Theorising Information Literacy: Opportunities and Constraints @asist_org #asist23

An obvious session to blog from the ASIS&T conference is a panel on Theorising Information Literacy: Opportunities and Constraints. This arises from a project which has produced a book Information Literacy Through Theory. Note that in addition to the people mentioned below, Arthur Coelho Bezerra and Marco Schneider (Brazilian Institute of Information in Science, Technology, Brazil) were also mentioned in the original submission, but were not able to attend. This was a dense presentation of ideas, so there is the usual caveat that this is my immediate, liveblogged, impression of the panel.

Alison Hicks (University College London, UK) began by identifying some ways in which theory can be used. The presenters had noted that theoretical work often happens without understanding of foundations, and there was a need to reflect on theory and its relationship with application and practice. Hicks explained that it had been a 2 year project with 13 people from different parts of the world, involving 2 online workshops and an iterative processes of writing. They started by doing some conceptual mapping of the work done in information literacy, undertaking a deep literature review to identify different theoretical approaches. These approaches included critical theory, practice theory, sociotechnical and sociopolitical (and some others), and they extracted 50 papers. These were coded and they identified 5 themes: tensions between agency and enactment; legitimacy of information (what counts as information); moral imperative of information literacy (they noted that there is little challenge of the benefits of being informed); socially situated shape of information literacy; marginalisation (e.g. issues of power and privilege).

Following on from this each presenter talked about a theoretical stance that they espoused/used.
Veronica Johansson (University of Boras, Sweden) talked about the theoretical approach of Critical Design, identifying with critical literacy rather than information literacy. The originators of Critical Design had said that all design can be affirmative (problem solving) or critical (problem finding - designing in a way that highlights biases etc.). This can be applied in for example looking at the way search results are presented, or the way in which books are classified and arranged, or in looking at indigenous ways of mapping rather than conventional western mapping.
Jutta Haider (University of Boras, Sweden) talked about sociomateriality as an approach, which may use metaphors and conceptual devices; exploring the actors, the material aspects of information literacy, to explore the meaning and practices (including information literacy practices) arising from interaction and co-constitution.
Ola Pilerot (University of Boras, Sweden) talked about the theoretical stance of institutional ethnography. This sees information literacy as an institution (a phenomenon that has become an institution: with a common literature, values, practices, actors, sites and contexts). This approach saw the local connected to the "extra local" with "ruling relations" (with the example of the ACRL framework having a local and international impact). Texts and material objects are important in shaping practices (e.g. syllibi, texts). The researcher's job is to identify and elucidate the ruling relations, zooming into local practice and then zooming out.
Noora Hirvonen (University of Oulu, Finland) talked about mediated discourse theory, seeing information literacy in a nexus of practice. Dscourse is viewed as multimodal (manifested in objects, actions etc not just words). Action is seen as mediated by the social and cultural. The attention is focused on a nexus of action - examining a "network of linked practices" where things come together the create action.
Following this, the panel discussed whether there are tensions in how the theories fit with, or challenge, each other (and whether it matters). They noted that there was a wider range in the book, and the panellists who had been able to attend were comparatively closer. However, overall, although there might be some tensions, it was productive and important to use these different approaches. The main issue raised was that of the relationship between critical literacy or information literacy (though that could also be productive).

