reviews Book Reviews 243 papers from the 2001 preconference, this book also includes selected papers from the previous three preconferences. In his keynote address, Ken Haycock (Graduate School of Library, Archival and Information Studies, at the University of British Columbia) reviewed the outcomes and recommendations of two ALA-spon- sored Congresses on Professional Educa- tion, in addition to those of other studies of successful professional development programs. Haycock’s address not only provides an overview of the current state of planning and development for librar- ian continuing education but also creates a context for the themes presented by the other presenters. The papers included in this book rep- resent an international perspective on continuing education for library profes- sionals. Contributors represent all areas of librarianship, including graduate schools of library science, libraries, and service providers. The authors discuss issues related to the delivery of profes- sional development both within their own countries and globally, review cur- rent practices, present case studies, dis- cuss models of technology use for con- tinuing education, and propose method- ologies and practices for future develop- ment and implementation. Several inter- esting and creative uses of technology are described. Two papers are particularly notewor- thy. Anne Clyde’s essay describes the In- ternational Association of School Librarianship’s School Libraries Online Web site. This site combines the use of vari- ous technologies to foster professional development for school librarians as well as to share information about, and encour- age research in, school librarianship. An- other noteworthy essay by Lesley Moyo describes Africa Virtual University. This in- teresting project provides continuing edu- cation opportunities in Africa; Moyo pre- sents it as a model for the library profes- sion. Moyo also focuses on the advantages of, and barriers to, technology-based edu- cation in Africa: financial, cultural, tech- nological, and content issues. Several other papers in the book also discuss these is- sues within the framework of providing professional and continuing education for librarians in developing countries. The papers are arranged in the order they were presented at the preconference as indicated in the table of contents. How- ever, there are no divisions within the book itself. Given that the preconference was focused on subthemes, a separate table of contents or index providing ac- cess to specific papers addressing those themes would have been helpful. The last five papers, which serve as appendices, are not clearly labeled as being from pre- viously held preconferences or as appen- dices. A note at the end of the foreword does indicate their status; however, it does not match the individual papers with a particular preconference. The print throughout the book is small; figures rep- resenting screenshots from Web sites also are small and at times blurry, making them difficult to read. Despite these stylistic difficulties, this volume of proceedings is recommended reading for anyone interested in the topic of professional continuing education for librarians. Those involved with the use of technology in education also may be interested as many of the essays provide good examples of the effective use of tech- nology in learning that may be adopted in other contexts.—Barbara J. D’Angelo, Arizona State University East. Longino, Helen E. The Fate of Knowledge. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Pr., 2002. 233p. alk. paper, $49.50, cloth (ISBN 0691088756); paper, $16.95 (ISBN 0691088764). LC 2001036267. The Fate of Knowledge is, in a general sense, a treatise on the philosophy of knowledge and the epistemology of science. More narrowly, it is an exploration of a matter of considerable moment and dispute in that domain, namely, the role of social relations in the production and content of scientific knowledge. In her explora- tion, Longino, professor of philosophy and women’s studies at the University of Minnesota, offers an impressive clarifica- 244 College & Research Libraries May 2003 tion and attempted resolution of the is- sues surrounding this subject. The broad issues treated by the author concern the nature, production, acceptance, and evo- lution of scientific knowledge. What is scientific knowledge? Are its production and acceptance largely individualistic, rational, and independent of cultural pro- cesses, social interactions, and historical contexts? Or is scientific knowledge de- termined by such factors? How can sci- entific knowledge be distinguished from nonscientific opinion and belief? In her treatment of these questions, Longino’s concern is not with historical or psycho- logical particulars, but, instead, with gen- eral patterns and processes. Most of it is an analytical critique, but an important part is a normative prescription for sci- entific knowledge. To a large extent, she builds her argu- ments on a categorization of the perspec- tives of philosophers and sociologists who have written