This study reports an experiment that examines whether librarians provide equitable virtual reference services to diverse user groups. The relative absence of social cues in the virtual environment may mean greater equality of services though at the same time greater inequalities may arise as librarians can become less self-aware online. Findings indicate that the quality of service librarians provide to African Americans and Arabs is lower than the quality of service they provide to Caucasian, Hispanic, Asian, and Jewish students. This study adds to the knowledge of subjective bias in the virtual environment by specifying those that are discriminated against online, identifying the kinds of discriminatory actions of virtual reference librarians, and identifying the type of queries that more frequently result in unbiased service.

Orientador: José Augusto Chaves Guimarães / Banca: Mariangela Spotti Lopes Fujita / Banca: Marcos Luiz Cavalcanti de Miranda / Resumo: Os instrumentos e os processos de representação do conhecimento refletem as visões políticas e culturais de seus idealizadores e, portanto, não são neutros. Desse modo, e considerando que a ética se estabelece como uma maneira de distanciar o poder sobre os outros, evitando ser objeto de qualquer ideologia, observa-se que, a questão da representação está intimamente ligada a uma dimensão ética, porque deve se preocupar com sua utilidade e confiabilidade para determinados grupos de usuários. Nesse sentido, propõe-se, por meio de pesquisa exploratória de natureza teórico-investigativa, estabelecer, a partir dos estudos de Antonio García Gutiérrez, Michèle Hudon e Clare Beghtol, a identificação de vertentes teóricas convergentes que subsidiem as questões sobre os aspectos éticos nas atividades de representação do conhecimento. Do cotejo e análise crítica das idéias dos referidos autores, observa-se que os mesmos possuem concepções convergentes em relação ao usuário e suas crenças, e complementares em relação à competência profissional, podendo-se concluir que os valores de transculturalidade na mediação, multilingüismo e garantia cultural são inerentes às atividades de representação do conhecimento e determinantes do fazer profissional na área. / Abstract: The instruments and the processes of knowledge representation reflect the political and cultural standpoint of its creators and, therefore, they are not neutral. That way, and considering that ethics establishes itself as a way to distance power over others, preventing itself from being the object of any ideology, one can observe that, the issue of representation is linked to an ethical dimension, because it shall concern its utility and reliability for determined groups of users. In this direction, it is considered, by means of exploratory research of theoretical-investigative character, to establish, based on the studies of Antonio García Gutiérrez, Michèle Hudon and Clare Beghtol, the identification of convergent theoretical chains that subsidize the issues on ethical aspects in the activities of knowledge representation. From confrontation and critical analysis of the ideas of the authors listed above, one can observe that the same ones have convergent takes on the user and its beliefs, and complementary takes concerning the professional ability, thus concluding that the values of transcultural ethics of mediation, multilingualism and cultural warrant are inherent to the activities of knowledge representation and determinant to professional performance in the field. / Mestre

Japan launched the new Course of Study in April 2012, which has been carried out in elementary schools and junior high schools. It will also be implemented in senior high schools from April 2013. This article presents an overview of the information studies education in the new Course of Study for K-12. Besides, the authors point out what role experts of informatics and information studies education should play in the general education centered around information studies that is meant to help people of the nation to lead an active, powerful, and flexible life until the satisfying end.

Notions of 'information poverty' and the "information poor" in LIS are examined from a discourse analytical perspective. Foucault's understanding of discourse, as forming the social reality to which it refers, is outlined and the related concept of the statement, as the basic element of discourse, is introduced. 'Information poverty' is examined as a statement in its relation to other statements in order to highlight assumptions and factors contributing to its construction. The analysis is based on close reading of 35 articles published in LIS journals between 1995 and 2005. Four groups of especially productive discursive procedures and themes are identified and discussed: 1. economic determin­ism, 2. technological determinism and the 'information society', 3. historicising the 'in­ formation poor', 4. the library profession's moral obligation and responsibility.

This study of 28 countries involves comparative content analysis of the English versions of codes of ethics proposed by professional associations. It yielded an empirically grounded typology of principles arranged in twenty categories. The most frequently identified principles were professional development, integrity, confidentiality or privacy, and free and equal access to information. While confidentiality and privacy, and equal access to information, appear in all existing typologies of library and information science ethics, other principles, such as copyright and intellectual property, democracy, and responsibility toward society, which appear in almost all other typologies, were evident in fewer than half of the codes. This empirical study provides a global perspective on library association code of ethics.

Intellectual property affects an increasingly large range of social life. Despite the breadth of goods and activities affected by intellectual property schemas, policy-makers, legislators, jurists and even many social theorists have a narrow understanding of the basis for instituting intellectual property rights and understanding their limits: most see intellectual property rights only as a means to create more intellectual goods in society. My dissertation argues that our intellectual property schemas and policies need to be more sensitive to the diversity of values involved in the social meanings of different intellectual goods and activities. Contrary to those who claim that "information wants to be free," I defend a property-based approach to the protection and regulation of intellectual goods. I argue that intellectual property schemas need to do a better job responding to the diversity of value that characterizes intellectual activities and goods. Finally, I argue that context is an important tool for marking out which values are to be promoted in different circumstances and communities.