The 2nd part of the session involved each panelist talking about the opportunities and challenges of each of the theoretical approaches they had talked about.
Hirvonen identified that discourse theory directs attention to "the dialogical relationship between the material world and discursive constructs", with social action at its centre. This "may help acknowledge the multimodaility of information and IL practices" including looking at the relationship between understandings of IL experienced by individuals and seeing it in a social context noticing "how IL can both enable and constrain actions".
Haider identified that an issue was - deciding what to investigate when meaning only emerged through interaction - and this involved "embracing definitional ambiguity". Part of it involved investigating "moments of stability". Also it can be used as a sensitising concept in approaching research. Haider mentioned being responsive to the messiness of the world, also with a having a social justice approach. As part of this she talked about resisting fetishisation of technology, not being intimidated by corporate information infrastructure [I think including search engines etc.], also considering the way in which these structures and infrastructures make it difficult to refuse them - so you could adopt a punk (authority resisting) approach.
Johansson reiterated that she relates critical design to critical literacy. Critical design involves reflecting on something desgned, in our daily lives, stimulating thoughts on underlying power imbalances that are produced and reproduced in designed objects (which can include designed objects such as search engines). Johansson sees this as a postsrutucturalist approach, where materiality is important, and it explores what we mean by reality (and what realities are constructed through the power structures and values that result in the designed objects/systems). Johansson saw the rich repetoire of methods as being one of the key benefits of using this approach. For example, one may critique, speculate and present critical alternatives.
Pilerot identified institutional ethnography as providing a "dual analytical perspective where the local is seen as connected to the extra-local" which shows information literacy in its local context and also how it is connected to things outside the local. This was seen as a "bottom up" approach examining local practice and interelatedness/interaction then tracing the ruling relations. He gave an example of using Web of Science and how you could trace the ruling relations (of how material is selected for inclusion, the underlying publication power structures etc.). Pilerot also noted that it is related to other approaches such as prctice theory and sociocultural theory.
Hicks then pulled some strands together, noting that there are many ways to theorise (different frameworks used; where attention is focused; approaches to theory - pedagogical, situational or ideological), and also that there are new themes emerging (e.g. to do with discourse & power; the decentring of language; revisitingand critiquing  premises)
The presentation part finished by the panelists addressing the questions of why theorisation of information literacy matter and how the theoretical work might translate into action. Some points that arose from this concerned how you dealt with normative aspects, and how some research arose from action, so could not be divided from it. Also there was the question of what kind of phenomenon it was. This was followed by a discussion amongst the audience.

Global AI Initiatives: From Theory to Practice @asist_org #ASIST23

I'm liveblogging Global AI Initiatives: From Theory to Practice a session at the from the ASIS&T conference that I'm currently attending. These are my immediate impressions of the session.
Andrew Cox (University of Sheffield, UK) presented on AI in Libraries, starting by identifying that there are a lot of strategy documents concerning AI, so AI has to be acknowledged as a strategic priority in libraries. There are recurrent themes such as regulation, ethical application and developing human capital. He referenced a paper that identified typical strategic themes, e.g. in some countries focusing on control, in some focusing more on what the market decides, or development by the state. At the moment AI is not mentioned much in library or institutional strategies (Cox referred to a recent study of the UK and China).
However there are many applications of AI in libraries: examples are using AI to create metadata for large collections; in writing documents; and in promoting AI literacy. This raises the question of whether libraries have AI capability? You need material, human and intangible resources (the latter being things like willingness to take risk and ability to change).
National and research libraries tend to have these capabilities/resources, whereas it is more doubtful with other types of libraries. Three ways that libraries can contribute are as follows. National library projects can be beacons of responsible AI (if they undertake required steps such as deciding priorities, respecting the rights of those represented in the collections, sharing the code and training materials they produce etc.) The second way that librarians can contribute is by contributing to institutional capability (using knowledge and skills to do with organising, finding etc. data). The third area of contribution is in developing AI literacy: some frameworks are being developed, but AI literacy can be hard to define and achieve (because it can be hidden, is changing etc.)i (My thought at this is that information literacy frameworks should be a starting point!)

Jesse Dinneen (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Germany) talked about Global AI initiatives: from theory to practice: European practice. He noted that GLAMR [Galleries, Museums, Libraries etc.] Institutions have been quick to leverage AI (digitisation, data analysis etc.) and European universities have also been quick to respond (developing guidelines for use in academia, incorporating into courses etc.). This leads to twin challenges: issues of ethics, and issues of regulation. There has not been so much GLAMR-specific research on AI risks. Wheras there are numerous guidelines etc. emerging, they mostly haven't been tested, so it isn't clear which principles, guidelines etc. are effective or feasible. Bringing together stakeholders/experts is a good start, but still hasn't addressed what works in practice.
Dinneen identified that since AI issues are about tech, information and people, LIS and GLAMR should be well positioned to help. In terms of AI regulation, there are different initiatives in different countries. There is an EU AI Act in process, derived from 7 European Commission-made ethical principles. They, for example, distinguish between different risk levels of applications. He spoke about some problems, in that those in teh industry have problems such as assuming people's literacy (e.g. to engage with user manuals and instructions), throwing AI into many products. In the EU there should be opportunities for research with the documentation that emerges from the EU Act. This could be used as a guide for those outside the EU.

