Search

This article highlights two critical race theory–based library and information science (LIS) identity models (LINQ and InFLOmation) that synergistically present ways in which librarians can fortify their agency through liberatory self-reflective modes of information behavior that organically respond to the geographical and sociocultural context of libraries. Whereas critical race theory (CRT) has been criticized for being nihilistic, we amplify CRT's liberatory aims by offering a conceptual synthetization of LINQ and InFLOmation as a heuristic tool for empowering librarians to see themselves as practitioners who must approach their work in culturally congruent ways that reflect a decolonized understanding of our mutual humanity as we connect via our digitized lives in the public sphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When Autherine Lucy enrolled as a library science student at the University of Alabama, she became the first Black student admitted to that previously all-White institution. But once she arrived on campus in early January 1956, her presence quickly occasioned riots that threatened her life and those around her. Despite legal support for Lucy from Thurgood Marshall and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, however, the University of Alabama ultimately expelled Lucy in late February, less than two months after she had matriculated. Although events surrounding her efforts to get a library science degree were widely covered in the national media in the spring of 1956, the nation's library community said, and did, nothing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article celebrates the 95th year of Library Quarterly, a significant milestone in the field of librarianship. It highlights the journal's role in providing intellectual continuity and addressing key topics that have shaped the profession over the past century. The journal's upcoming centennial is marked by special articles and issues focusing on democracy, health, race, and equity, reflecting the current critical time in librarianship. The editors emphasize the importance of libraries in supporting intellectual freedom, promoting literacy, and fostering equity and inclusion, especially in the face of challenges such as censorship and disinformation. [Extracted from the article]

20 years ago, the executive board of the Humboldt University Berlin decided to have the Institute for Library and Information Science closed. The article describes the events following this decision, and explains why the institute has survived nevertheless, how letters of support and strategy papers have impacted on this outcome. It also discusses the lessons for other university institutes and libraries to be drawn from it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of lists of questionable journals as a means to ensure research quality and integrity is the subject of an ongoing debate due to their ambiguous criteria. To assess the reasonableness of these lists from a typological perspective, we examined how effectively they reflect differences in bibliometric attributes among distinct groups and whether these differences are consistent. Using the Early Warning Journal Lists from the National Science Library of the Chinese Academy of Sciences as a case study, we categorized listed journals by warning levels and publication years. Our findings indicate potential inconsistencies in the criteria used for assigning warning levels, as we observed varying degrees of differences (or their absence) among groups across different key academic indicators. Notably, when it comes to citation metrics like journal impact factor and journal citation indicator, it appears that these criteria may not have been considered for grouping, although this lack of clarity from the creators is apparent. This underscores the importance of conducting more scientific and thorough evaluations of lists of questionable journals, along with a greater emphasis on sharing precise standards and data. Our study also provides recommendations for future iterations of such lists by different institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many libraries serve multilingual communities, however, research around multilingual libraries remains sparse. This study provides a theorized understanding of how a multilingual library is experienced by stakeholders, drawing on interviews and focus groups, event evaluations, and field observations. Findings highlight how multilingual communities value the metaphorical space, via the physical space allocated to stock and events, with borrowing influenced by complex rationales. The study troubles traditional notions of success within the field of library science, necessitating a reconceptualization of stock, borrowing and events in a multilingual library, aligning with notions of belonging and ownership that the multilingual library represents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This quantitative study seeks out creative approaches (CA) to solve some of Google Scholar's shortcomings, notably a lack of clear database controls for resource format selection, along with an absence of a peer-reviewed button. As the primary endeavor, the research proposal targets three (theology-specific) research questions at Google Scholar to discover if certain techniques bring back a higher likelihood of journal articles. As a secondary concern, do the same approaches help readers identify peer-reviewed articles? In its findings, the CAs impacted the overall research questions differently. As intended, CA-3A and CA-3B both removed capstone papers from the search results; however, CA-3B cut too many journal articles, whereas CA-3A only reduced journal formats