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This study aims to discern medieval information literacy (IL) practices through scrutiny of medieval manuscripts: both the content and the “marks of usage” evident therein.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to discern medieval information literacy (IL) practices through scrutiny of medieval manuscripts: both the content and the “marks of usage” evident therein.
Design/methodology/approach
Analysis of the writing of scribes. Engagement with selected primary texts (manuscripts) and prior scholarly investigations.
Findings
Ample evidence exists of the practice of IL in the medieval era, and how it was transmitted and negotiated across time and space. Popular guides for scholars, including Hugh of St. Victor's Didascalicon, and the marks of usage left on manuscripts by readers/scribes, are evidence of how members of scholarly communities engaged in collaborative metacognitive work, helping each other with tasks such as understanding the ordinatio (organisation) of texts; cross-referencing; locating information; and making judgments about relevance, amongst others. New practices were stimulated by key historical transitions, particularly the shift from ecclesiastical to secular settings for learning.
Research limitations/implications
This is a preliminary study only, intended to lay foundations and suggest directions for more detailed future investigations of primary texts. The scope is Eurocentric, and similar work might be undertaken with the records of practice available elsewhere, e.g. the Arab world, South and East Asia.
Originality/value
Some previous work (e.g. Long, 2017) has investigated medieval scholarly communities by retrospectively applying notions from practice theory, but no prior work has specifically focused upon IL as the practice under investigation.
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Pete Reffell and Andrew Whitworth
IT education has become a key skill for higher education students, but the teaching of this subject is often ineffective. Office‐related, “button‐pushing” skills are passed onto…
Abstract
IT education has become a key skill for higher education students, but the teaching of this subject is often ineffective. Office‐related, “button‐pushing” skills are passed onto students via standardised packages with little regard for context and individual needs. Attempts to use IT to foster more critical and foundational faculties are lacking. The potential impacts of this approach are investigated with the aid of the critical theory of Jürgen Habermas, and his concept of colonisation. As they are amongst the agents for the transmission and reproduction of society, educators in any subject have a responsibility to structure and deliver their teaching in a critical, bottom‐up fashion. This especially applies to IT education.
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The purpose of this paper is to advocate and contribute to a more nuanced and discerning argument when ascribing a democratic role to libraries and activities related to…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to advocate and contribute to a more nuanced and discerning argument when ascribing a democratic role to libraries and activities related to information literacy.
Design/methodology/approach
The connections between democracy and libraries as well as between citizenship and information literacy are analysed by using Mouffe’s agonistic pluralism. One example is provided by a recent legislative change (the new Swedish Library Act) and the documents preceding it. A second, more detailed example concerns how information literacy may be conceptualised when related to young women’s sexual and reproductive health. Crucial in both examples are the suggestions of routes to travel that support equality and inclusion for all.
Findings
Within an agonistic approach, democracy concerns equality and interest in making efforts to include the less privileged. The inclusion of a democratic aim, directed towards everyone, for libraries in the new Library Act can be argued to emphasise the political role of libraries. A liberal and a radical understanding of information literacy is elaborated, the latter is advocated. Information literacy is also analysed in a non-essentialist manner, as a description of a learning activity, therefore always value-laden.
Originality/value
The agonistic reading of two central concepts in library and information studies, namely, libraries and information literacy is fruitful and shows how the discipline may contribute to strengthen democracy in society both within institutions as libraries and in other settings.
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It is now forty years since there appeared H. R. Plomer's first volume Dictionary of the booksellers and printers who were at work in England, Scotland and Ireland from 1641 to…
Abstract
It is now forty years since there appeared H. R. Plomer's first volume Dictionary of the booksellers and printers who were at work in England, Scotland and Ireland from 1641 to 1667. This has been followed by additional Bibliographical Society publications covering similarly the years up to 1775. From the short sketches given in this series, indicating changes of imprint and type of work undertaken, scholars working with English books issued before the closing years of the eighteenth century have had great assistance in dating the undated and in determining the colour and calibre of any work before it is consulted.
THE material used for the construction of the wings of nearly all the aircraft made up to ten years ago was wood, generally silver spruce. Steel tube was sometimes used for the…
Abstract
THE material used for the construction of the wings of nearly all the aircraft made up to ten years ago was wood, generally silver spruce. Steel tube was sometimes used for the fuselage and tubular steel spars had occasionally been used in the wing structure. While wood un‐doubtedly gave excellent service, it was felt that something more durable and more uniform in its properties was required. Sir W. G. Armstrong Whitworth Aircraft, Ltd., of which I am chief engineer, began experiments in metal construction in 1917. The first aeroplane made by this firm in which the whole of the structure was of steel was flown in 1918, and production in series began in 1923. Since then very large numbers of aircraft have been constructed chiefly for the British Royal Air Force, both by my own firm and by four other British constructors, who have made similar aircraft under licence. The purpose of this paper is to give some of the reasons which led to the choice of steel, to describe the system of construction used, and to tell of the experience gained in the manufacture and supply of steel aircraft during the last ten years.
