On 3/31/11 7:39 PM, "Marcia J. Bates" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Dear Folks,

I'm sending a special appeal to the field regarding the Third Edition of the Encyclopedia of Library and Information Sciences (CRC Press, 2010). My Co-Editor Mary N. Maack and I did our very best to bring the highest quality encyclopedia to the field.

This was a monster project--a huge commitment by many people. Over 700 authors--including many of you--and a 50-person advisory panel were involved in writing the many brand-new and updated article-length entries in the 7-volume,  5,742-page encyclopedia (also available in online form).  Some of the best-known researchers and professional leaders from many countries contributed.

After retiring, I worked full time for 4 years as Editor-in-Chief, and Mary worked on overload for the same time while still working full time at UCLA.  No fewer than 13,000 email messages were exchanged on my portion of the work alone.

We worked and re-worked the contents so as to create as comprehensive, balanced, and up-to-date coverage as possible of several information disciplines, including LIS, archives, museum studies, informatics, knowledge management, and social studies of information.

-->Yet only half of the US and Canadian LIS programs have bought the encyclopedia, according to OCLC's WorldCat.  Most of the British, Scandinavian, or other European schools have not bought it, despite the many authors--over 30% of the total--that we were able to attract from outside the U.S.  I know these have been unusually hard times economically, but if we are not able to recognize and take up such a huge communal project so central to our field--then what does matter to us as a professional community?

Rather than an encyclopedia to be consulted only occasionally, it should be thought of as a comprehensive state-of-the-art review of all the specialties in the information disciplines--a review that can be consulted frequently, with the articles widely used in classrooms.  ASIST members were kind enough to award it the "Best Information Science Publication of the Year" award for 2010. (See a recent review in: Tony Chalcraft, (2011) Reference Reviews, 25(1): 9-11.)

Please see the full Introduction, Topical Table of Contents, and Alphabetical Table of Contents on my website:  http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/bates/ . The Topical Table of Contents best presents the underlying structure of the encyclopedia, being grouped by the major categories of topics covered.

-->Remember, you as faculty can recommend the purchase of items by your library; don't assume that the purchase will happen otherwise.

Thanks for your attention, Marcia