marginally. Successfully, all three variations of CA-4 deducted some book titles without affecting the journal formats; CA-4A performed the most helpful in both outcomes. For CA-5, it labeled journal articles with high precision, though not systematically. CA-5 also reflected the only approach of any value to assist detecting a peer-reviewed journal title. Lastly, all three CA-6 approaches considerably reduced the size of the search results. Notably, CA-6B aggressively removed book formats, while not inadvertently throwing out journal articles. Key terms: Academic dissertations; academic librarianship; book format; Boolean searching; comparative studies; database searching; Google Scholar; information retrieval [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the centrality and density of the 'Artificial Intelligence' cluster within interdisciplinary research networks, contrasting it with thematic clusters like 'prediction' and 'library.' The research aims to assess AI's impact on education and services compared to other thematic clusters. To achieve this, we employed Python analysis tools on a dataset of 587 articles from the Web of Science Core Collection, examining centrality measures and collaboration dynamics. The methodology includes systematic data collection, centrality analysis, and advanced visualisation techniques. The findings indicate AI's high centrality and moderate density, underscoring its pivotal role in driving interdisciplinary research. Comparative analysis reveals AI's broader application potential and influence compared to other clusters. Additionally, insights into country collaborations and centrality measures within clusters illuminate network dynamics and key nodes. Visualisations, such as scatter and box plots, offer comprehensive insights into centrality distribution and relationships within the collaboration network. These results contribute significantly to understanding AI's role in interdisciplinary research, informing strategic planning and resource allocation for future advancements. The broader implications of findings suggest potential practical applications and directions for future research in leveraging AI's influence across various domains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: This study investigated the performance of a generative artificial intelligence (AI) tool using GPT-4 in answering clinical questions in comparison with medical librarians' gold-standard evidence syntheses. Methods: Questions were extracted from an in-house database of clinical evidence requests previously answered by medical librarians. Questions with multiple parts were subdivided into individual topics. A standardized prompt was developed using the COSTAR framework. Librarians submitted each question into aiChat, an internally managed chat tool using GPT-4, and recorded the responses. The summaries generated by aiChat were evaluated on whether they contained the critical elements used in the established gold-standard summary of the librarian. A subset of questions was randomly selected for verification of references provided by aiChat. Results: Of the 216 evaluated questions, aiChat's response was assessed as "correct" for 180 (83.3%) questions, "partially correct" for 35 (16.2%) questions, and "incorrect" for 1 (0.5%) question. No significant differences were observed in question ratings by question category (p=0.73). For a subset of 30% (n=66) of questions, 162 references were provided in the aiChat summaries, and 60 (37%) were confirmed as nonfabricated. Conclusions: Overall, the performance of a generative AI tool was promising. However, many included references could not be independently verified, and attempts were not made to assess whether any additional concepts introduced by aiChat were factually accurate. Thus, we envision this being the first of a series of investigations designed to further our understanding of how current and future versions of generative AI can be used and integrated into medical librarians' workflow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This article explores the ranging notions of a public library for all and the related conflicts on for all and the principle of neutrality in Norway and Denmark. Design/methodology/approach: A document study of four profession magazines in a ten-year period is conducted, focusing on the problematizations of for all using the WPR approach: What's the Problem Represented to be? Theories on public sphere and democracy frequently applied in Library and Information Science (LIS) are discussed in relation to the ranging notions. Findings: The analysis shows that although for all is used as an argument by both advocates and opponents of the principle of neutrality, there are different notions of who constitutes for all. In total, five ranging notions of for all are identified and presented in a typology, to serve as a framework to understand the conflicts concerning neutrality and the public library for all. Originality/value: The typology offers a new conceptual framework for understanding the nature of the conflicts and why they appear. The analysis indicates a need to discuss the use of for all in order to engage in more nuanced discussions of the democratic role of the public library. