Exploring New Approaches to the Organization of Knowledge: The Subject Classification of James Duff Brown

James Duff Brown was an infl uential and energetic librarian in Great Britain in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. His Subject Classifi - cation has characteristics that were unusual and idiosyncratic during his own time, but his work deserves recognition as one of the precursors of modern bibliographic classifi cation systems. This article discusses a number of theories and classifi cation practices that Brown developed. In particular, it investigates his views on the order of main classes, on the phenomenon of ???concrete??? subjects, and on the need for synthesized notations. It traces these ideas briefl y into the future through the work of S. R. Ranganathan, the Classifi cation Research Group, and the second edition of the Bliss Bibliographic Classifi cation system. It concludes that Brown???s work warrants further study for the light it may shed on current classifi cation theory and practice.published or submitted for publicatio

Graphic Representations of Hierarchical Systems: Preliminary Study

Graphic representations are used to explain or illustrate concepts in many contexts. This paper presents initial research into the graphic representation of hierarchical systems. In particular, the visual arguments presented in tree and circular hierarchical diagrams are described and discussed using a number of particular examples. Since the graphic display for a hierarchical system represents the relationships recognized by that system, a study of characteristic types of graphic display contributes to our knowledge of the theory that underlies the system. The extent of conceptual match between the visual and classificatory arguments represents the degree to which the graphic form depicts the theory it purports to illustrate

Information Literacy Competencies and Copyright in Brazilian Higher Education Institutions

RESUMEN: La competencia informacional o alfabetización informacional (COINFO/ALFIN) es la evolución natural de la antigua formación de usuarios en las bibliotecas adaptada a los nuevos tiempos, donde la tecnología juega un importante papel. Por su parte, el uso ético y legal de la información es una de las competencias que conforman este tipo de formación dentro de los estándares internacionales COINFO/ALFIN. Con el objetivo de conocer la repercusión del uso ético y legal de la información dentro de estos planes formativos de las bibliotecas de educación superior en Brasil, se diseñó un breve cuestionario en línea para averiguar si poseen un plan de COINFO o de formación de usuarios, si dentro de los planes se trata el uso ético y legal de la información y los derechos de autor, en qué consiste esta información cuando se produce, y si las bibliotecas disponen de personal preparado para atender dudas sobre estas cuestiones. De los resultados se desprende que las bibliotecas de educación superior en Brasil aún tienen un largo camino por recorrer en materia de COINFO. No todas tienen planes adecuados para sus usuarios y entre los que sí tienen, cuando se habla sobre derechos de autor, el discurso se centra en los aspectos sancionadores de los mismos, sin dar cabida a la formación que permita saber a autores y usuarios qué derechos tienen, cómo usar las obras de terceros o cómo pueden compartir sus obras, entre otros.ABSTRACT: Information literacy (IL) is the natural evolution of the old “user training” in libraries, adapted to the new times where technology plays an important role. Legal and ethical use of information is one of the competencies incorporated in important international standards of IL. In order to know the impact of the ethical and legal use of information within these training plans in libraries of higher education entities in Brazil, a brief online questionnaire was designed and executed. The questionnaire aimed to research the existence of plans for IL and/or user training , the ethical and legal use of information, copyright, what kind of information they show, and the availability of staff members at libraries to address concerns on these issues. The results show that libraries of higher education entities in Brazil still have a lot of work to do in our area. Not all of them have adequate education plans for their users and those who do have them, and also include some information about copyright, the discourse focuses on disciplinary aspects, without training authors nor users about their rights, how to use the work of others, how to share their own work, amongst others

Mapping Sentences and Classification Schedules As Methods of Displaying Facets

Two separate streams of facet research emerged during the 1930s and 1940s. In India, S.R. Ranganathan developed facet theory in the context of his work on bibliographic classification systems, and in Israel L. Guttman developed facet theory in the context of the behavioural sciences. Ranganathan and Guttman used the term "facet" and its associated terms (e.g., "facet analysis") with identical meanings and each researcher developed analytico-synthetic methods appropriate for his own field. The paper describes the method each field developed for displaying facet structures, and the two methods are compared. The paper suggests that facet analysis in general and mapping sentences in particular have properties that can be usefully exploited in the development of all types of classification systems, including but not limited to, bibliographic classification systems

James Duff Brown's Subject Classification and Evaluation Methods for Classification Systems

James Duff Brown (1862-1914), an important figure in librarianship in late nineteenth and early twentieth century England, made contributions in many areas of his chosen field. His Subject Classification (SC), however, has not received much recognition for its theoretical and practical contributions to bibliographic classification theory and practice in the twentieth century. This paper discusses some of the elements of SC that both did and did not inform future bibliographic classification work, considers some contrasting evaluation methods in the light of advances in bibliographic classification theory and practice and of commentaries on SC, and suggests directions for further research

Term relationships and their contribution to text semantics and information literacy through lexical cohesion

Abstract: An analysis of linguistic approaches to determining the lexical cohesion in text reveals differences in the types of lexical semantic relations (term relationships) that contribute to the continuity of lexical meaning in the text. Differences were also found in how these lexical relations join words together, sometimes with grammatical relations, to form larger groups of related words that sometimes exhibit a more tightly-knit internal structure than a simple chain of words. Further analysis of the lexical semantic relations indicates a specific need to focus on a neglected group of relations, referred to as nonclassical relations, and a general need to focus on relations in the context of text. Experiments with human readers of text are suggested to investigate these issues, as well as address the lack of research that uses human subjects to identify reader-oriented relations. Because lexical cohesion contributes to the semantic understanding of text, these reader-oriented relations have potential relevance to improving access to text-based information. As well, the structured groups of words formed using a combination of lexical and grammatical relations has potential computational benefits to lexical cohesion analysis of text. 1