This thesis is about the issue of privacy in the virtual world of social networks. It describes the pitfalls as well as options in the area of privacy in a user interface of social network Facebook. It also analyzes the user knowledge of these options by using the questionnaire survey and try to find a correlations in the answers of users. The conclusion suggests ways to raise social awareness of the principles of functioning of social networks and the handling of personal data on the Internet.

Orientador: José Augusto Chaves Guimarães / Banca: João Batista Ernesto de Moraes / Banca: Eduardo Ismael Murguia Marañon / Banca: Juan Carlos Fernández-Molina / Banca: Miriam Figueiredo Vieira da Cunha / Resumo: Os estudos sobre a ética na Organização e Representação do Conhecimento, especialmente no Tratamento Temático da Informação, têm colaborado para sedimentar os referenciais teóricos e metodológicos da Ciência da Informação, que se justificam pelo pressuposto da inclusão social que, enquanto um metavalor, se situa entre o preconceito social e o proselitismo, formando um cenário onde três universos axiológicos convivem: o do documento ou informação, o do usuário e o do bibliotecário. Por isso, a indexação está ligada a uma dimensão ética porque deve preocupar-se com sua confiabilidade e utilidade em relação a determinadas comunidades discursivas ou domínios específicos. Nesse sentido, propõe-se, por meio de uma pesquisa exploratória e documental, com características qualitativas e indutivas, identificar a máxima especificidade terminológica que linguagens de indexação brasileiras permitem para termos relativos à homossexualidade masculina, analisando como corpus investigativo os termos atribuídos aos artigos científicos publicados na Journal of Homosexuality, Sexualities e Journal of Gay & Lesbian Mental Health, entre os anos de 2005 a 2009. Do cotejo e análise dos termos e das linguagens de indexação brasileiras verifica-se uma aproximação de significados no contexto brasileiro, imprecisão terminológica, com indícios de preconceitos disseminados através do 'politicamente correto', representação inadequada da temática e a presença de figuras de linguagem / Abstract: The studies on ethics in Knowledge Organization and Representation, especially in the Subject Approach to Information, have collaborated to establish the theoretical and methodological aspects of Information Science which are justified by the assumption of social inclusion, as a metavalue, it situated itself between social prejudice and proselytize, creating a situation where three axiological universes coexist: the document or information, the user and the librarian. Therefore, the indexing is linked to an ethical dimension because it must concern itself with its reliability and usefulness in certain discourse communities or specific domains. In this direction, it is proposed through an exploratory and documental research with qualitative and inductive characteristics to identify the maximum specific terminological that Brazilian indexing languages allow for terms relating to male homosexuality, analyzing like investigative corpus the terms assigned to papers published in the Journal of Homosexuality, Sexualities and Journal of Gay & Lesbian Mental Health, between the years 2005 to 2009. From confrontation and analysis of terms and the Brazilian indexing languages there is an approximation of meaning in the Brazilian context, imprecision in the terminology, with indications of prejudices disseminate by 'politically correct', the biased representation of the thematic and the presence of figures of speech / Doutor

This study presents a critical investigation into the teaching of computer ethics. A qualitative pluralistic approach (a mixture of qualitative approaches) was used to investigate case studies of teaching computer ethics to university-level students from Bahrain. The main issue was that ethics to Arabs and Muslims is a matter of religion than a matter of philosophy whereas the dominant perception in the academic literature which discussed computer ethics teaching is that computer ethics is a form of practical philosophy and hence separate from religion. In order to shed light on this, the study investigated computer ethic’s perceptions and teaching practices which were occurring in universities in Bahrain. The study found that the issue was not a matter of perception but rather a matter of confusion and a misconception. Computer ethics was being confused with morality, religion, basic computer skills to name just a few. And such confusion was causing computer ethics to gradually disappear from the curriculum and become substituted with concepts which were not necessarily capable of building students’ ethical thinking. The study recommends that computer ethics teachers and policy makers from Bahrain distinguish computer ethics from religion, morality and from any other concept and identify it as an independent field of study, also teachers need to involve their students in social and ethical analysis of various kinds so that students understand that ethics is not a set of rules on what is forbidden and allowed aimed at providing straightforward answers to a given problem but rather ethics is a ‘cognitive tool’; a mechanism through which different competing ethical theories and standards are used to reflect on a given problem.

1 Theoretische Grundlage des scaffoldings 2 Scaffolding in der Geographie 3 Unterschiedliche Wege führen ans (Lern-)Ziel