Neo-Pragmatic Organization

Throughout the course of this term log, much of my focus has been on pragmatism in relation to administration; specifically, library administration. As we wrap-up the course, my last log entry will conclude with thoughts on this contemporaneous and relevant topic...

In his editorial, A new pragmatism, Will Manley writes, "A prediction that I made last fall is unfortunately coming true. Public libraries are rapidly becoming the main battlegrounds where our political wars are being fought" (1998). And, Manley wrote this well before 9/11 and the Patriot Act. In a nation where librarians are increasingly confronted with working out censorship issues, etc., with our communities and government, we must ask ourselves as a profession: Where do we stand?...

I would like to claim that a neo-pragmatist position in LIS provides a sociocultrual perspective that aids in library organization.

Until now, library and knowledge organization have been mainly understood as providing the tools for the storage and retrieval of documents. As we moved beyond Modernism and into a Post-Fordist society, we also move beyond strict empiricism, strict rationalism, and strict historicism. Instead, "[p]ragmatism, derived from the consideration of goals and their consequences," (Smiraglia, 2002) becomes a driving force in our societies. And, perhaps, too, should be considered extremely forceful in our libraries.

Neo-pragmatism focuses on communication and participation in relation to information seeking. According to neo-pragmatism, reality is not based in objectivism or subjectivism. Instead, neo-pragmatic reality focuses on physical actions (which are judged by their consequences). Hence, neo-pragmatic knowledge deals with linguistics as they are revealed through their significances. Neo-pragmatism argues for intersubjectivity and community.

Olof Sundin and Jenny Johannisson argue, "Information seeking is, thus, much more than the seeking of facts." They go on, "It would be more theoretically adequate, from a neo-pragmatist and socio-cultural perspective, to treat people's interaction with information and information systems as communicative participation in different social practices. Accordingly, an understanding of people's information seeking, from this perspective, should start in an understand of the communities of justification they participate in" (2005).

The spirit of the library, though, is often lacking. Recent oganizational changes in library management and services have underscored the need for libraries to re-examine their core values in an effort to remain true to their principles.

In class we've studied many different organizational techniques... We have reviewed the history of management, including scientific management. We've have also reviewed different administrative structures, e.g. bureaucratic, self-managing teams, organic. etc. Other structures include managing from the middle and ROW. Neo-pragmatism does not offer a clear administrative structure, but, perhaps this is to be expected. It does however offer the link between linguistics and organization, and organization and principle. Neo-pragmatic organization is not based on worn-out methods or fads. Neo-pragmatic administrative and management views offer a foundation to proceed in the library while remaining true to institutional values and relevant (and prevalent) issues of justice.

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"An interesting research question would therefore be to study different aspects of the relations between education and professional practice within LIS" (Sundin & Johannisson, 2005).

Sources:

Manley, Will. A new pragmatism (1998). American Libraries. Chicago (29), 7, 136.

Smiraglia, Richard P (2002). The progress of theory in knowledge organization. Library Trends. Urbana (50), 3, 330-349.

Sundin, Olof & Johannisson, Jenny (2005). Pragmatism, neo-pragmatism and sociocultural theory: Communicative participation as a perspective in LIS. Journal of Documentation. Bradford (61), 1, 23-43.