A genealogy of open access: negotiations between openness and access to research

Open access (OA) is a contested term with a complicated history and a variety of understandings. This rich history is routinely ignored by institutional, funder and governmental policies that instead enclose the concept and promote narrow approaches to OA. This article presents a genealogy of the term open access, focusing on the separate histories that emphasise openness and reusability on the one hand, as borrowed from the open-source software and free culture movements, and accessibility on the other hand, as represented by proponents of institutional and subject repositories. This genealogy is further complicated by the publishing cultures that have evolved within individual communities of practice: publishing means different things to different communities and individual approaches to OA are representative of this fact. From analysing its historical underpinnings and subsequent development, I argue that OA is best conceived as a boundary object, a term coined by Star and Griesemer (1989) to describe concepts with a shared, flexible definition between communities of practice but a more community-specific definition within them. Boundary objects permit working relationships between communities while allowing local use and development of the concept. This means that OA is less suitable as a policy object, because boundary objects lose their use-value when ‘enclosed’ at a general level, but should instead be treated as a community-led, grassroots endeavour

Founding brothers: Leland, buck, and cappon and the formation of the archives profession (session 404)

This session on archives history examines the role of three individuals-Waldo G. Leland (1879-1966), Solon J. Buck (1884-1962), and Lester J. Cappon (1900-1981)-in the formation of the archives profession in the United States in the first three-quarters of the twentieth century. These "founding brothers" published extensively, but they also created and maintained personal manuscript collections that reflect how they viewed themselves and how they wanted to be remembered. Four archivists/historians track through the lenses of the papers of the "founding brothers" the emergence of professional history to the beginnings of public history with their alliance and tension with archival science as a distinct profession

History of Urban Main Library Service

published or submitted for publicatio

Free Speech and the Diverse University

There are those who think that free speech and inclusivity on college campuses are inconsistent. The notion that the two values are in tension with one another has become a common framing for thinking about the modern campus. A Gallup-Knight Foundation poll of college students asked respondents not only whether they valued free speech or diversity but also to choose between them and indicate which was “more important for colleges.” When forced to choose, a substantial minority of students said they would prioritize inclusivity over the freedom to express “viewpoints that are offensive” on campus. Following the Gallup-Knight poll the American Council on Education put a similar question to college presidents. University leaders overwhelmingly insisted that if forced to choose they would prioritize allowing students “to be exposed to all types of speech.” Those pollsters were hardly alone in wanting to focus attention on “when core values collide.” Much of the debate surrounding campus free speech in recent years has assumed that choices must be made between speech and inclusivity and has moved on to argue over which should take priority. This Article proceeds in three Parts. Part I explores the need for universities to clearly articulate their position on free speech. Part II explains why it is crucial to integrate community members into an inclusive intellectual culture. And Part III identifies discrete administrative steps that must be taken to implement these policies