Ambra McPeters, a mother of autistic children, is volunteering to be a “book” at the Human Library, scheduled for 1-4 p.m. Saturday at the Faulkner County Library in Conway. Her title is Autism Mom.
The project is a partnership between the library, 1900 Tyler St., and City of Hope Outreach in Conway, a nonprofit Christian organization with initiatives in education, housing and community development. CoHO works with three low-income neighborhoods and has transitional housing for men.
The Human Library is made up of people representing different groups in the community who have faced prejudice, stereotypes or discrimination. The goal is to gain understanding and change the way people think about these groups.
In other words, don’t judge a book by its cover.
Allen said the Human Library is a concept created by the Danish youth organization Stop the Violence in 2000, and it has activities on six continents, according to the website www.humanlibrary.org.
McPeters, who is an administrative director of CoHO, has two children with autism. She said her hope is to help people understand how autism “affects the entire family,” not just the child who has it. Also, she wants people to understand why her 4-year-old son has meltdowns in public.
“It’s like a storm in the brain that causes a lot of frustration and confusion,” McPeters said.
She said a sensory-processing disorder goes hand in hand with autism. Some autistic children are avoiders, who respond negatively to loud noises, light, etc.
“My son is a seeker; they don’t take in enough input,” she said. “He’s constantly looking for more input, so his behavior seems hyperactive. When he goes into a room, he doesn’t see the big picture; he has to examine each part. … It can cause overload and meltdowns.
“A lot of kids will self-harm; some, like my son, lash out.”
When that happens in public places, people judge him and her parenting skills, she said.
“People are mean; they will come up and say the meanest things,” McPeters said. “It makes you want to stay home,” but she said it’s important to take Genesis out to get him acclimated to situations and places.
“I want to help people understand that the more services that are out there, the more therapies they get, the better chance they have for the future,” she said. “It’s so hard to get help.”
McPeters said her 14-year-old daughter, Cordelia, has high-functioning autism.
“Hers is like a gift; she excels at everything,” McPeters said. She home-schooled her until this year. McPeters also has a 3-year-old daughter, Marley Jade.
McPeters said CoHO aims to bring about understanding of issues such as homelessness and poverty, and a person who is homeless will represent a book, too.
Nancy Allen, adult services and reference librarian at the Faulkner County Library, said the Human Library project is one she’s been looking at for a while.
“It’s something I’ve been mulling over the last couple of years,” she said. “I’ve known about the Human Library for quite some time and have researched it. I just didn’t feel like I had access to a community who would like to be books.
“When CoHO approached me, I said, ‘I would love to partner with you in this endeavor. I think it’s important because you have resources I don’t have, and I have resources you don’t have,’” Allen said.
“A number of people have reached out via email” to be books, she said. They include “a single mom, a parent of a disabled child, a gay man and a trans woman, somebody from a Jewish community. We have an atheist.”
Allen said she is recruiting volunteers from the library, the University of Central Arkansas and CoHO to act as docents.
“A patron who wants to check out a human book will look at our catalogue. The docent will get the ‘book off the shelf,’” she said, and take the human book and patron to a separate area to have a 20-minute conversation. The patron can renew the book for an additional 10 minutes.
“Docents make sure the time is pretty much followed. To make sure no one is feeling uncomfortable, we’ll have the patron sign certain rules of behavior, rules of conduct,” she said.
A deputy from the Faulkner County Sheriff’s Office will be on-site, too.
“[The volunteer books are] being vulnerable enough to do this, so why would I set up a situation where they would feel uncomfortable?” Allen said.
She said her goal for the project is for people to be heard.
“I think there are a lot of voiceless or silenced people in our community, and this is a chance to give them a forum, a chance to be heard, possibly,” Allen said. “There are a lot of people who suffer from judgments and stereotypes and a lot who make them. The best way to overcome some of that is to sit down face to face rather than reading social media.”
Tristan Norman, a junior at Hendrix College, was an intern for CoHO last summer and is helping to organize the Human Library.
“Events like these, you can’t have any grandiose ideas about what it’s going to be. … Sharing the story is enough,” Norman said. “It’s a platform for people to have an opinion and engage in storytelling. Storytelling is the most important for me. I think the stories are very relatable.”
He said participants who check out the “books” will realize, “Hey, this is a person across from me.”
There will be at least a dozen people participating as books, he said.
Norman said it’s an idea that’s long overdue for Conway.
“We’re going to have to start having these conversations eventually, with the influx of industry and the way Conway is growing. We’re having conversations larger cities have had,” he said.
He said a college or church could hold a Human Library.
“Everyday people are putting these on. It can be a regular human being with a desire to tell stories,” Norman said.
“It’s giving a face to the label,” McPeters said,
“putting humanity to the label.”
For more information, contact Allen at the library at (501) 327-7482 or nancy@fcl.org, or Norman at normantristanhendrix@gmail.com.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.