Library/information science academics have been troubled for a long while as to whether anyone outside our discipline takes any notice of our research, since the issue was first thoroughly discussed in a paper by Blaise Cronin and Stephen Pearson. It is well-known that much of LIS's toolkit of theories and concepts, and the data to… Continue reading Both a borrower and a lender be? Is LIS research used outside the discipline?
Category: library information science
CoLIS10 Ljubljana
The 10th CoLIS (Conceptions of Library and Information Science) conference was held earlier this month (16-19 June 2019) in Ljubljana, Slovenia, organised by the Department of Librarianship, Information Science and Book Studies at the University of Ljubljana. (It really doesn't seem three years since the last CoLIS conference.) The conference chairs were Polona Vilar and… Continue reading CoLIS10 Ljubljana
Information education for onlife
I was fortunate enough to be able to visit the lovely city of Pisa earlier this month, to give a keynote talk at FEIS 2018, an international symposium on the future of education in information science. The symposium was part of the EINFOSE Erasmus+ project, which is examining the variation in entry requirements and learning… Continue reading Information education for onlife
Information generations; the end of the Millennials?
The idea of a 'generation' is a widely understood one, and we often take it for granted that people of a certain age will have similar experiences, expectations, and values. Terms like 'Baby Boomers', 'Gen X', and 'Millennials' are in common use, and it seems to be generally accepted that they have some value as… Continue reading Information generations; the end of the Millennials?
Why LIS doesn’t have a quick fix for the post-factual society … and why that’s OK
The irony is that by now it was supposed to be perfect. For most of my working life in the library/information area, first as a practitioner and then as an academic, the emphasis was on providing access to information. Most of the time, whatever the topic, there was never enough information, and accessing what there… Continue reading Why LIS doesn’t have a quick fix for the post-factual society … and why that’s OK
Super-science, fundamental dimension, way of being: Library and information science in an age of messages
This is a slightly modified version of a chapter by Lyn Robinson and myself, published in Information cultures in the digital age: a festschrift in honor of Rafael Capurro. M Kelly and J Bielby (eds). Wiesbaden: Springer VS, 2016, pp 31-43. Introduction Rafael Capurro’s body of writings encompass a wide and diverse set of issues… Continue reading Super-science, fundamental dimension, way of being: Library and information science in an age of messages
Into the infosphere: theory, literacy and education for new forms of document
This is a slightly revised version of a chapter contributed by myself and Lyn Robinson to a Festschrift in honour of our colleague Professor Tatjana Aparac-Jelušić, of the University of Zadar in Croatia. We came to know Tatjana particularly through the LIDA conferences, of which she has been the inspiration and main organiser, through her… Continue reading Into the infosphere: theory, literacy and education for new forms of document
CoLIS 9 Uppsala
The latest in the series of CoLIS (Conceptions of Library and Information Science) conferences was held at the University of Uppsala at the end of June, following on from CoLIS 7 in London in 2010, and CoLIS 8 in Copenhagen in 2013. This is, I think, my favourite conference from the viewpoint of getting new… Continue reading CoLIS 9 Uppsala
The once and future editorial; expressing academic opinion
This is an amended and expanded version of an editorial to appear in Journal of Documentation. My copy of Chambers Dictionary tells me that an editorial is "an article in a newspaper, written by an editor or leader writer". Merriam-Webster puts it slightly differently: "a newspaper or magazine article that gives the opinions of the… Continue reading The once and future editorial; expressing academic opinion
Plus ça change in information research; or the modernity of older studies
Aslib was, from 1924 to 2010, an independent membership organisation for special librarianship, technical and commercial information work, and latterly for information management, It was highly influential in the development of documentation and information science, in the UK and worldwide. Its activities included research and consultancy, training, professional development, publishing, and technology development. Aslib was… Continue reading Plus ça change in information research; or the modernity of older studies
The Occasional Informationist 