scholarly journals On the Space/Time of Information Literacy, Higher Education, and the Global Knowledge Economy

Author(s):  
Karen Nicholson

Local sites and practices of information work become embroiled in the larger imperatives and logics of the global knowledge economy through social, technological, and spatial networks. Drawing on human geography’s central claim that space and time are dialectically produced through social practices, in this essay I use human/critical geography as a framework to situate the processes and practices—the space and time—of information literacy within the broader social, political, and economic environments of the global knowledge economy.  As skills training for the knowledge economy, information literacy lies at the intersection of the spatial and temporal spheres of higher education as the locus of human capital production. Information literacy emerges as a priority for academic librarians in the 1980s in the context of neoliberal reforms to higher education: a necessary skill in the burgeoning “information economy,” it legitimates the role of librarians as teachers. As a strategic priority, information literacy serves to demonstrate the library’s value within the university’s globalizing agenda. While there has been a renewed interest in space/time within the humanities and social sciences since the 1980s, LIS has not taken up this “spatial turn” with the same enthusiasm—or the same degree of criticality—as other social science disciplines. This article attempts to address that gap and offers new insights into the ways that the spatial and temporal registers of the global knowledge economy and the neoliberal university produce and regulate the practice of information literacy in the academic library. Pre-print first published online 12/09/2018

2010 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-71
Author(s):  
Caroline Molina-Ray

2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 128
Author(s):  
Darla Fletcher

In the context of internationalization and globalization of higher education, Kemal Gürüz’s book, Higher Education and International Student Mobility in the Global Knowledge Economy, explores contributions made by international students and scholars in higher education from a historical perspective. A native of Turkey, Gürüz studied and worked for a while at Harvard University and the State University of New York in the United States. He presents the international mobility of students and scholars with in-depth historical, cultural and socio-economical perspectives. Gürüz highlights global knowledge economy, institutional patterns of higher education, enrollments, governance, and recent changes in higher education of several countries in this book.


Author(s):  
Philip Altbach

Problems concerning academic freedom exist almost everywhere—created by changing academic realities, political pressures, growing commercialization and marketization of higher education, or legal pressures. The purpose of this article is to argue that academic freedom needs to be carefully defined so that it can be defended in the global climate of complexity. A new, and probably more delimited, understanding of academic freedom is needed in the age of the Internet and the global knowledge economy.


2020 ◽  
Vol 41 (8/9) ◽  
pp. 631-653
Author(s):  
Sanaz Soltani ◽  
Shahrokh Nikou

PurposeInformation literacy is defined as discrete abilities that a person requires to have in order to find, assess, use and share information. As information literacy skills play a prominent role in the students' academic achievement, students and in particular international students coming to continue their postgraduate studies in other countries may face problems in finding and using library services. The purpose of this paper is to explore and investigate the information literacy skills, challenges and needs of international and domestic students at the Finnish universities.Design/methodology/approachThis paper uses a mixed-methods design. Quantitative data were collected through an online survey (82 respondents) and qualitative data were collected through semi-structured interviews with 10 international and 10 domestic students.FindingsAcademic library services are used but in different ways. The findings indicate that international students have a relatively low level of information literacy skills compared to domestic students and faces various challenges, especially in the beginning of their studies.Research limitations/implicationsThe study was exploratory, and data were collected from limited number of Finnish universities and may not be representative of the underlying population.Practical implicationsAcademic libraries should provide effective courses on research methods and library services to the international students while keeping in mind the international students language and cultural barriers.Originality/valueThis is one of the first attempts in information literacy research that focusses on international and domestic students' information literacy skills at the higher education environment. As such, the results provided in this paper can help librarians and decision-makers at the higher education environments to plan better and become more efficient in delivering information services meeting students' information needs and expectations.


Mousaion ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Doris Noll ◽  
Cheryl Brown

This paper explores the applicability of a new model of information literacy, SCONUL, developed in the global North, to the South African higher education academic library context with all its enormous challenges of accessibility, transformation, basic education and intellectual awareness. Based on a case study of a postgraduate class in a commerce faculty, the paper draws on a survey and focus groups with students and interviews with lecturers to explore perceptions of information literacy and digital literacy as 21st-century skills that students need to be successful in their studies and the world of work. The findings show that whilst students exhibit confidence (through personal internet confidence) in terms of information literacy, they are not as skilled as they believe themselves to be. They also have a narrow notion of the concept. There are also contradictions in the understanding of the concept of information literacy between librarians, students and lecturers.


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