My interests are in how documents convey information and knowledge, and promote understanding, and on new forms of document, with a particular focus on philosophical, theoretical and ethical aspects. This includes aspects of the history and futurology of documents, information behaviours and literacies, and the changing role of the information- and document-centred professions.
I am interested in the kinds of theories, concepts and models used in the information sciences, both in academic study and in practice. I have examined conceptions of information in different domains, particularly philosophy, physics and biology, to see if lessons can be learnt, and useful insights gained, from this kind of comparison. This may mean drawing lessons for the information sciences from ideas of information in the physical and biological sciences; but equally it may perhaps work the other way, with LIS concepts informing other disciplines. Philosophically, I believe that the ideas of Karl Popper and of Luciano Floridi are particularly valuable for the theory-base of the information sciences.
I am also interested in the nature, organization and use of documents and information resources of all kinds, applying the insights of documentation, going back to Otlet and Briet, to new forms of digital documents and collections. This includes the historical development of documents and recorded information, and documentation institutions, with a particular interest in the nineteenth century, when much of our present information environment took shape. Because of my educational and work background, my focus is especially on resources in chemistry, toxicology, and healthcare. I have also examined the idea of landscapes as documents, and in the documentation activities of nineteenth century park designers, such as Joseph Paxton and Edward Kemp.
I find the idea of ‘understanding’ of particular importance, and how the information sciences can help promote understanding, rather than simply imparting information, increasing knowledge, or addressing a limited concept of information literacy. Another long-standing involvement is in information for creativity and innovation, which has a strong relation to browsing approaches to information seeking, including similarity and dissimilarity analysis.
Knowledge organization is another long-standing interest; having, from the start of my information career, been influenced by the writing of Brian Vickery and Alan Gilchrist, I was fortunate enough, decades later, to be co-author of two editions of Gilchrist and Aitchison’s thesaurus construction text. I am current helping Claudio Gnoli and co-workers with the elaboration of the matter levels of the Integrated Levels Classification.
I believe in the importance of fostering links between theory and practice, and between teaching, scholarship, and research, in the information sciences, stemming from my experience as a practitioner for twelve years in research information services in the pharmaceutical industry. For more on my education and training activities, see here, for my current and past research students, see here, and for my publications list see here.
I was programme director for the CoLIS 7 conference held in London in 2010, and am a member of the international advisory board for the CoLIS conferences, the next of which will be held in Glasgow in 2025. I believe that this series of conference encapsulates the best of academic research in the information sciences.
I am currently a project evaluator for UK Research and Innovation, and for thr Slovenian Research Agency. I was a member of the panel for UoA34, which covers LIS research, in the UK Research Excellence Framework 2021, as I was for UoA36 in REF2014. I have been an Aslib Council member, and a member of the UNESCO information literacy expert panel.
I have acted as a consultant for a number of UK and international organisations, including Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, Ciba-Geigy, AstraZeneca, Forensic Science Service, Health Development Agency, National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, Taylor and Francis, Clifford Chance, Oxford University Press, the London Fire Brigade, the BBC and News International, have been a consultant /evaluator for the Open Society Institute’s Information programmes, and have acted as an expert witness on information access in the High Court.
I am currently editor of Journal of Documentation, and am also an editorial board member of Information, Sci, and Knjižnica, and previously editor of Perspectives in Information Management and of IT Link, and editorial board member for portal: libraries and the academy, Aslib Journal of Information Management, Journal of Chemical Information and Computer Sciences, Expert Systems in Information Work, Alternatives to Laboratory Animals, and International Journal of information Management. I am author or editor of eight published books, most recently co-author of Introduction to Information Science (2nd edition, 2022, Facet Publishing) and of Open Access in Theory and Practice (2020, Routledge)
The Occasional Informationist 