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The diversification of academic roles can lead to work overload, with significant consequences for well-being. In this context, the academic library's role in supporting research has become crucial. This study aimed to examine the relationship between academics and librarians based on the practices offered to support research activities, and the relevance of Community of Practice (CoP) theory in this context. Eighteen in-depth interviews with academic librarians from public universities in Poland were conducted. A thematic narrative approach emphasized the local context of the findings while grounding them in a broader context of international observations. This study shows that at all stages of scholarly communication, we observe interactions between academics and librarians. Although the level and type of these interactions differ depending on the stage and the institution, they are a rich source of knowledge about academics' needs. While organizing access to print and digital collections remains an essential part of their duties, the emphasis of their activities is shifting from collection management to service provision. These efforts lead to shared practices that constitute the community as defined in CoP theory, even though at the preliminary stage, it is often still unrecognized, invisible to the organization and even to some members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The retention of mid-career academic librarians of color is a topic rarely researched by the profession. This paper addresses these gaps in the research by identifying what mid-career means to academic librarians of color and then focusing on what factors influence mid-career librarians of color to stay or leave academic librarianship. The authors conducted 25 semi-structured interviews with 21 current mid-career librarians and 4 people who left academic librarianship at the mid-career point. A qualitative analysis was conducted using in-vivo coding. While there is no concrete definition of mid-career, participants identified emotional, financial, and opportunistic factors that contributed to their feeling of being mid-career. There was general agreement that mentorship and community were the main factors for staying. Those who left struggled with acculturating to the overwhelming whiteness of librarianship and the constantly changing, unwritten rules of higher education. Academic librarianship needs to prioritize the voices of BIPOC librarians and truly listen to what they are saying. • The definition of mid-career is nebulous, shifting based on many different factors. • Mentorship is an important retention factor and mentoring is one mid-career benefit. • Finding community is the number one way for BIPOC librarians to survive in academia. • Those who left struggled with the constantly changing, unwritten rules of academia. • Academic librarianship needs to prioritize the voices of BIPOC librarians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article in the Library Service from February 2025 deals with various topics. Among other things, the method "User Story Mapping" in digital library projects is examined. In addition, the development of the software tool "Output" is described, which was developed by the University Libraries of Magdeburg and Potsdam to optimize publication and cost monitoring. Also reported is the 20th anniversary of the Institute for Library Science at Humboldt University in Berlin. The Bibliography of Bernese History (BBG) is also presented. [Extracted from the article]

Introduction. Ethnography has increasingly been utilised by social science researchers outside of social and cultural anthropology. We report here an analysis of the extent and nature of its use in library studies research over the past decade. Method. Our study adapts and extends a content analysis of library studies literature conducted by Khoo et al. (2012), using a systematic search process to identify potentially relevant studies published since 2011. Analysis. We coded the resulting corpus to establish whether articles were ethnographic using two interpretations of the term (one broad, one narrower). We also coded other aspects, including specific ethnographic methods used, library sector, country of research, and time in the field. Results. While there remains interest in ethnography, its growth appears to have slowed. We note also that the term ethnographic has been used in this corpus to describe research involving participant observation (the narrower definition) only in 55% of cases. Conclusion. Ethnography remains underutilised in library studies research, particularly in the context of public libraries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of ABI Technik is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article represents a prologue of the discussion of the article "Models of DEIB: Part II-Exploring Models of Inclusion from other Health Professions for Dentistry". It explores existing practices and philosophies from other disciplines that could be applied toward creating environments of inclusion and belonging in dentistry. The primary focus here is to provide an opportunity for the dental profession to leverage knowledge and experiences from other health professions to enhance and expand inclusion efforts and provide enhance engagement at all levels., Competing Interests: Disclosure The authors have nothing to disclose. There were no funding obtained or conflicts to disclose., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

This study describes examples of models and frameworks from other professions that could be applied toward creating environments of inclusion and belonging in dentistry. Examples are provided of activities, frameworks, and models that can serve to launch similar activities within dentistry. Selected models of inclusion from library science, medicine, nursing, dental hygiene, and social work can be used by the dental profession to help make definitive strides in the inclusion arena to combat challenges of access and inequitable oral health status., Competing Interests: Disclosure The authors have nothing to disclose., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)