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A Reconsideration of Metatheories of Library and Information Science: A Chinese Information Philosophy Perspective

Wang, Lin; Duan, Jiaxuan

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/133127

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Title
A Reconsideration of Metatheories of Library and Information Science: A Chinese Information Philosophy Perspective
Author(s)
  • Wang, Lin
  • Duan, Jiaxuan
Issue Date
2024-08
Keyword(s)
information philosophy, library and information science, Kun Wu, metatheory, paradigm shifts
Date of Ingest
2026-04-23T13:09:06-05:00
Abstract
In Western countries, the philosophy of information has emerged in the last two decades and influenced the core ideas of library and information science (LIS). Chinese information philosophy, which Kun Wu proposed in the 1980s, has been largely ignored in LIS. Chinese information philosophy is a unique academic school in the international information philosophy community and has great potential to update foundations in LIS. This paper investigates the value and implications of Chinese information philosophy for metatheoretical research in LIS. It draws out theories of this philosophy in the digital age to discuss insights LIS can gain, including in information ontology and epistemology, information thinking theory, information evolution theory, holographic theory, social information theory, and information production theory. Introducing Chinese information philosophy to LIS will change the metatheoretical landscape of the discipline and bridge Chinese and Western LIS to a large degree.
Publisher
Johns Hopkins University Press
Series/Report Name or Number
Volume 73, Issue 1-2, August & November 2024
Type of Resource
text
Genre of Resource
article
Language
eng
Copyright and License Information
Copyright 2025 University of Illinois Board of Trustees

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Library Trends 73 (1-2) August & November 2024: Design and the Philosophy of Information [Restricted] PRIMARY
This 2024 special issue of Library Trends was inspired by the contributions of Marcia Bates to our field and discipline. We are very fortunate to have her selected works gathered into three volumes (Bates 2018a, 2018b, 2018c). Thus, the vision for this issue was to treat Bates’s research “protoparadigm” as derived from Thomas Kuhn as a design sounding board, and I invited authors to freely explore these parameters. Additionally, I called for scholarship deriving from the emergence of Chinese information philosophy as another metatheory for LIS. I intentionally left the term “design” as open as possible, with some influence of Floridi’s (2019) definition of philosophy as conceptual design as a directive. Also, Bates (2002) has long called for good design for elements making up retrieval system interfaces and criticized models that do not actually improve information sources for users.