Seven Steps to a Brighter Digital Repository Future | Main | Expanding the value of scholarly, open access e-journals
November 30, 2008
There's More to The Design and Implementation of an Institutional Repository than Just Scholarship and Technology...
The current issue of JEP, The Journal of Electronic Publishing includes an article by Oya Y. Rieger, entitled Opening Up Repositories: Social Construction of Innovation in Scholarly Communication. Rieger's article draws on her experience with "digital repository development and assessment efforts at the Cornell University Library" as well as other experience. However, Rieger notes that much of the available research focuses on the technology aspects of IR design, and does not address the design and implementation of IRs from a socio-cultural perspective. Her current article attempts to place IR design into a more theoretical context by examining IR development from the "social construction of technology theory, actor-network theory, and the socio-technical interactions networks model" (Reiger 2008).
Oya Y. Rieger is the associate university librarian for information technologies at Cornell University Library. Rieger's article opens with a brief examination of the institutional repository eCommons@Cornell hosted at Cornell University Library. She notes that the eCommons@Cornell is built on DSpace, an open access digital repository system originally built through a joint development project between MIT and Hewlett-Packard. However, the article shifts from the technical aspects of the repository to a focus on the socio-cultural context of an institutional repository. The author further notes that libraries take on a new role as "active disseminators" of information through the advent of an institutional repository, shifting the library's role from that of "passive receivers of scholarly outputs" (Rieger 2008).
Rieger first examines the "social construction of technology" in the context of designing and implementing institutional repositories, noting that relevant social groups emerge in the academic environment that operate as "stakeholders" in the IR and influence the development process. Additionally, the discussion examines attitudes toward the IR environment in the academic setting and then explores the use of DSpace specifically as an open access tool for the implementation of the institutional repository. Rieger further notes how the agendas of the open access community in the context of both DSpace and the IR designers meet to satisfy the needs of the academic community.
The second portion of Rieger's examination focuses on "Actor-Network Theory" in the context of the creation of an institutional repository, highlighting the dynamic and complicated "web" of interrelated and interdependent elements in the implementation process. Here, the author discusses actor-network theory in its relation to the change from the traditional scholarly publishing model to the open access/institutional repository model.
The third section examines IRs from the socio-technical interactions networks model, discussing the dynamic cultural context in which the shift in scholarly publishing is occurring. Rieger's discussion addresses the "dialectic of control," and includes in the discussion current issues in scholarly communication including the current Modern Language Association examination of scholarly publication requirements and the recent mandate by the National Institute of Health for the deposit of articles resulting from NIH funding in PubMed Central.
Rieger's article gives an interesting examination of the development of scholarly communication technologies, particularly the move to open access publishing, providing a theoretical framework from which to observe the changes occurring in the scholarly communication environment. Since the article focuses on the theoretical aspects of the implementation of an IR instead of the technological aspects of the project, it provides an illuminating examination of the process. The article is certainly a must read for anyone gearing up for an IR development project.
This blog posting refers to the online edition of the following article:
Rieger, Oya Y. Opening Up Institutional Repositories: Social Construction of Innovation in Scholarly Communication. The Journal of Electronic Publishing 11, no. 3 (Fall 2008).
Online full text of the article is available through The journal of Electronic Publishing and can be found here.
Entry posted by Burr Osoinach--Collection Development IS 560, Fall 2008.
Posted by colldev at November 30, 2008 07:15 PM