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One major aspect of T.D. Wilson’s research has been his insistence on situating the investigation of information behaviour within the context of its occurrence Ö within the everyday world of work. The significance of this approach is reviewed in light of the notion of embodied cognition that characterises the evolving theoretical episteme in cognitive science research. Embodied cognition employs complex external props such as stigmergic structures and cognitive scaffoldings to reduce the cognitive burden on the individual and to augment human problem‐solving activities. The cognitive function of the classification scheme is described as exemplifying both stigmergic structures and cognitive scaffoldings. Two different but complementary approaches to the investigation of situated cognition are presented: cognition‐as‐scaffolding and cognition‐as‐infrastructure. Classification‐as‐scaffolding views the classification scheme as a knowledge storage device supporting and promoting cognitive economy. Classification‐as‐infrastructure views the classification system as a social convention that, when integrated with technological structures and organisational practices, supports knowledge management work. Both approaches are shown to build upon and extend Wilson’s contention that research is most productive when it attends to the social and organisational contexts of cognitive activity by focusing on the everyday world of work.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a close, detailed analysis of the frequency, nature, and depth of visible use of two of Foucault’s classic early works, The Archaeology of Knowledge and The Order of Things, by library, and information science/studies (LIS) scholars.

The study involved conducting extensive full-text searches in a large number of electronically available LIS journal databases to find citations of Foucault’s works, then examining each citing article and each individual citation to evaluate the nature and depth of each use.

Contrary to initial expectations, the works in question are relatively little used by LIS scholars in journal articles, and where they are used, such use is often only vague, brief, or in passing. In short, works traditionally seen as central and foundational to discourse analysis appear relatively little in discussions of discourse.

The study was limited to a certain batch of LIS journal articles that are electronically available in full text at UCLA, where the study was conducted. The results potentially could change by focussing on a fuller or different collection of journals or on non-journal literature. More sophisticated bibliometric techniques could reveal different relative performance among journals. Other research approaches, such as discourse analysis, social network analysis, or scholar interviews, might reveal patterns of use and influence that are not visible in the journal literature.

This study’s intensive, in-depth study of quality as well as quantity of citations challenges some existing assumptions regarding citation analysis and the sociology of citation practices, plus illuminating Foucault scholarship.

The difficulties of basing healthcare on literary warrant have been explained in different ways: busy practitioners have no time to read extensively, physical access is difficult, and adequate surrogates for texts like indexes, abstracts, systematic reviews are partial in their coverage. The author suggests that a deeper problem of domain conflict must be addressed. This paper reviews problems identified in previous research on evidence‐based nursing practice, which indicates that there are conflicts between medical and nursing domains. EBM (evidence‐based medicine, or “text”) poses challenges for nurses (proponents of “caritas”). An additional surrogate for the medical corpus, the clinical guideline, is discussed. When based on inclusive consultation, this may prove to be a hospitable epistemological bridge for groups whose domains are in conflict. Drawing on “social studies of science” literature, the author explores the provenance and status of the clinical guideline as a “translation artefact” or bridging mechanism, and presents a “snapshot” case study of the Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network in 1998. She suggests that the clinical guideline is a powerful documentary genre, which links several strands of information science: information retrieval, literary warrant and the politics of classification.