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Library and information science

Library and Information Science (LIS) is the study of issues related to libraries. This includes academic studies (most often surveys) about 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 Library science include the acquisition, 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.

Library Science is distinct from Librarianship, which is the practical services rendered by librarians in their day-to-day attempt to meet the needs of library patrons. Librarianship tends not to create new knowledge, nor to strive to advance any field or discipline. Librarians only rarely engage in Library Science, and then usually outside their jobs as librarians. But the study of Library Science is part of the requisite training of librarians. "Information" and "documentation" means non-book materials that university libraries deal with, such as magazines, scientific journals, technical reports, and access to online databases.

The term "Library and Information Science" should not be broken into these separate pieces. Library and Information Science is a hybrid academic field that grew from library schools' fight for survival in the electronic age. The politics of academia, issues of status and prestige, issues of perceived obsolescence and other forces created these programs. Programs in Library and Information Science are interdisciplinary, overlapping with the fields of systems' analysis, computer science, statistics and various parts of the social sciences.

The field of Library and Information Science is not defined by its output of information specialists, but by the "information specialists" who remain in academia teaching and doing research, by its literature, its journals and all the other ways in which an academic discipline is defined, the study of which, by the way, falls within the scope of Library and Information Science!

Important LIS institutions and resources:

The National Information Standards Organization (http://www.niso.org)
Indiana University SLIS, http://www.slis.indiana.edu/
Syracuse University School of Information Studies, http://istweb.syr.edu/
University of Michigan School of Information, http://www.si.umich.edu/
University of Pittsburgh School of Information Sciences, http://www2.sis.pitt.edu/
University of Washington Information School, http://www.ischool.washington.edu/
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Information and Library Science, http://www.ils.unc.edu/
University of North Texas School of Library and Information Sciences, http://www.unt.edu/slis/
Dominican University (River Forest, IL) http://www.dom.edu/gslis/gslis
University of Illinois Graduate School of Library and Information Science, http://alexia.lis.uiuc.edu/
University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Library and Information Studies, http://www.uri.edu/artsci/lsc/
Simmons College Graduate School of Library & Information Science, http://www.simmons.edu/gslis/

OCLC (Online Computer Library Center), http://www.oclc.org/
American Library Association, http://www.ala.org/
Canadian Library Association, http://www.cla.ca/
Australian Library and Information Association, http://www.alia.org.au/
American Society for Information Science and Technology, http://www.asis.org/
International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA), http://www.ifla.org

Some current LIS issues:

information explosion
information retrieval
knowledge management
reference sources
information storage
information literacy
slow fires
mass deacidification
information architecture
public lending right