LIS Education and Multidisciplinarity: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

Library and Information Science (LIS) education has a long tradition of multidisciplinarity. Faculty from a wide variety of subject disciplines staffed professional library education programs prior to the establishment of the LIS doctorate at the University of Chicago in 1928. In the mid-twentieth century faculty in LIS schools commonly possessed the LIS doctorate as well as the master's degree in library and information science. But by the late twentieth century, more subject specialists with doctorates from outside the field of LIS were hired as LIS school faculty, contributing to the multidisciplinarity of the field. This study reviews Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE) statistics and analyzes selected faculty and doctoral student characteristics relevant to multidisciplinarity. The question is raised as to whether the trend toward multidisciplinarity among faculty and doctoral students in LIS professional education programs will result in the enhancement or the disintegration of the discipline of library and information science. Suggested criteria for measuring the outcome of the trend are discussed.