Interdisciplinary Knowledge Organization PDF
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Rick Szostak · Claudio Gnoli María López-Huertas Interdisciplinary Knowledge Organization Interdisciplinary Knowledge Organization Rick Szostak (cid:129) Claudio Gnoli (cid:1) Mar´ıa Lopez-Huertas Interdisciplinary Knowledge Organization RickSzostak ClaudioGnoli UniversityofAlberta Universit(cid:3)adiPavia Edmonton,Alberta,Canada Pavia,Italy Mar´ıaL(cid:1)opez-Huertas UniversityofGranada Granada,Granada,Spain ISBN978-3-319-30147-1 ISBN978-3-319-30148-8 (eBook) DOI10.1007/978-3-319-30148-8 LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2016932884 ©SpringerInternationalPublishingSwitzerland2016 Thisworkissubjecttocopyright.AllrightsarereservedbythePublisher,whetherthewholeorpartof the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilarmethodologynowknownorhereafterdeveloped. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publicationdoesnotimply,evenintheabsenceofaspecificstatement,thatsuchnamesareexempt fromtherelevantprotectivelawsandregulationsandthereforefreeforgeneraluse. Thepublisher,theauthorsandtheeditorsaresafetoassumethattheadviceandinformationinthis book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained hereinorforanyerrorsoromissionsthatmayhavebeenmade. Printedonacid-freepaper ThisSpringerimprintispublishedbySpringerNature TheregisteredcompanyisSpringerInternationalPublishingAGSwitzerland Preface This book is motivated by the increased importance of interdisciplinary schol- arship within the academy and the widely perceived shortcomings of existing knowledgeorganizationschemes(KOSs)inservinginterdisciplinaryscholarship. Thebookreachesasetofverystrongconclusions: (cid:129) Existingbibliographicclassificationsystems[thatis,classificationsofworks,as in libraries] are organized on a disciplinary basis; as a consequence they serve interdisciplinaryresearchandteachingpoorly. (cid:129) A novel approach to classification, grounded in the phenomena studied rather thandisciplines,wouldserveinterdisciplinaryscholarshipmuchbetter.Itwould alsoproveadvantageousfordisciplinaryscholarship.Ifwecanaidallscholarsin their search for information, the productivity of scholarship would thus be increased. (cid:129) This novel approach is entirely feasible.Various concerns that might beraised can each be addressed. The broad outlines of what a new classification would looklikearedeveloped. (cid:129) This new approach might serve as a complementto or a substitute for existing classificationsystems. (cid:129) Thoughtheimpetusforthisnovelapproachcomesfrominterdisciplinarity,itis also better suited to the needs of the Semantic Web, and a digital environment moregenerally. Thisbookthusproposesanovelapproachtoclassification,discussesitsmyriad advantages, and outlines how such an approach to classification can best be pursued. It should thus be of great interest to scholars of classification research, knowledgeorganization,digitization,andinterdisciplinarityitself.Indeedwehope to encourage a collaborative effort toward the detailed development of such a classification. v vi Preface Key Features Thisis,quitesimply,thefirstbooktotakeinterdisciplinaryknowledgeorganization asitscentraltheme.Thismightseemsurprising,giventheimportanceofinterdis- ciplinarityinthecontemporaryacademy.Itisevenmoresurprisinggiventhatthe literatureoninterdisciplinarityappreciatesthatfindingrelevantinformationisone of the key barriers to interdisciplinarity. The paucity of previous research on interdisciplinary knowledge organization reflects in part the inertia surrounding existing classification systems: those in use in most of the world’s libraries were developed manydecadesagowhenneither interdisciplinaritynordigitization was foreseen.Italsoreflectsinpartafearthatconceptualambiguitylimitsthescopefor atrulyinterdisciplinaryapproachtoclassification.Inthisbook,wewilldiscusshow theapproachtoberecommendedmighteithersubstitutefororcomplementexisting classification schemes. And we will discuss at length how we can best combat conceptualambiguity. The approach that we recommend blends a comprehensive classification with domain-specific classification practices. The book should thus be of interest to advocatesofbothofthesetypesofresearch(domainanalysiswillbeexplainedin Chap.3,anddiscussedindetailinChap.6). The logical structure of the book deserves emphasis. Each chapter addresses a coherent set of questions. Later chapters build directly on the preceding analysis. Mostimportantly: (cid:129) Chapter 2 argues that interdisciplinary researchers will want to search by the phenomenaandcausalrelationshipsstudiedinawork,thetheoriesandmethods applied,andtheperspectiveoftheauthor. (cid:129) Chapter3thenexamineswhattypeofclassificationwouldfacilitatethesetypes ofsearch. (cid:129) Chapter4reviewssomeattemptsinthisdirection,andaddresseswhythistypeof classificationhasnotalreadybeenadopted. (cid:129) Chapter5describesthefeasibilityofdevelopingsuchaclassification. (cid:129) Chapters6,7,and8developstrategiesfordoingso. The book is thus able toprovide a strongjustification for acarefully described andnovelapproachtoknowledgeorganization. Thoughtheprimaryfocusofthebookisonclassificationsystems,theanalysisis in places extended to other knowledge organization systems (KOSs) such as thesauri and ontologies (these will also be explained in Chap. 3). The possibility ofacomprehensivethesaurusisexplored.Theclassificationproposedhasmanyof theadvantagessoughtinontologiesfortheSemanticWeb.Thebookwillthusbeof interesttoscholarsworkingintheseareasaswell. The authors each bring something unique to this project. Rick Szostak is a scholarofinterdisciplinarity(andformerpresidentoftheAssociationforInterdis- ciplinaryStudies).Hehaspublishedseveralarticlesinleadingjournalsininforma- tion