Dania Bilal (University of Tennessee-Knoxville, USA) talked about iSchool leaders' vision of Information Science curricula in the age of AI. She was talking about members of the iSchools Association. She looked at the 54 North American iSchools covering AI and related content, searching for the occurance of mentions of AI (or related topics such as machine learning). 39% did not offer courses (i.e. a module or class) related to AI. 9 iSchools had AI certificates and concentration programmes. As a next step iSchool leaders will be asked about why AI was not integrated larger scale, what vision they had for the topic, and how well they are preparing future professionals.

George Hope Chidziwisano (University of Tennessee-Knoxville, USA) talked about AI initiatives in Africa. He highlighted the biases in AI systems, such as difficulty in understanding bilingual speakers. Human-centred approaches have been proposed, stressing that diverse populations must be involved in AI development. An example of bias was that ChatGPT only included Egypt as a representative of African information. Chidziwisano used an example of asking ChatGPT about Nsanje in Malawi, and pointed out the major inaccuracies in the "information" provided. He pointed out that there were means to collect data using the resources and infrastructures that were actually used in the countries (instead of only using the tools and infrastructures that are used in Western countries). Chidziwisano used an example of using audio data from chickens in Malawi to predict poultry disease in other countries, noting that it was important to collect data from different countries to develop a more generalisable model.

Finally Vandana Singh (University of Tennessee-Knoxville, USA) talked about AI in the technology industry. She started with a Deloitte survey about companies engaging with AI and almost 100% were doing something. 33% of tech, media and communications companies had "active AI solutions". (I think she was referring to this report) Challenges include employees understanding of AI, and AI ethics. Singh then talked about what ethics meant in the AI industry (at a basic level this means - not doing harm to people), with challenges such as opacity of AI systems, bias, manipulation of behaviour, privacy.
These challenges are not easy to fix, for example there are differing definitions of fairness and bias. Singh talked about developments such as the group DAIR and the issues they are concerned with. She noted there are numerous companies engaging with these issues, giving some examples, and that these are evolving very rapidly, and it was important to engage with them in discussion. She also mentioned specific initiatives such as StereoSet and this article. Singh also talked about transparency of AI - and identified a role for iSchool educators in teaching about transparent AI.
Following this there were interesting discussions in groups about various aspects of AI and information science/libraries.
Image by Sheila Webber using Midjourney AI. It took me a while to stop it showing me very spooky wired female heads in response the the prompt Artificial Intelligence, Information Science. In . the end I specified "in the style of Gwen John" so it lost a bit of the spookiness.

Information Research into Practice, Policy, and Action @asist_org #ASIST23

One session from the ASIS&T conference being held in London focused on participative research. It was entitled Making a Difference: Translating Information Research into Practice, Policy, and Action. The first presentation Towards a Critical Approach to Community-engaged Information Research and Shared Knowledge (by Jia Tina Du and Clara M. Chu) talked about the Community-Engaged Information Behavior (CEIB) methodological framework (Du & Chu, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lisr.2022.101189) and also presented two projects Project APRCH: Agency in the Preservation of Refugee Cultural Heritage and Cultural use of ICT4D to promote Indigenous knowledge continuity of Ngarrindjeri stories and communal practices which utilised the Ngarrindjeri ICT4D Pondi (Murray Cod) visual design framework. 
The second presentation was From Research to Strategic Planning to Collective Action: A Logic Model Using Theory of Change to Further Civic Engagement for Racial Justice in Public Libraries (Bharat Mehra, Kimberly Black, and Baheya S. Jaber): This project is using Theory of Change, in a project funded by the US Institute of Museum and Library Services (2022 - 2025). The proposal for the project is here: https://www.imls.gov/sites/default/files/project-proposals/LG-252354-OLS-22-Full-Proposal.pdf
The third presentation was Building a Smart City Portal for a Sustainable Future Through a Collective Impact Approach (by Kendra S. Albright, Bill Edgar, Christina Turner; presented by Chu): The overall goal of this project is to improve the quality of life for the citizens of Cleveland. After finding barriers were not just gaps in device ownership, internet connection and digital/literacy, but also accessing specialist knowledge, they are developing a portal connecting people to subject matter experts. It should include e.g. a directory, applications (like Zoom) that residents can use. Methods include stakeholder interviews and user experience research.
Following the presentations we broke into groups to discuss issues around collective impact, including engagement and collaboration with stakeholders who might have different foci from each other, and the difficulties of matching desired goals for a project with funding agencies' priorities.

