic harvesting of information related to my personal, professional, and familial relationships; nor of my purchases and other commercial interactions.

Who else might like this book?
Students who are learning to differentiate between reliable and unreliable information would benefit from this book, especially its introductory chapter. People who use Google without thinking about how it decides what is and is not relevant to their search terms would benefit from reading this book.

With what would you pair this book?
In between reading sessions, I listened two a couple of different podcast hosts interviewing Dr. Noble. Hearing her voice, and her description of her research in conversational--rather than scholarly, written--terms, helped me connect with the information in the book as I read it.

Listen to those podcasts right here!