The Library as Forum in the Social Media Age

This book lays out the purpose of libraries and, building upon that: creates a discursive practice within which conversations about essential political issues; details how the analysis of discourse can enable the conversations;

sets forth a philosophical framework for the librarians and facilitators of the conversations, and more.

John M. Budd is Professor Emeritus in the School of Information Science and Learning Technologies of the University of Missouri. He has also served on the faculties of the University of Arizona and Louisiana State University. He has been active in professional associations for more than thirty years, serving (among other offices) as Chair of the American Library Association’s Library Research Round Table. He has also served in many capacities in the Association for Library and Information Science Education, including as President. He has also served as President of Beta Phi Mu. Budd has been on several committees with the Association of Information Science and Technology, including twice on the publications committee. He has been a mentor to several individuals, but as members of ASIS&T and as doctoral students. He has been committed to service since the beginning of his career, first as an academic librarian and then as a library and information science faculty member for twenty-eight years. Budd has been a prolific author throughout his career. He has published well over 100 journal articles in some of the most prominent journals, including Library and Information Science Research, Journal of Information Science, Journal of Documentation, and JASIST. His publications also include a number of books, such as The Changing Academic Library, Six Issues Facing Libraries Today: Critical Perspectives, Democracy, Economic, and the Public Good: Informational Failures and Potential, and Higher Education’s Purpose. He has presented more than 125 times at professional conferences.

His teaching and some of his writings have had a political focus. A paper published in Public Library Quarterly presented the gist of the ideas in this book. Moreover, he has written about discourse and discursive practices as they relate to library-related actions. Much of thought has centered on phenomenology and has incorporated this philosophy into his work for more than twenty-five years.