Global Perspectives on Inclusive Curricula @asist_org #ASIST23

My second liveblog from the ASIS&T conference is on the panel Global Perspectives on Inclusive Curricula: Places, Practices, and Pedagogy – hosted by the European and South Asia Chapters of ASIS&T with Syeda Hina Batool Shahid (University of the Punjab, Pakistan), Julia Bullard (University of British Columbia (UBC), Canada), Jennifer Campbell-Meier (Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand), Ina Fourie (University of Pretoria, South Africa), Andrea Jimenez and as chair Sophie Rutter (both from my institution, University of Sheffield, UK). I will make the usual caveat that this is my immediate and imperfect impression of what was said.

Bullard started by introducing the Canadian context, and began by acknowledging the traditional holders of the land at her home university. She talked about issues that make inclusive pedagogy critical and challenging, including: the image that Canada projects vs. the reality; the minoritized students' relationships to libraries and archives (they may have felt that the library was a place that made them safe and seen, so being made aware of the problems e.g. with classification schemes can be challenging); the third was relationship between tech courses and diversity & inclusion (realising that tech is not neutral etc.). UBC has had initiatives including: survey of inclusive strategies; creation of internal resources; workshops to support people in changing the curriculum.
Batool talked about the Pakistan context. Firstly she talked about how multicultural the South Asian environment is (e.g. more than 1000 languages). Batool mentioned the work of internationa agencies like the World Bank, USAID and UNESCO though "they were there til the findings were there" i.e. there was a lack of long term impact. She highlighted the ENGAGE project which worked with children in schools. Batool identified that in Pakistan there were well-written policy documents - but these were not translated into actual actions. She also felt that at the basic level there was a lack of sensitivity, for example if you examine textbooks. In rural areas, as another example, there is lack of attention to education for girls (there is no minimum school leaving age). A major problem is lack of infrastructure and inclusive services. From that point of view, there is a need to attend these bigger issues before focusing on an inclusive curriculum.
Campbell-Meier talked about the Aotearoa New Zealand context. She talked about how she needed to place herself within the context, with a Maori introduction of herself, and she started with that for this talk. She talked the policy context in New Zealand and how at the institutional context their whole approach to learning and teaching (and the university atructure) was affected by Maori philosophies and values. In particular this affected ethics, with much more thoughtful consideration of how people will feel protected, safe and with agency in the research process. In terms of assessment, students can hand in oral assessments, and the teachers have to consider how some students will have a focus on orality rather than textual knowledge. Campbell-Meier talked about how all the educators were on a journey, and things can change all the time, so the journey continues.
Fourie talked about the South African context. She identified that different institutions have different approaches, and she focused on the University of Pretoria. The history of Apartheid cannot be ignored. South Africa also has 11 official languages, and many students from other African countries do not speak South African venacuar languages, and may also not want to engage in English. There are also many South Asian students. Thus there are many cultural, language and traditional differences, as well as different religions, backgrounds and physical disabilities as well as learning problems. Additionally many terms are used around this issue. At the University of Pretoria they have a Curriculum Transformation Committee, and have events and inititiatives, but there are still a lot of problems. She gave the example of entering a room where people were speaking in Afrikaans - you might feel excluded if they continued speaking in that language, but also if they switched to English for your benefit. She said they had a module on Indigenous Knowledge, and also that there were attempts to create discussion spaces (third spaces) for students and academics. She mentioned this publication https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-02327-9.
Jimenez talked about the UK context, mentioning one strand around inclusivity of people with disabilities, and the second strand around decolonisation of the curriculum and the role of universities. Although some commentators saw the latter as involving more than inclusion, these issues are often included in Diversity Equality & Inclusion initiatives in UK universities. Jimenez referred to the policies and practice as regards Inclusion at the University of Sheffield. Sheffield positions itself as celebrating inclusion, but if the you look at the statistics for the UK as a whole, it does not look good e.g. in terms of the percentage of black female professors. One further problem is that some of the action plans for different aspects of inclusion can be in conflict when you put them together. Jimenez talked about a project in the Information School, which started with an annotated bibliography, then there were interviews with staff and students, then they held a coproduction workshop with staff and students. Jimenez also highlighted that students are a diverse group, so they are aiming not to stereotype. They are still working on outcomes from the project.
Questions at the end of the session included - what are the desired outcomes of inclusivity? how can you tell when you are successfully inclusive? There were more comments about language and the difficulty when not everyone speaks the national official language, or when students from outside the home country feel exluded if a local language is spoken. A question of whether the issue was dominated by Western agendas was also raised. Altogether there were a lot of rich and important issues raised.

