The present historical moment may seem a particularly inopportune time to review Bowling Alone, Robert Putnam's latest exploration of civic decline in America. After all, the outpouring of volunteerism, solidarity, patriotism, and self-sacrifice displayed by Americans in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks appears to fly in the face of Putnam's central argument: that \"social capital\" -defined as \"social networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arise from them\" (p. 19)'has declined to dangerously low levels in America over the last three decades. However, Putnam is not fazed in the least by the recent effusion of solidarity. Quite the contrary, he sees in it the potential to \"reverse what has been a 30to 40-year steady decline in most measures of connectedness or community.\"' As an example of how the current \"war on terrorism\" could generate a durable civic renewal, Putnam points to the burst in civic practices that occurred during and after World War II, which he says \"permanently marked\" the generation that lived through it and had a \"terrific effect on American public life over the last half-century.\" 3 If Americans can follow this example and channel their current civic

Bowling alone: The collapse and revival of American community

This is the first handbook where the world’s foremost “experts on expertise” review our scientific knowledge on expertise and expert performance and how experts may differ from non-experts in terms of their development, training, reasoning, knowledge, social support, and innate talent. Methods are described for the study of experts’ knowledge and their performance of representative tasks from their domain of expertise. The development of expertise is also studied by retrospective interviews and the daily lives of experts are studied with diaries. In 15 major domains of expertise, the leading researchers summarize our knowledge of the structure and acquisition of expert skill and knowledge and discuss future prospects. General issues that cut across most domains are reviewed in chapters on various aspects of expertise, such as general and practical intelligence, differences in brain activity, self-regulated learning, deliberate practice, aging, knowledge management, and creativity.

The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance

Too Much to Know: Managing Scholarly Information Before the Modern Age

Jaron Lanier’s essay Digital Maoism: The Hazards of the New Online Collectivism is a self-described rant of the dangers of the hive mentality in suppressing individual human intelligence as demonstrated in online resources such as Wikipedia and MySpace. He sees merit in collective decision-making and problem-solving if evaluation is uncontroversial, but argues that individuals are essential in providing judgment, taste, and user experiences in many situations. Lanier’s essay appeared in the online progressive publication Edge and received responses from a variety of technologists, academics, and writers. In this Balance Point column, four academic librarians provide a library public services viewpoint in responding to Lanier’s essay.

Collectivism vs. Individualism in a Wiki World: Librarians Respond to Jaron Lanier's Essay

You are not a gadget

The scope of this article is to address the possibilities and challenges librarians concerned with social justice may face when working with the ACRL Framework. While the Framework recognizes that information emerges from varied contexts that reflect uneven distributions of power, privilege, and authority, it is missing a cogent statement that connects information literacy to social justice. In this article, authors concerned with social justice and civic engagement will share their reflections on the Framework from a critical pedagogical and social justice orientation.

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Seeking Social Justice in the ACRL Framework

The Free Online Encyclopedia, as Wikipedia calls itself, is a radical departure from traditional encyclopedias and traditional methods of knowledge creation. This chapter is an examination of how a community of amateurs on Wikipedia has challenged notions of expertise in the 21st century. It does so by first looking at the roots of Wikipedia in a phenomenon known as the “wisdom of the crowds” and in the open source software movement. The reliability of Wikipedia is examined as are the claims made by major critics of the project. Throughout, epistemological questions raised by Wikipedia are addressed.

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Wikipedia's Success and the Rise of the Amateur-Expert

PurposeThe Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois (CARLI) consists of 128 libraries This paper aims to present an analysis of collection and open educational resources (OER) initiatives undertaken by CARLI over the past decade that contribute to improving college affordability Design/methodology/approachAfter reviewing important literature pertaining to library consortia and college affordability, this paper presents a detailed case study of CARLI’s collection and OER initiatives FindingsOwing to their economies of scale, library consortia have the potential to make substantial contributions to improving college affordability Originality/valueCompared to the efforts of individual libraries to improve college affordability, library consortium efforts have received far less attention in the professional literature The work of the CARLI consortium documented here can provide a template for other library consortia that are working to improve college affordability

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Library consortia contributing to college affordability: collection and OER initiatives in the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois

While the ideal of a paperless library may be unobtainable, striving for a paperless interlibrary loan department is both possible and desirable. Interlibrary loan departments at smaller academic libraries are often understaffed and overworked. In this environment, streamlining and efficiency become priorities; implementing practical changes that save time, effort, and money are critical. Changes may include going paperless, improving shipping techniques, using custom holdings wisely, and training staff for efficiency.

Increasing Efficiency and Decreasing Waste by Overhauling Interlibrary Loan Procedures at a Small Community College

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Christopher A. Sweet

Papers

Seeking Social Justice in the ACRL Framework

Wikipedia's Success and the Rise of the Amateur-Expert

Library consortia contributing to college affordability: collection and OER initiatives in the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois

Increasing Efficiency and Decreasing Waste by Overhauling Interlibrary Loan Procedures at a Small Community College

Service-Learning and Information Literacy: Creating Powerful Synergies