Creativity, Discovery, and Research
in the Library:
Supporting "Screwing Around"
Transforming Libraries, Transforming Research
27 June 2014
Anna-Sophia Zingarelli-Sweet
overview
- research and the MLIS student
- "The Hermeneutics of Screwing Around"
- three ways to reintroduce curiosity and creativity:
- conceptualize browsing
- build serendipity into research methods
- support robust collaboration
research and the MLIS student
research methods required
in about half of MLIS programs (Park 2003)
we enter the field with a feeling
that research is overwhelming
and that we have little to offer researchers
except a list of databases and search tips
digital scholarship
"use of digital evidence and method,
digital authoring,
digital curation and preservation,
and digital use and reuse of scholarship"
(Smith Rumsey 2011)
from
digital knowledge
to
Stephen Ramsay
http://www.playingwithhistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/hermeneutics.pdf
that much information...
exceeds our ability to create reliable guides to it.
two ways to handle information overload:
search
browsing
we think of the computer as a device
that has revolutionized search...
could we imagine a world in which
"Here is an ordered list of the books you should read"
gives way to
"Here is what I found. What did you find?"
digital reading
Nina Clements,
http://www.ebrowsing.org/blog/2014/4/1/is-browsing-too-slow-for-todays-users
physical browsing takes time
students still crave a tactile approach
Is the digital necessarily opposed
to the tactile, to browsing, and to slowing down?
If "the medium is the message"
then it matters how we conceptualize
and deploy digital media.
Anne Mangen
Journal of Research in Reading 31:4 (2008)
doi 10.1111/j.1467-9817.2008.00380.x
Columbia University Libraries
Feminist Scholars Digital Workshop
thank you!
Anna-Sophia Zingarelli-Sweet
hello@annasophiazingarelli.com
@aszingarelli