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The 10 Best Library & Information Science Books list have been recommended not only by normal readers but also by experts.
You’ll also find that these are top-ranking books on the US Amazon Best Sellers book list for the Library & Information Science category of books.
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Let’s take a look at the list of 10 Best Library & Information Science Books.
10 Best Library & Information Science Books
Now, let’s dive right into the list of 10 Best Library & Information Science Books, where we’ll provide a quick outline for each book.
1. The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood by James Gleick Review Summary
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The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood
From the bestselling author of the acclaimed Chaos and Genius comes a thoughtful and provocative exploration of the big ideas of the modern era: Information, communication, and information theory. Acclaimed science writer James Gleick presents an eye-opening vision of how our relationship to information has transformed the very nature of human consciousness. A fascinating intellectual journey through the history of communication and information, from the language of Africa’s talking drums to the invention of written alphabets; from the electronic transmission of code to the origins of information theory, into the new information age and the current deluge of news, tweets, images, and blogs. Along the way, Gleick profiles key innovators, including Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace, Samuel Morse, and Claude Shannon, and reveals how our understanding of information is transforming not only how we look at the world, but how we live. A New York Times Notable Book A Los Angeles Times and Cleveland Plain Dealer Best Book of the Year Winner of the PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award
2. Semantic Web for the Working Ontologist: Effective Modeling in RDFS and OWL by Dean Allemang Review Summary
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Semantic Web for the Working Ontologist: Effective Modeling in RDFS and OWL
Semantic Web for the Working Ontologist: Effective Modeling in RDFS and OWL, Second Edition , discusses the capabilities of Semantic Web modeling languages, such as RDFS (Resource Description Framework Schema) and OWL (Web Ontology Language). Organized into 16 chapters, the book provides examples to illustrate the use of Semantic Web technologies in solving common modeling problems. It uses the life and works of William Shakespeare to demonstrate some of the most basic capabilities of the Semantic Web. The book first provides an overview of the Semantic Web and aspects of the Web. It then discusses semantic modeling and how it can support the development from chaotic information gathering to one characterized by information sharing, cooperation, and collaboration. It also explains the use of RDF to implement the Semantic Web by allowing information to be distributed over the Web, along with the use of SPARQL to access RDF data. Moreover, the reader is introduced to components that make up a Semantic Web deployment and how they fit together, the concept of inferencing in the Semantic Web, and how RDFS differs from other schema languages. Finally, the book considers the use of SKOS (Simple Knowledge Organization System) to manage vocabularies by taking advantage of the inferencing structure of RDFS-Plus. This book is intended for the working ontologist who is trying to create a domain model on the Semantic Web.
3. The Accidental Taxonomist, Second Edition by Heather Hedden Review Summary
The Accidental Taxonomist, Second Edition
The Accidental Taxonomist is the most comprehensive guide available to the art and science of building information taxonomies. Heather Hedden a leading taxonomy consultant and instructor walks readers through the process, displaying her trademark ability to present highly technical information in straightforward, comprehensible English. In this fully revised second edition, Hedden provides updates on taxonomy standards, development techniques, and career opportunities for taxonomists. She presents fresh survey data and offers new and expanded coverage of such critical topics as taxonomy testing, metadata, linked data, and SharePoint. Drawing on numerous real-world examples, she explains how to create terms and relationships, select taxonomy management software, design taxonomies for human versus automated indexing, manage enterprise taxonomy projects, adapt taxonomies to various user interfaces, and more.
4. Beasts Factual and Fantastic (Medieval Imagination) by Elizabeth Morrison Review Summary
Beasts Factual and Fantastic (Medieval Imagination)
easts Factual and Fantastic features vivid and charming details from the wealth of manuscripts in the collections of the J. Paul Getty Museum and the British Library, along with a lively text; together both word and image provide an accessible and delightful introduction to the imagination of the medieval world.