Geoff Walton, Matthew Pointon, Jamie Barker, Martin Turner and Andrew Joseph Wilkinson
The purpose of this paper is to determine to what extent a person’s psychophysiological well-being is affected by misinformation and whether their level of information discernment…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to determine to what extent a person’s psychophysiological well-being is affected by misinformation and whether their level of information discernment has any positive or negative effect on the outcome.
Design/methodology/approach
Participants (n = 48) were randomly and blindly allocated to one of two groups: control group participants were told a person they were working with was a student; experimental group participants were additionally led to believe that this other participant had extreme religious views. This was both stigmatising and misinforming, as this other person was an actor. Participants completed a pre-screening booklet and a series of tasks. Participants’ cardiovascular responses were measured during the procedure.
Findings
Participants with high levels of information discernment, i.e. those who are curious, use multiple sources to verify information, are sceptical about search engine information, are cognisant of the importance of authority and are aware that knowledge changes and is contradictory at times exhibited an adaptive stress response, i.e. healthy psychophysiological outcomes and responded with positive emotions before and after a stressful task.
Social implications
The findings indicate the potential harmful effects of misinformation and discuss how information literacy or Metaliteracy interventions may address this issue.
Originality/value
The first study to combine the hitherto unrelated theoretical areas of information discernment (a sub-set of information literacy), affective states (positive affect negative affect survey) and stress (challenge and threat cardiovascular measures).
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Matthew Pointon, Geoff Walton, Martin Turner, Michael Lackenby, Jamie Barker and Andrew Wilkinson
This paper intends to explore the relationship between participants' eye fixations (a measure of attention) and durations (a measure of concentration) on areas of interest within…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper intends to explore the relationship between participants' eye fixations (a measure of attention) and durations (a measure of concentration) on areas of interest within a range of online articles and their levels of information discernment (a sub-process of information literacy characterising how participants make judgements about information).
Design/methodology/approach
Eye-tracking equipment was used as a proxy measure for reading behaviour by recording eye-fixations, dwell times and regressions in males aged 18–24 (n = 48). Participants' level of information discernment was determined using a quantitative questionnaire.
Findings
Data indicates a relationship between participants' level of information discernment and their viewing behaviours within the articles' area of interest. Those who score highly on an information discernment questionnaire tended to interrogate the online article in a structured and linear way. Those with high-level information discernment are more likely to pay attention to an article's textual and graphical information than those exhibiting low-level information discernment. Conversely, participants with low-level information discernment indicated a lack of curiosity by not interrogating the entire article. They were unsystematic in their saccadic movements spending significantly longer viewing irrelevant areas.
Social implications
The most profound consequence is that those with low-level information discernment, through a lack of curiosity in particular, could base their health, workplace, political or everyday decisions on sub-optimal engagement with and comprehension of information or misinformation (such as fake news).
Originality/value
Ground-breaking analysis of the relationship between a persons' self-reported level of information literacy (information discernment specifically) and objective measures of reading behaviour.
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David R. Sloan, Damon Aiken and Alan C. Mikkelson
The purpose of this research is to explore the effects of regional geographic brand congruency (GBC) on brand trust, brand parity, perceived value, brand honesty and purchase…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this research is to explore the effects of regional geographic brand congruency (GBC) on brand trust, brand parity, perceived value, brand honesty and purchase intentions.
Design/methodology/approach
The research uses an experimental method in two studies to test hypotheses derived from the literature.
Findings
This research conceptualizes GBC as the relationship between products/services and geographic regions that are authentic, credible and fitting. Results from the two studies support the hypothesis that brands with regional GBC have higher levels of consumer evaluation compared to brands with geographic incongruence or with no geographic reference at all.
Research limitations/implications
This research offers insight into the decision to name a brand. If one is going to associate a product with a regional geographic location, it is more effective to use a location that is fitting as it applies to that product; otherwise, it would be best to avoid a geographic association in a brand name.
Originality/value
The exploration of regional geographic brand congruency in relation to outcomes of brand trust, brand parity, perceived value, purchase intentions and honesty offers new insights into the nature and role of place images.
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Instances have occurred in which the holes in the top main plane spars, at the attachment of the front and rear flying wire fittings, in D.H. 87A and 87B (Hornet Moth) aeroplanes…
Abstract
Instances have occurred in which the holes in the top main plane spars, at the attachment of the front and rear flying wire fittings, in D.H. 87A and 87B (Hornet Moth) aeroplanes have elongated, and caused cracks in the underside of the spar.
It was a rough crossing and the last thing we wished to be reminded of was food. The word had an almost repulsive sound. The stomach, however, is a long‐suffering organ. The cruel…
Abstract
It was a rough crossing and the last thing we wished to be reminded of was food. The word had an almost repulsive sound. The stomach, however, is a long‐suffering organ. The cruel writhings of its muscle layers, at loggerheads with each other, gradually ceased and the organ returned to its pre‐crossing quiescence.