HEDMAN, Jenny.On librarians’ occupational identities:ICT and the shaping of information seeking expertise.IFLA(on line). Oslo : 2005.Consulted the 02-06-07
Access to the URL: http://www.ifla.org/IV/ifla71/papers/053e-Hedman.pdf
Abstract
Changes in the Scandinavian LIS (Library and information science) curriculum during the last decade, interacting with librarianship as well as with society at large, call for a deepened understanding of the social dynamics of librarians’ occupational identities. At least two central themes emerge studying the recent development of librarianship, namely the process of academisation and the implementation of contemporary ICT (information and communication technology) tools. This paper discusses Scandinavian academic librarians’ expertise, identified as the roles of information seeking experts and as information literacy mediators; both coming to expression within the professional practice of user education. This is done through a theoretical discussion with points of departure taken in current theory of professions and in Patrick Wilson’s writing on librarians’ unique competence. The discussion is empirically illustrated primarily by examples from a study on 31 Scandinavian academic libraries’ web-based tutorials for information literacy. Finally, some suggestions are made for the development of user education as well as for future research. (author's abstract)
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"An expert to whom?
Patrick Wilson argues that everybody can be an expert on something, but it takes more than specialised knowledge to become an authority (Wilson, 1983, pp. 26-30). Professional claims of jurisdiction within a certain knowledge domain and the priority of interpretation coming with it are associated with a status that must be earned and only can be ascribed by others – especially other experts in the same field. This kind of authority is thus particularly concerned with the cognitive or intellectual aspects of power. Wilson puts it as follows: “What one needs to know also depends in part on what others expect one to know” (Ibid., p 150).
As the tools for computer based information seeking have become more accessible and usable for end-users, handling search engines, databases and other computerised tools, is not exclusively a librarian asset anymore. In the face of loosing authority, a new kind of expertise has been put forward by librarians, with a focus on information literacy and the pedagogical practices associated with it. This becomes quite evident in Sundin’s study in illustrations given of librarians that are implicitly described as persons with the potential to select the “right” information (Sundin 2005, p 123). In comparison, I find it noteworthy that if librarians tend to work hard to provide end-users with qualitative information, they tend to work even harder to provide them with information on the virtues of the library and the continuous necessity of consulting librarians.
A profession is often defined in relation to other professions (cf. Abbott 1988; Larson 1977) –
horizontally – but vertical positioning also takes place in relation to clients. The question of librarians’ competence as information seeking experts and information literacy mediators may be addressed from the aspect of librarian-user interaction. This could well be extra fruitful in the context of higher education. Raising the classical question of librarians’ ability to evaluate and recommend information sources to “expert” users, the concept of cognitive authority may be put to work. Is it even possible for a “generalist” to choose and recommend information sources to subject experts? Or, put in Wilson’s terms, may the librarian actually be an authority on authorities (1983, pp 179-183)? Many of the tutorials in Sundin’s study implicitly argue for this kind of librarian expertise, but the previously cited quotation from Seldén serves as a striking contrast of a frustrated user view."
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DC Publisher : International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA)
DC Date : created : 2005/08/14-18
DC Format : PDF (.pdf)
DC Identifier : http://www.ifla.org/IV/ifla71/papers/053e-Hedman.pdf or http://www.ifla.org/IV/ifla71/papers/053f_trans-Hedman.pdf
DC Language : 'en' or 'fr'
DC Coverage : world
DC Relation : Hjørland, B. (2000). Library and information science; practice, theory, and philosophical basis.Information Processing and Management, 36(3), 501-31.
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