An information meta-state approach to documentation

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to bring both Simondonian and Deleuzian insights to bear upon the nature of documents and documentation by viewing them as non-representationalist, and as products of transduction and reticulation that render documents assemblages that are in constant negotiation with an environment as instances of a perpetually renewing problematic.

Design/methodology/approach

Simondon's work on metastability and transduction can offer particular insights into how the author views documents in terms of their materiality, signification, and possibly to move beyond the phenomenological bias in the treatment of documents.

Findings

In understanding or describing the process of documentation as a reticulation or unfolding, the author also comes to view the document as an assemblage in perpetual negotiation. This paper adapts Deleuze and Guattari's articulation framework of expression-signification and provides a bit of groundwork towards two registers of information (first and second order) according to the preindividual process of that allows for the individuation of documents.

Originality/value

This paper makes an original contribution to understanding the process of documentation and the product of documents in a more fluid, interdynamic context by shifting or displacing the traditional view of information.

Citation

X. Faucher, K. (2014), "An information meta-state approach to documentation", Journal of Documentation, Vol. 70 No. 4, pp. 503-525. https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-09-2012-0118