on scientific knowl- edge. She contends that many thinkers have approached this subject in one or another of two opposing, dichotomous ways. On the one hand, philosophers have taken a normative approach, em- braced monistic explanation, and empha- sized rationality and cognition by indi- vidual scientists but have downplayed— or even excluded—pluralistic explana- tion, as well as historical and social con- text. In contrast, sociologists of science have taken an empirical approach, focus- ing on either the ideological, cultural set- ting of research or social interactions among members of scientific communi- ties. In so doing, a number of sociologists have espoused relativism and denied the role of cognition in science. To Longino, this opposition is false, unproductive, and a barrier to communication between phi- losophers and sociologists of science. Her aim is to produce an epistemology that dissolves this dichotomy—an epistemol- ogy that recognizes that science is both rational and social. This perspective she calls “social epistemology,” a perspective that she most strongly elucidates and de- velops. Following an initial review of the works of other philosophers and sociolo- gists, the author turns to “Disassembling the Rational–Social Dichotomy,” a chap- ter in which she describes and analyzes two principal obstacles to reconciling the approaches of normative/philosophical and empirical/sociological investigators: first, ambiguity of the term “knowledge,” and second, a set of binary epistemologi- cal concepts. In an attempt to reduce mis- understanding, Longino distinguishes three meanings of scientific knowledge: (1) knowledge production, the practices and processes that generate knowledge; (2) knowing, a three-way relationship among knowers, representations (e.g., models and theories), and objects (e.g., black holes); and (3) content, the corpus of knowledge that consists of verbal, mathematical, or visual representations. That sociologists and philosophers have regarded these three senses of knowledge in differing, opposing ways has been a principal source of disagreement and misunderstanding. Paralleling misunder- standing of the meanings of knowledge has been a dichotomy consisting of a set of binary concepts. In this dichotomy, the “rationalizers” stress individualism and monism, while eschewing relativism, whereas the “sociologizers” emphasize nonindividualism, pluralism, and relativ- ism. In place of this dichotomy, Longino advocates what she terms “the nondichomtomizers way,” which is nonindividualist in that it stresses the social interdependence among knowers, pluralist in that it recognizes that there can be more than one satisfactory account of reality, and nonrelativist in that it re- jects the argument that evidentiary justi- fication is arbitrary. One should note that despite her advocacy of the position that social factors shape scientific research and content, she is not an antirealist or social constructivist; she does not hold the view that scientific explanations are social con- structions that need not have any corre- spondence with reality. In “Socializing Cognition,” Longino amplifies her attempt to reconcile the two Book Reviews 245 opposing views by arguing that social factors play an integral role in all three senses of knowledge. She contends, for example, that social processes have a for- mative role in two cognitive activities— observation and reasoning—emphasized by philosophers of science in their treat- ments of knowledge production. Obser- vation, she writes, “is not simple sense perception … but an organized sensory encounter that registers what is perceived in relation to categories, concepts, and classes that are socially produced. Both ordering and organization are (dependent on) social processes.” Similarly, reason- ing, especially when used to support or justify ideas, involves challenges and re- sponses that arise from social interactions. To anyone educated in the social sciences these points seem indisputable. In marked, rather unexpected contrast with preceding chapters, the expository mode of “Socializing Knowledge” changes from analytical to prescriptive and normative; in other words, from an analysis of how scientific knowledge (and perhaps all knowledge) is produced and accepted to a presentation of a model of how it ought to be produced and accepted. The foundation of Longino’s model is community-based criticism or, more spe- cifically, “critical discursive interactions.” Such criticism, she writes, “must be epis- temologically effective—by helping a community avoid falsehood and by help- ing to bring its accepted content into alignment with its cognitive goals and its cognitive standards.” To ensure effective- ness of criticism, Longino sets forth four criteria: first, venues in the form of “pub- licly recognized forums for the criticism of evidence, of methods and of assump- tions and reasoning;” second, uptake, con- sisting of a community’s changing its be- liefs and theories in response to critical discourse; third, public standards, prin- ciples by which theories, hypotheses, and