Information technology in librarianship : new critical approaches

In the last 15 years, the ground - both in terms of technological advance and in the sophistication of analyses of technology - has shifted. At the same time, librarianship as a field has adopted a more skeptical perspective; libraries are feeling market pressure to adopt and use new innovations; and their librarians boast a greater awareness of the socio-cultural, economic, and ethical considerations of information and communications technologies. Within such a context, a fresh and critical analysis of the foundations and applications of technology in librarianship is long overdue.

• Introduction: Information Technologies and Libraries-Why Do We Need New Critical Approaches? p. 1 John E. Buschman and Gloria J. Leckie
• 1 Foundations
• 1 Critical Theory of Technology: An Overview p. 31 Andrew Feenberg
• 2 Surveillance and Technology: Contexts and Distinctions p. 47 Gary T. Marx
• 3 Cycles of Net Struggle, Lines of Net Flight p. 61 Nick Dyer-Witheford
• 4 A Quick Digital Fix? Changing Schools, Changing Literacies, Persistent Inequalities: A Critical, Contextual Analysis p. 83 Ross Collin and Michael W. Apple
• 5 Theorizing the Impact of IT on Library-State Relations p. 105 Sandra Braman
• 2 Applications
• 6 The Prospects for an Information Science: The Current Absence of a Critical Perspective p. 129 John M. Budd
• 7 Librarianship and the Labor Process: Aspects of the Rationalization, Restructuring, and Intensification of Intellectual Work p. 143 Michael F. Winter
• 8 "Their Little Bit of Ground Slowly Squashed into Nothing": Technology, Gender, and the Vanishing Librarian p. 165 Roma Harris
• 9 Children and Information Technology p. 181 Andrew Large
• 10 Open Source Software and Libraries p. 205 Ajit Pyati
• 11 Technologies of Social Regulation: An Examination of Library OPACs and Web Portals p. 221 Gloria J. Leckie and Lisa Given and Grant Campbell
• 12 Libraries, Archives, and Digital Preservation: A Critical Overview p. 261 Dorothy A. Warner
• Conclusion: Just How Critical Should Librarianship Be of Technology? p. 281 John E. Buschman
• Index p. 289
• About the Editors and Contributors p. 293