Nodes and Arcs: Concept Map, Semiotics, and Knowledge Organization.

Purpose – The purpose of the research reported here is to improve comprehension of the socially-negotiated identity of concepts in the domain of knowledge organization. Because knowledge organization as a domain has as its focus the order of concepts, both from a theoretical perspective and from an applied perspective, it is important to understand how the domain itself understands the meaning of a concept. Design/methodology/approach – The paper provides an empirical demonstration of how the domain itself understands the meaning of a concept. The paper employs content analysis to demonstrate the ways in which concepts are portrayed in KO concept maps as signs, and they are subjected to evaluative semiotic analysis as a way to understand their meaning. The frame was the entire population of formal proceedings in knowledge organization – all proceedings of the International Society for Knowledge Organization’s international conferences (1990-2010) and those of the annual classification workshops of the Special Interest Group for Classification Research of the American Society for Information Science and Technology (SIG/CR). Findings – A total of 344 concept maps were analyzed. There was no discernible chronological pattern. Most concept maps were created by authors who were professors from the USA, Germany, France, or Canada. Roughly half were judged to contain semiotic content. Peirceian semiotics predominated, and tended to convey greater granularity and complexity in conceptual terminology. Nodes could be identified as anchors of conceptual clusters in the domain; the arcs were identifiable as verbal relationship indicators. Saussurian concept maps were more applied than theoretical; Peirceian concept maps had more theoretical content. Originality/value – The paper demonstrates important empirical evidence about the coherence of the domain of knowledge organization. Core values are conveyed across time through the concept maps in this population of conference paper

Cultural Pervasiveness or Objective Violence?: Three Questions about KOS as Cultural Arbiters

Knowledge organization and knowledge organization systems are pervasive in human experience, yet the effect of this pervasiveness is overlooked and little analyzed. Several authors have called for a theory of knowledge organization that embraces cultural and social realities alongside domain-centric ontologies. Examples of leading studies point to pervasive and occasionally oppressive discourses embracing race, sex and gender and economics. Three research questions are presented about how to study knowledge organization systems as cultural arbiters and how to incorporate temporality and atemporality into the methodology of subject ontogeny

Domain Analysis of SIG/CR 2012

Domain analytic techniques are applied to the abstracts approved for the 2012 SIG/CR Classification Workshop. Results of preliminary metric analyses are described

Is FRBR a Domain? Domain Analysis Applied to the Literature of The FRBR Family of Conceptual Models

Domain analysis helps visualize the semantic intellectual content of a coherent group, or domain. A domain is a group with an ontological base, an underlying teleology, common hypotheses and epistemology, and social semantics. FRBR has spawned a family of conceptual models, and much writing. A recent second anthology about the FRBR models raises the question of whether a coherent domain has formed around the FRBR family. Domain analysis is used here to visualize the semantic content of the FRBR family domain, and to compare its two main component groups, scholar authors and practitioner authors. Results show a common teleology with some subtle differences surrounding implementation of the FRBR family of models

Disciplinary, Asynthetic, Domain-Dependent: NARCIS a National Research Classification in Isolation

NARCIS, the National Academic Research and Collaborations Information System, is the national research portal of the Netherlands. NARCIS is governed by a knowledge organization system—a classification—by the same name. For a variety of reasons—a disciplinary base, a lack of synthesis, and domain-dependency—the NARCIS classification is highly compartmentalized and therefore inhospitable for interoperability. In addition, the classification has been revised repeatedly leading to the problems of scheme-versioning and subject ontogeny

Performance works: Continuing to comprehend instantiation

Much work in knowledge organization (KO) is conceptual, which results in a theoretical framework that is itself largely conceptual. In some cases empirical methods have been employed as well for direct observation of phenomena. Direct observation provides a critical base point and a variety of empirical approaches have been used to good effect in KO. The phenomenon of instantiation has been examined to date almost entirely based on the analysis of data derived from empirical analysis. In the present paper we demonstrate the efficacy of the empirical model for category generation by taking one category of instantiation—the performance work—and submitting it to analytical scrutiny. Data from three analytical studies are reviewed and placed alongside evidence from datasets gathered for prior studies on instantiation. A performance work is realized in space and time, and thus exists spatiotemporally. The performance work might be derived from a precedent work, related to other works that are embedded, have adjunct documentation, and be accompanied by antecedent works. A naïve classification is derived empirically, a model follows rationally, and together with semiotic elements a partial typology is generated that represents the essential knowledge elements from which a KO schema for performance works might evolve

Modulation and Specialization in North American Knowledge Organization: Visualizing Pioneers

Pioneers are those who, in some way, lead their peers to new destinations. In the evolution of a domain, the pioneers might very well be those who have followed a theoretical principle in some particularly ardent manner, thus leading the rest of the domain toward an evolving research front. The present paper is an attempt to use the tools of domain analysis to diachronically analyze the domain of knowledge organization as it is evolving in North America. That is we use bibliometric tools to identify the axes that define North American knowledge organization and its scientists, who are its pioneers. The evolution of a North American chapter of the International Society for Knowledge Organization (ISKO) marks a growth in coherence of a long active research area. An interesting research question is: what are the characteristics of North American scholarship in knowledge organization? Author co-citation analysis of North American authors whose work appeared in the journal Knowledge Organization is contrasted with author co-citation analysis of authors from outside North America. North American leaders are clearly identified, and some themes—such as knowledge organization online—that are emergent topics in North America are identified

Big Classification: Using the Empirical Power of Classification Interaction

Classification as a cultural artifact serves an epistemological role as disseminator of the culture it embodies. A theory of classification interaction has been proposed that would combine empirical iterations of bibliographic characteristics as factors interacting with traditional conceptual elements in classifications. Nine million UDC numbers extracted from the OCLC WorldCat are sampled and deconstructed, to look for correlations with content-designated components of the associated bibliographic records. Chi-squared is used to locate statistically-significant correlations among nominal-level variables. Results demonstrate a series of footprints of predictable associations. A complex network of associations is revealed and visualized. The results are promising and point to a series of more complex investigations

From Atomic Elements to Fantastical Machines: The “Concept” in International Classification

The concept—an idea, a notion—is accepted as the core entity in knowledge organization (KO). The founder of the science of KO, Ingetraut Dahlberg, defined a concept repeatedly over time. Concepts have been well-discussed in the literature of both KO and information and have even been described as elementary particles in a theory of knowledge interaction. But an interesting question is what did the concept mean to these original thinkers in the nascent KO a century or more ago? An earlier series of papers about the evolution of the concept in information science based on the discourse of the concept in American Documentation led irrevocably to the notion of the concept as an element that could be isolated for analysis alongside frequent references to fantastical machines. This short paper describes an ongoing research project to undertake the same level of discourse analysis in the foremost evolutionary journal of KO, International Classification. A simple narrative of the occurrence of the “concept” in IC over the course of its run shows evolving definitions but also reveals usage of the notion of the concept as core (or atomic) element