science in recent yearsregarding the desirability andfeasibility ofthe sort of Preface vii classification outlined in this book. Claudio Gnoli and Mar´ıa L(cid:1)opez-Huertas are scholarsofinformationScience(andrecentlyservedrespectivelyasvicepresident and president of the International Society for Knowledge Organization [ISKO]). Claudio Gnoli has also published many articles arguing for the new approach to classification urged in this book. Mar´ıa L(cid:1)opez-Huertas has published domain analyses of the interdisciplinary field of gender studies, and thus brings a critical perspective on both domain analysis and the needs of interdisciplinary scholars. Manyworksofeachauthoraredrawnuponinthisbook. Audience Theprimaryaudienceforthebookwillbeinformationscienceprofessionals.The bookshouldbereadilyaccessibletostudentsinthefieldbutatthesametimewill offer novel insights to experienced practitioners. It is entirely original in its approach but yet makes use of and synthesizes a diverse literature. It holds out the promise of a collaborative effort to develop novel KOSs. As stressed above it should be of interest to both those who perform domain analysis and those who wishtoworktowardacomprehensiveclassification. The second audience will be interdisciplinary scholars, and especially scholars ofinterdisciplinarityitself.Asnotedabove,such scholarsarekeenlyawareofthe informationchallengestheyface,butunawarethatthereisapossiblesolution.They should be interested in the broad contours of that solution, and more generally in how KOSs do and could operate. They will then be able to advocate for the development of appropriate KOSs (see Chap. 10). Moreover we shall argue that thedetaileddevelopmentofsuchaKOSisbestperformedinconcertbyscholarsof knowledgeorganizationandscholarsofinterdisciplinarity:thelattercanadviseon how best to serve their needs (Chaps. 4 and 9). This book will also develop strategies for interdisciplinary communication that are of direct use to interdisci- plinaryscholars.Andtherearelessonsalongthewayregardingclarityinexpressing causalarguments,theories,andmethods;argumentsinfavorofacoherentscholarly enterpriselinkedbyinterdisciplinarity;anddescriptionsofthenatureoftheworld weliveinsuchasthetheoryofintegrativelevels.Wewilldiscusshowinterdisci- plinarity can benefit from the Semantic Web and how the KOSs proposed in this book may be well suited to this enterprise. Last but not least, interdisciplinary scholarsmayseeparallelsbetweenthediscourseondomainanalysiswithininfor- mationscienceandthebroaderdebatesregardingspecializedversusinterdisciplin- aryresearchintheacademy.Insum,interdisciplinaryknowledgeorganizationis,as the name suggests, a field in which interdisciplinary scholars and knowledge organization scholars should interact; this book introduces each to the other field inordertofacilitatethatinteraction. viii Preface ThoughontologiesareaKOStheyhavemostoftenbeendevelopedbycomputer scientists and others from outside the field of information science. The formal structure—precise definitions of terms and stipulation of relationships among these—is hoped to facilitate computer navigation of diverse databases. There are, perhaps unsurprisingly, important parallels between the challenges of communi- catingacrossdisciplinesandacrossdatabasesdevelopedfordifferentpurposesby different agents. And it will turn out that the sort of KOS we recommend in this book serves many of the purposes of ontologies. It is particularly well suited to a digitalworld,anditsstructureseemswellsuitedtotheneedsoftheSemanticWeb. Athirdaudienceforthisbook,then,isscholarsofdigitization,ontologies,andthe SemanticWeb. Governments, granting agencies, and university presidents routinely both laud interdisciplinary scholarship and seek to facilitate it. And it is widely appreciated thatscholarshavetroublefindingrelevantknowledgeinotherfields,understanding it when they do, and communicating back to all relevant audiences. Our book proposes solutions to each of these challenges. This book shows how we can enhance interdisciplinary scholarship through the improved classification of worksandtheideasthatthesecontain.ArguablythedevelopmentofKOSssuited tointerdisciplinarityisthesinglemostimportantpolicyinnovationforfacilitating interdisciplinarity.WewillrevisitintheconcludingchapterhowthesortofKOSs advocated in the book should be a goal of public policy. This goal cannot be pursued without detailed knowledge of the shape of the desired KOSs. A fourth audience for this book, then, comprises policy-makers interested in facilitating interdisciplinarity. Timeliness of This Book Thetimelinessofthebookshouldbestressed.Itcomesatapointintimewhen: (cid:129) Thereiswidespreaddiscussionofhowbesttofacilitateinterdisciplinarity. (cid:129) Digitization allows works to be classified along multiple dimensions, and thus respondtotheinformationneedsofinterdisciplinarians(whilealsobetterfacil- itatingdisciplinaryresearch). (cid:129) Importantly, digital publication increases the value of a classification that can guide researchers to related works in other fields (rather than stressing shelf placementoflikeworks). (cid:129) Onlinedatabasesabound buteach tendstoemployauniqueclassification.The approach outlined in our book addresses potential solutions to this problem aswell. Preface ix (cid:129) More generally there is a widespread concern that the world faces information overload.Andthebestanswertooverloadisorganization:peopleneednotknow everything as long as they know how to find what they need. The sort of classification we advocate should simplify search for the general user as well asthescholarlyuser. Edmonton,AB,Canada RickSzostak Pavia,Italy ClaudioGnoli Granada,Spain Mar´ıaL(cid:1)opez-Huertas
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