Critical Organization of Knowledge in Mass Media Information Systems

Abstract

Antonio García Gutiérrez holds a Ph.D. in information sciences from Complutense University of Madrid and is a professor at the School of Communication in Seville University. He has acted as an information systems consultant for international organizations such as UNESCO, World Tourism Organization and as an evaluator of scientific projects for the Fifth Framework Programme of the European Union. He has written more than fifteen books that address the problems of knowledge organization and its construction from post-epistemological stances linked to objects related to cultural studies and the postcolonial approach, such as the memory, the experience, the identity and the culture. Abstract: This paper studies knowledge organization (KO) in media archives, focusing on the presence of subjectivity in the core tasks of mass media knowledge organizers (MKOS) dealing with press, radio and TV records, such as classification, representation, and any other process related to content analysis and organization in news information systems. Far from rejecting subjectivity and ideological bias in these operations -since they coparticipate in the media construction of reality-the authors consider MKOS to be genuine ideological and cultural mediators with the right and social responsibility to explicitly state the results of their "objectifiable" work (obtained through KO protocols and procedures determined by the media/company, classifications, thesauri, ontologies, etc.) and differentiate them from those of their political, ideological, cultural and, in sum, subjective stances. In order to achieve this, we propose the application of critical operators that should be followed by technical, collaborative and even technological actions geared to investing information systems with the capacity to consider those stances and allowing users to distinguish them. In short, it is the theoretical recognition of the subjective and biased presence of media knowledge organization operators in a job that is usually considered neutral, banal and even objective, and the initial development of tools for critical, self-critical, technical, and technological training keyed to its practical solution. This paper outlines the lines of work of a broader research study on the critical function of KO in the field of global media memory.

The Ethics of Knowledge Organization and Representation from a Bakhtinian Perspective

“…In this sense, guided by the search for solutions aimed at a pragmatic context, the author presents the following proposals: the adoption of an open and unfinished theory of concepts, well-grounded practice of "declassification" through the establishment of two operators that complement each other: the complex operator, which works to ensure equitable expression of all positions and worldviews about a theme; and the cross-cultural operator which decides and democratically runs, from a scalable consensus, a compulsory and periodically revised, cross-cultural synthesis based on the survey conducted by the complex operator (García Gutiérrez 2014; García Gutiérrez and Martínez-Ávila, 2014). The cross-cultural operator is, according to the authors, the antidote to the relativism the complex operator could be accused of, and the complex operator, on the other hand, would represent the democratic and hermeneutical balance the crosscultural operator seeks support.…”

“…In the last two decades, authors in the field of KO (Beghtol 2002;2005;Berman 1993;Frohmann 1990;1994;García Gutiérrez 2002, 2014García Gutiérrez and Martínez-Ávila, 2014;Guimarães et al, 2008;Hjørland 2002;2008a;2008b;Hudon 1997;Olson 2001;Olson and Schlegl, 2001) have sought to understand the impact of social and cultural processes on activities of knowledge organization and representation (KOR). We assume that this search is based on a socio-cognitive perspective, since we have observed a gradual abandonment of the hegemonic position of the subject oriented to a rationalistic and idealistic perspective, which in the KO domain, unfolds in traditional positions of subject-user, subject-author and subject-classifier/indexer.…”

Classifying Authorial Perspective

“…In particular, this would help users evaluate the potential relevance of works (Clavier and Paganelli 2011). And of course it would alert users to potential biases in the text (Gutierrez and Martinez-Avila 2014). Lukoianova and Rubin (2013) suggest that it might also enhance detection of purposeful deception.…”

Aplicación de la Teoría Crítica de Raza en la organización y representación del conocimiento

“…Los sesgos y problemas éticos en las clasificaciones bibliográficas y otros sistemas de organización y representación del conocimiento son un aspecto que ha sido ampliamente expuesto en la literatura de las últimas décadas (por ejemplo, Berman, 1971;Foskett, 1971Foskett, , 1984Afolabi, 1992;Olson & Ward, 1997;Olson, 2000Olson, , 2001aOlson, , 2002Olson & Schlegl, 2001;Milani et al, 2014). El paso de una hegemonía positivista hacia unas posiciones más pragmatistas ha permitido el rechazo cada vez más abierto de valores como la neutralidad y la objetividad en pos de la reivindicación de la explicitación de los puntos de vista en los procesos de organización y desarrollo de sistemas (por ejemplo, García Gutiérrez, 2002;2011;Martínez-Ávila & Guimarães, 2013;García Gutiérrez & Martínez-Ávila, 2014). En términos más técnicos, Birger Hjørland lo expresa del siguiente modo (Hjørland, 2007, p. 8, traducción propia):…”