Essay by Charlene V. Martoni
Information is pertinent in any discipline, which is why so many meanings for it exist. In his 1991 article, entitled “Information as Thing,” Michael K. Buckland, a professor at the UC Berkeley School of Information, identifies three variant definitions for “information” in relation to the information sciences: information-as-process, information-as-knowledge, and information-as-thing. He then elaborates on the final of these definitions, information-as-thing, in his 1997 article, entitled “What is a ‘Document’?” Buckland shows, in these pieces, why it is necessary for information professionals to widen the parameters for what should be considered an informative document. In presenting his ideas, Buckland opens the information sciences to new possibilities, and so he opens the world to them as well. Continue reading “Michael K. Buckland’s Liberation of the Information Sciences”