5. Crash Course in Library Budgeting and Finance by Glen Holt Review Summary
Crash Course in Library Budgeting and Finance
Concise, informative, and well-indexed, this book helps readers get the “big picture” as well as the considerable number of details involved in managing the finances for a library. For all libraries, money is critical to decision-making about technology, staffing, and collections. As a result, informed budgeting is critically important for any library to succeed. This book explains library finance in a practical, engaging way, using examples of real situations in different types of libraries to teach key points. Written by authors with years of experience in budgeting and financial planning within a variety of library settings and in teaching library management or fundraising at the university level, Crash Course in Library Budgeting and Finance makes it painless to learn how to properly manage money in any library environment. The book addresses the entire process of financial planning, from a general, conceptual overview of library budgeting to the details of generating and spending income, and describes best practices for implementing financial controls. Subjects covered include building construction and capital projects, fund raising, capital campaigns, moving to fee-based services, extending and developing earned income, financial best practices, and assessment and evaluation. The authors also make recommendations regarding when and how to share relevant financial information throughout the organization and with constituents throughout the book. * Provides completely updated information through engaging, clear explanations of details on licensing, contracts, and maintaining technology and electronic resources * Supplies helpful guidance for all levels of library staff―not just upper management * Offers numerous real-world budgeting and finance examples from practicing librarians * Presents information relevant to library administrators in all types of libraries, staff who work with budgets, library finance and budget officers, library board or governance officers, and library foundation managers and grant writers
6. The Science of Managing Our Digital Stuff (The MIT Press) by Ofer Bergman Review Summary
The Science of Managing Our Digital Stuff (The MIT Press)
Why we organize our personal digital data the way we do and how design of new PIM systems can help us manage our information more efficiently. Each of us has an ever-growing collection of personal digital data: documents, photographs, PowerPoint presentations, videos, music, emails and texts sent and received. To access any of this, we have to find it. The ease (or difficulty) of finding something depends on how we organize our digital stuff. In this book, personal information management (PIM) experts Ofer Bergman and Steve Whittaker explain why we organize our personal digital data the way we do and how the design of new PIM systems can help us manage our collections more efficiently. Bergman and Whittaker report that many of us use hierarchical folders for our personal digital organizing. Critics of this method point out that information is hidden from sight in folders that are often within other folders so that we have to remember the exact location of information to access it. Because of this, information scientists suggest other methods: search, more flexible than navigating folders; tags, which allow multiple categorizations; and group information management. Yet Bergman and Whittaker have found in their pioneering PIM research that these other methods that work best for public information management don’t work as well for personal information management. Bergman and Whittaker describe personal information collection as curation: we preserve and organize this data to ensure our future access to it. Unlike other information management fields, in PIM the same user organizes and retrieves the information. After explaining the cognitive and psychological reasons that so many prefer folders, Bergman and Whittaker propose the user- subjective approach to PIM, which does not replace folder hierarchies but exploits these unique characteristics of PIM.
7. Foundations of Library and Information Science by Richard E. Rubin Review Summary
Foundations of Library and Information Science
Richard E. Rubin’s book has served as the authoritative introductory text for generations of library and information science practitioners, with each new edition taking in its stride the myriad societal, technological, political, and economic changes affecting our users and institutions and transforming our discipline. Rubin teams up with his daughter, Rachel G. Rubin, a rising star in the library field in her own right, for the fifth edition. Spanning all types of libraries, from public to academic, school, and special, it illuminates the major facets of LIS for students as well as current professionals. Continuing its tradition of excellence, this text addresses * the history and mission of libraries from past to present, including the history of service to African Americans; * critical contemporary social issues such as services to marginalized communities, tribal libraries, and immigrants; * the rise of e-government and the crucial role of political advocacy; * digital devices, social networking, digital publishing, e-books, virtual reality, and other technology; * forces shaping the future of libraries, including Future Ready libraries, and sustainability as a core value of librarianship; * the values and ethics of the profession, with new coverage of civic engagement, combatting fake news, the importance of social justice, and the role of critical librarianship; * knowledge infrastructure and organization, including Resource Description and Access (RDA), linked data, and the Library Research Model; * the significance of the digital divide and policy issues related to broadband access and net neutrality; * intellectual freedom, legal issues, and copyright-related topics; * contemporary issues in LIS education such as the ongoing tensions between information science and library science; and * the changing character of collections and services including the role of digital libraries, preservation, and the digital humanities. In its newest edition, Foundations of Library and Information Science remains the field’s essential resource.
