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Information Science
Information The Basics provides an accessible introduction to the multifaceted field of Information Science (IS). Inviting readers to explore a modern field of study with deep historical foundations, the book begins by considering the complexities of the term "information" and the information life cycle from classification to preservation. Each chapter examines a different area within IS, surveying its history, technologies, and practices with a critical eye. This interdisciplinary field incorporates a wide range of approaches which it shares with humanities, social science, and technology fields. What makes IS unique is its emphasis on the connections between information, technology, and society. The need to share information more effectively in response to social, environmental, and biomedical challenges has never been so urgent; the volume discusses the risks as well as benefits that come with the emerging technologies that make it possible. The book also explores how IS, with its long-standing commitment to intellectual freedom and digital inclusion, and its keen attention to the protection of privacy, data ethics, and algorithmic transparency, can contribute to the creation of a more open and equitable society. Information The Basics is essential reading for anyone who wishes to know more about information and the impact it has on our world. It will be particularly useful for anyone intending to study IS at the undergraduate level or considering a shift to a career in the information professions.
276 pages, Paperback
Published December 30, 2022
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March 7, 2023xii
The practices of information science include the classification, organization, retrieval, analysis, utilization, governance, management, study, design, expression, and preservation of information
xiii definition: We typically refer to both the container of information (an instruction sheet) and the meaning it conveys (the instructions) as information. The term sometimes serves as an adjective describing an attribute (an informational video) or a value (an informative meeting), but it also defines subjective states related to understanding (being well-informed) or status (being an informant). As a verb, information may be a relational act (informing someone else) or be implicated in complex social processes (the political, psychological, and social effects of dis/misinformation upon public opinion and behavior).
xiv A more computational way of thinking about information comes from information theory, a branch of mathematics that models the processing, storage, and transmission of information.
the datainformation-knowledge-wisdom (DIKW) pyramid, which places data at the bottom and wisdom at the top
xv Lyn Robinson and David Bawden productively analyze the “gap” between five distinct approaches to information: technological, physical, biological, social, and philosophical.
xx. crucial flows of information to meet contemporary crises, have also produced vulnerabilities that enable bad actors to take advantage of the 21st century information cornucopia heralded as “Big Data.”
p. 9 The different aspects of information—object, content, process, and context—are of central importance to all the practices and professions of information science p. 27 A catalog is a list of the names (or other identifying labels) of items in a collection. A bibliography is a common kind of catalog that lists written works organized by author. In contrast, an index is often organized by the topics in a collection (or within a single work). An index at the back of a book, for example, is typically an alphabetized list of topics with page numbers indicating where that content shows up in the text.
p. 34 Belgian lawyer named Paul Otlet (1868–1944). Inspired but also frustrated by the Dewey Decimal system’s focus on books, Otlet developed Universal Decimal Classification (UDC) which could handle many kinds of media: photographs, videos, advertisements, brochures, letters, and miscellaneous ephemera
p. 37 The Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) are used not only in the U.S. Library of Congress, but in libraries across the Englishspeaking world, as well as nations that use English as a second or common language.
p. 44 Epistemologies (ways of knowing and understanding the world), and ontologies (ways of classifying the world) are tied to one another. Epistemological understandings lead to different ontologies, because how human beings classify the world is necessarily shaped by assumptions about the nature of the world.
p. 47 “metadata” defined as “data about information,” but also as “data about data,” or “information about information,” or even “information about data.”
Data is derived from an information source, and it has the potential to become information again.
p. 50 vocabulary control, a technique of listing words understood by the system to ensure that users will find what they are looking for. Accounting for synonyms and alternative language forms are also forms of vocabulary control.
p. 52 four broad types: descriptive metadata, administrative metadata, structural metadata, and markup languages.
pp. 53-55 Dublin Core
p. 58 The term epistemicide is used to refer to the deliberate destruction of indigenous knowledge systems and their replacement by other ideas about how knowledge is created, classified, and under
stood.
The practices of information science include the classification, organization, retrieval, analysis, utilization, governance, management, study, design, expression, and preservation of information
xiii definition: We typically refer to both the container of information (an instruction sheet) and the meaning it conveys (the instructions) as information. The term sometimes serves as an adjective describing an attribute (an informational video) or a value (an informative meeting), but it also defines subjective states related to understanding (being well-informed) or status (being an informant). As a verb, information may be a relational act (informing someone else) or be implicated in complex social processes (the political, psychological, and social effects of dis/misinformation upon public opinion and behavior).
xiv A more computational way of thinking about information comes from information theory, a branch of mathematics that models the processing, storage, and transmission of information.
the datainformation-knowledge-wisdom (DIKW) pyramid, which places data at the bottom and wisdom at the top
xv Lyn Robinson and David Bawden productively analyze the “gap” between five distinct approaches to information: technological, physical, biological, social, and philosophical.
xx. crucial flows of information to meet contemporary crises, have also produced vulnerabilities that enable bad actors to take advantage of the 21st century information cornucopia heralded as “Big Data.”
p. 9 The different aspects of information—object, content, process, and context—are of central importance to all the practices and professions of information science p. 27 A catalog is a list of the names (or other identifying labels) of items in a collection. A bibliography is a common kind of catalog that lists written works organized by author. In contrast, an index is often organized by the topics in a collection (or within a single work). An index at the back of a book, for example, is typically an alphabetized list of topics with page numbers indicating where that content shows up in the text.
p. 34 Belgian lawyer named Paul Otlet (1868–1944). Inspired but also frustrated by the Dewey Decimal system’s focus on books, Otlet developed Universal Decimal Classification (UDC) which could handle many kinds of media: photographs, videos, advertisements, brochures, letters, and miscellaneous ephemera
p. 37 The Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) are used not only in the U.S. Library of Congress, but in libraries across the Englishspeaking world, as well as nations that use English as a second or common language.
p. 44 Epistemologies (ways of knowing and understanding the world), and ontologies (ways of classifying the world) are tied to one another. Epistemological understandings lead to different ontologies, because how human beings classify the world is necessarily shaped by assumptions about the nature of the world.
p. 47 “metadata” defined as “data about information,” but also as “data about data,” or “information about information,” or even “information about data.”
Data is derived from an information source, and it has the potential to become information again.
p. 50 vocabulary control, a technique of listing words understood by the system to ensure that users will find what they are looking for. Accounting for synonyms and alternative language forms are also forms of vocabulary control.
p. 52 four broad types: descriptive metadata, administrative metadata, structural metadata, and markup languages.
pp. 53-55 Dublin Core
p. 58 The term epistemicide is used to refer to the deliberate destruction of indigenous knowledge systems and their replacement by other ideas about how knowledge is created, classified, and under
stood.
April 8, 2026
kurslitteratur som jag fann riktigt intressant!!
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