Emerging technologies have offered libraries and librarians new ways and methods to collect and analyze data in the era of accountability to justify their value and contributions. For example, Gallagher, Bauer and Dollar (2005) analyzed the paper and online journal usage from all possible data sources and discovered that users at the Yale Medical Library preferred the electronic format of articles to the print version. After this discovery, they were able to take necessary steps to adjust their journal subscriptions. Many library professionals advocate such data-driven library management to strengthen and specify library budget proposals.

The study of information science and technology has expanded over the years to include more kinds of people, more kinds of behavior, more methods, and a broader inclusion of fields. There is at least one area, however, where very few information studies scholars have tread: entertainment, particularly fiction. Yet many fields indicate that information studies should consider fiction. In this paper, we discuss how fiction is an informative genre and reasons why information studies scholars have mostly ignored fiction. We also identify potential research directions for studying fiction. We provide a summary of works about fiction and information, discuss motivations for expanding (and not expanding) information studies beyond what it is and has been, and we use an exploratory study of one example of a fiction-interaction -reading Young Adult novels -to illustrate how fiction is important to information behavior.

Surveillance is an important element of contemporary society. To understand current surveillance and its implications for privacy, this paper contributes to theory by identifying three oxymorons (apparent paradoxes) related to privacy and surveillance in the “smart home.” After discussing how “smart homes” are telling examples of the general privacy paradox (only an apparent paradox), the paper examines two related oxymorons: what I term the oxymoron of the surveillance of care and the oxymoron of inconvenient seamlessness. They are drawn from empirical, historical, and conceptual investigations of users' attitudes and behaviors. The paper identifies defining differences between automated and “smart homes,” the complexity of understanding implications for privacy and surveillance of such homes, and how empirical studies of attitudes about and behavior related to “smart homes” can inform theory. The paper is partially grounded in feminist and historical research about the home, individual and family life, and consideration of contemporary surveillance theories. Carefully examining oxymorons about surveillance and privacy is key to our understanding and to our scholarly and political action, showing the continuing need for critical surveillance and privacy studies.

No abstract

No abstract