{"id":311,"date":"2006-02-07T11:19:00","date_gmt":"2006-02-07T18:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/blog\/?p=309"},"modified":"2006-02-07T11:19:00","modified_gmt":"2006-02-07T18:19:00","slug":"the-idea-of-library-and-the-importance-of-a-name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/2006\/02\/07\/the-idea-of-library-and-the-importance-of-a-name\/","title":{"rendered":"The idea of \u201clibrary\u201d and the importance of a name."},"content":{"rendered":"

McGill’s Graduate School of Library and Information Studies is evidently considering dropped the words “Graduate” and “Library”, which has some students up in arms. School of Information Studies? I don’t think it sounds as nice, or fits as well the role of the school, which just added three specializations this year: Knowledge Management, Archival Studies, and Librarianship. If you’re going to offer a specialization in “librarianship”, wouldn’t it make sense to keep “library” in the name? The crux is this, what does the word “library” mean in the 21st century, and how is it viewed outside of the library community? Removing the word would likely be based on the idea that “library science” has fallen far enough out of its specialization in libraries and into a more general idea of information management. Is there an viable instance where “library studies” are outside of and distinct from “information studies”?<\/p>\n

If you do a wikipedia search for library science<\/a> it automatically brings up the entry for LIS (Library and Information Science). For wikipedia, library science automatically incorporates information science, but the reverse does not seem to be true.<\/p>\n

Library and information science (LIS) is the study of issues related to libraries and the information fields. This includes academic studies regarding how library resources are used and how people interact with library systems. These studies tend to be specific to certain libraries at certain times. The organization of knowledge for efficient retrieval of relevant information is also a major research goal of LIS. Basic topics in LIS include the acquisition, cataloging, classification, and preservation of library materials. In a more present-day view, a fervent outgrowth of LIS is information architecture. LIS should not be confused with information theory, the mathematical study of the concept of information or information science a field related to computer science and cognitive science.<\/p>\n

Programs in LIS are interdisciplinary, overlapping with the fields of computer science, various social sciences, statistics, and systems analysis.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Doing a search for “information science” points you to informatics<\/a>, where the language points much more into the realm of computer science and information management via databases and software engineering.<\/p>\n

Informatics or information science is the study of information. It is often, though not exclusively, studied as a branch of computer science and information technology and is related to database, ontology and software engineering.<\/p>\n

Informatics is primarily concerned with the structure, creation, management, storage, retrieval, dissemination and transfer of information. Informatics also includes studying the application of information in organizations, on its usage and the interaction between people, organizations and information systems. Within information science attention has been given in recent years to human computer interaction (HCI) and to the ways people generate, use and find information.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In the academic world, it’s easy to think that being a librarian is all about creating databases, utilizing new software, being technologically innovative, and so-on and so-forth, ad technologicum. However, many LIS graduates find work in small public libraries, where you still find a lot of patrons who don’t want to use computers or databases, and who want to ask the librarian anytime they have a question. For a lot of librarians, patron interaction and reference work are what make their jobs worthwhile, and while younger library users will likely jump on the technology bandwagon, utilizing the software and databases created by the librarian instead of the librarian directly, we have a more conventional generation, who having grown up with card catalogs and print indexes, aren’t keen on skipping the middleman and jumping straight into information overload.<\/p>\n

Day by day the line is blurring between LIS and Informatics. We, as librarians and library students, are at a point where we need to try and straddle the gap between the two, and eventually build a bridge. I think that it is important to maintain the distinction between information study as a librarian to information study as a computer science student or software engineer. Yes, as “librarians” we want to be able to branch out. We are versatile, and can offer many skills outside of the library setting. But if that is our explicit goal, then the field of library science will decline, and the importance of the library as place will eventually be swallowed by technology, computer science, and the internet. The library can always expand its purview, and incorporate innovation and technology to its heart’s content. We can make the words “library science” mean “information expert”, rather than letting “information expert” destroy the word “librarian”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

McGill’s Graduate School of Library and Information Studies is evidently considering dropped the words “Graduate” and “Library”, which has some students up in arms. School of Information Studies? I don’t think it sounds as nice, or fits as well the role of the school, which just added three specializations this year: Knowledge Management, Archival Studies, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,20],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=311"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ahniwa.com\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}