Multispecies Information Science @asist_org #ASIST23

When I can find somewhere to plug in my laptop, I will be doing a little liveblogging from the ASIS&T Annual meeting. Today I'm attending a panel on Multispecies Information Science with Niloofar Solhjoo (Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand), Steve Fuller (University of Warwick, UK), Jenna Hartel (University of Toronto, Canada), Christopher Lueg (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA), Dirk van der Linden (Northumbria University, UK). This is just my immediate impression of what these scholars said.
Firstly Niloofar Solhjoo identified how people and animals are living in a "more than human world" (so should be focused more holistically, rather thanon humans' needs). She urged "Let's stop viewing the information worlds as one that sees humans as separate from (or better than) other life forms". She identified Marcia Bates as innovative in starting to include animals and non-sentient objects in her categorisation of information. She also talked about scholars who have talked about an evolutionary approach, embodiment and post-humanism, faculitating an animal turn in information research.
Solhjoo talked about how her own passion and enthusiasm for her companion animals had led to her research focus. In any situation, there is the human and the animal, and also the environment in which they live and move, and there are many aspects to investigate.
How can you you do multispecies information research? This can be through objective approaches (e.g. sensors, tracking devices) and subjective approaches (visual methods, sensory methods, art-based methods). Solhjoo mapped her own research path, which included observation of the animals and humans (through walking and day-in-the-life interviews), digital photo-diary, interviews with photo elicitation, photo exhibition and phenomenological writing. Solhjoo talked of the "red thread of information" which connected the experience of the animals and their humans. She identified Love, Living in co-existence and Learning as the key themes. Here research is published e.g. here, here and here. She say this as part of a wider movement to be kinder and more inclusive in our focus on different communities and species.

Following this Christopher Lueg talked about embodiment. He referenced is paper which is here. He noted "what a specific view of the world we humans have" - both individually and as a species. He asserted that "we can learn a lot about human perception from nonhuman animals", helping us to consider aspects of the world that we normally ignore or do not perceive. Lueg talked about the movement to de-centre human-centred design, and build in experience of selected animal views in our design process.
Then Dirk van der Linden talked about his journey from a software engineer, whose first experience of design for non human species was in designing a drone for dog walking. At that point he realised the difficulty of designing for animals (the dog kept trying to jump and catch the drone, they hedn't thought about dog behaviour). He realised that a tech solution to animal-human relations was not really the best thing since it focused on "solutions" that didn't actually solve underlying problems (but rather producing "cute tech"). Also he realised there was a need to think more carefully about what animal welfare meant (resulting in questioning things like domestication of animals).
Steve Fuller raised some further issues such as - what comprises "consent" in animals. He stressed too the need to think about domesticated animals (which may only exist because of humans) and undomesticated animals. It's important to consider - where does the data from animals come from - are you representing the animal properly? For information scientists this should include issues of documentation - how can you document an animal's consent to research, including experimentation. Unless you know how the species thinks, you don't know if they consent. Thus, Fuller thought that if we want to engage more with animals and research their information world, we have to consider these issues much more deeply, otherwise we are likely to be misrepresenting them.
Finally Jenna Hartel talked about her information videos and how they embrace a multispecies approach, including animal and insect guides within her videos, featuring the animals used as metaphors by scholars, and as a key way of telling stories e.g. in her plagiarism video (Hartel's videos are here).
There were also following question session there were questions about how this related to inclusion of the different human communities' voices, issues of what information & information use mean, and prejudice against specific animal species.
Photo by Sheila Webber, Tassie (my virtual Siamese Kittycat) observes me from under the tea trolley in Second Life.