Library and Information Science - Difficulties Defining LIS

Difficulties Defining LIS

"The question, "What is library and information science?" does not elicit responses of the same internal conceptual coherence as similar inquiries as to the nature of other fields, e.g., "What is chemistry?", "What is economics?", "What is medicine?" Each of those fields, though broad in scope, has clear ties to basic concerns of their field. Neither LIS theory nor practice is perceived to be monolithic nor unified by a common literature or set of professional skills. Occasionally, LIS scholars (many of whom do not self-identify as members of an interreading LIS community, or prefer names other than LIS), attempt, but are unable, to find core concepts in common. Some believe that computing and internetworking concepts and skills underlie virtually every important aspect of LIS, indeed see LIS as a sub-field of computer science! Others claim that LIS is principally a social science accompanied by practical skills such as ethnography and interviewing. Historically, traditions of public service, bibliography, documentalism, and information science have viewed their mission, their philosophical toolsets, and their domain of research differently. Still others deny the existence of a greater metropolitan LIS, viewing LIS instead as a loosely organized collection of specialized interests often unified by nothing more than their shared (and fought-over) use of the descriptor information. Indeed, claims occasionally arise to the effect that the field even has no theory of its own. " (Konrad, 2007, p. 652-653).