8. Archive Wars: The Politics of History in Saudi Arabia (Stanford Studies in Middle Eastern and Islamic Societies and Cultures) by Rosie Bsheer Review Summary
Archive Wars: The Politics of History in Saudi Arabia (Stanford Studies in Middle Eastern and Islamic Societies and Cultures)
The production of history is premised on the selective erasure of certain pasts and the artifacts that stand witness to them. From the elision of archival documents to the demolition of sacred and secular spaces, each act of destruction is also an act of state building. Following the 1991 Gulf War, political elites in Saudi Arabia pursued these dual projects of historical commemoration and state formation with greater fervor to enforce their postwar vision for state, nation, and economy. Seeing Islamist movements as the leading threat to state power, they sought to de-center religion from educational, cultural, and spatial policies. With this book, Rosie Bsheer explores the increasing secularization of the postwar Saudi state and how it manifested in assembling a national archive and reordering urban space in Riyadh and Mecca. The elites’ project was rife with ironies: in Riyadh, they employed world-renowned experts to fashion an imagined history, while at the same time in Mecca they were overseeing the obliteration of a thousand-year-old topography and its replacement with commercial megaprojects. Archive Wars shows how the Saudi state’s response to the challenges of the Gulf War served to historicize a national space, territorialize a national history, and ultimately refract both through new modes of capital accumulation.
9. Library Research Models: A Guide to Classification, Cataloging, and Computers by Thomas Mann Review Summary
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Library Research Models: A Guide to Classification, Cataloging, and Computers
Most researchers, even with computers, find only a fraction of the sources available to them. As Library of Congress reference librarian Thomas Mann explains, researchers tend to work within one or another mental framework that limits their basic perception of the universe of knowledge available to them. Some, for example, use a subject-disciplinary method which leads them to a specific list of sources on a particular subject. But, Mann points out, while this method allows students and researchers to find more specialized sources, it is also limiting–they may not realize that works of interest to their own subject appear within the literature of many other disciplines. A researcher looking through anthropology journals, for example, might not discover that the MLA International Bibliography provides the best coverage of folklore journals. In Library Research Models, Mann examines the several alternative mental models people use to approach the task of research, and demonstrates new, more effective ways of finding information. Drawing on actual examples gleaned from 15 years’ experience in helping thousands of researchers, he not only shows the full range of search options possible, but also illuminates the inevitable tradeoffs and losses of access that occur when researchers limit themselves to a specific method. In two chapters devoted to computers he examines the use of electronic resources and reveals their value in providing access to a wide range of sources as well as their disadvantages: what people are not getting when they rely solely on computer searches; why many sources will probably never be in databases; and what the options are for searching beyond computers. Thomas Mann’s A Guide to Library Research Methods was widely praised as a definitive manual of library research. Ronald Gross, author of The Independent Scholar’s Handbook called it “the savviest such guide I have ever seen–bracingly irreverent
10. The Newbery and Caldecott Awards: A Guide to the Medal and Honor Books, 2020 Edition by Association for Library Service to… Review Summary
The Newbery and Caldecott Awards: A Guide to the Medal and Honor Books, 2020 Edition
This annual favorite, newly updated to include the 2020 award and honor books, gathers the books deemed most distinguished in American children’s literature and illustration since the inception of the renowned prizes. A trusted guidebook for quick reference and collection development, it’s also a useful resource for curriculum links and readers’ advisory. With an easy-to-use streamlined look and format, the 2020 guide features * a new interview with two-time Newbery medal winner Lois Lowry; * explanations of criteria used to select the winners; * details regarding the media used to create the artwork in Caldecott-winning titles; and * updated bibliographic citations and indexes for the award winners. This resource for locating information about the best in children’s books is invaluable for children’s services librarians, educators, and everyone else who cherishes quality literature and illustration.