practices can be evaluated; and fourth, tempered equality, equality of intellectual authority qualified by the amount of training and past record of the individu- als who offer criticism. Meeting these cri- teria for effective critical dialogues, she holds, would insure diversity of perspec- tives on ideas, methods, and findings without reducing scientific knowledge to relativistic chaos. Whether or not her model would be ef- fective is arguable. The democratic, social- istic tenor of the model has an undoubted appeal to anyone troubled by the sometimes imperious, male-dominated scientific estab- lishment. At the same time, her presenta- tion of the model leaves some questions unanswered. For instance, how should one define a community with regard to critical discussion? Should effective critical dia- logue about theories, hypotheses, and methods be limited only to qualified mem- bers of a scientific community or opened to all interested members of a broader com- munity? Or, should only the potential (or actual) economic, social, and ecological con- sequences of scientific programs be opened to truly public criticism? Then, too, in re- gard to the concept of tempered equality, how should intellectual authority be deter- mined? Should criticism of an interpreta- tion of the fossil record of human evolu- tion by a so-called creation scientist be as- signed epistemic weight equal to that made by a paleoanthropologist? By virtue of presenting several con- crete cases of pluralistic explanation, “Pluralism and Local Epistemologies” is the book’s most interesting chapter. The cases the author explores, all from modern biology, feature situations in which two explanations, models, or meth- ods stand in seemingly irreconcilable con- flict with one another. Whereas a monist would hold that one or another of the opposing views in each case will eventu- ally be accepted, Longino—a pluralist— argues that these kinds of opposition of- ten represent different, but complemen- tary, accounts of natural phenomena. How should one judge this work? While conceding that substantive criti- cism should be left to philosophers and sociologists of science, and without re- peating criticism made previously in this review, I would make the following points: To begin with, nearly all readers 246 College & Research Libraries May 2003 with a background in the social sciences would not dispute the central tenets of the author ’s argument—that scientific representations are approximations to real phenomena, that social and cultural factors influence scientific knowledge, that plurality of models and theories is often valuable, and that informed criti- cism of scientific ideas should be encour- aged. At the same time, one is sometimes unsure of what she means by knowledge. What, essentially, is knowledge? How does it differ from information? In certain places in the text, she appears to intend to limit the term knowledge to scientific knowledge, but in other instances she seems to use the term to refer to all knowl- edge. Turning to stylistic matters, pro- spective readers should be forewarned that despite its catchy title, the book’s subject matter and expository style are abstract and academic. With a handful of notable exceptions, the text is nearly de- void of concrete examples. For all read- ers except those trained in philosophy, this absence of concrete illustrations hin- ders understanding. Seemingly written for philosophers and sociologists of sci- ence, the book contains little that lends itself to easy digestion. Following and understanding Longino’s arguments and analysis requires sustained attention, ef- fort, and re-reading. Even so, any who have an interest in the genesis and nature of scientific knowledge should find her exploration of epistemology enlightening and rewarding.—James D. Haug, The Smithsonian Institution. Reading Acts: U.S. Readers’ Interactions with Literature, 1800–1950. Eds. Bar- bara Ryan and Amy M. Thomas. Knox- ville: Univ. of Tennessee Pr., 2002. 289p. alk. paper, $36 (ISBN 1572331828). LC 2001-5651. On the surface, it might not be obvious that there are connections between the issues librarians are facing these days and these essays that completed their intro- spections more than half a century ago. Yet, a closer inspection of this fascinating compilation of eleven historical and lit- erary essays on “reading acts” from sev- eral historical periods—and this is impor- tant—reveals issues that are alive and kicking today for librarians. What do people read? How do they make their choices about what they read? What pri- mary source documents should we be saving today so that similar analyses can be done in the future concerning today’s readers? These are all questions we pon- der and analyze on a regular basis. More- over, a collection such as this forces one to think about issues such as resource preservation, collection development policies for archives, as well as the need to develop an ability to think imagina- tively. But I digress, as I suspect these were not the goals of the authors and editors of this collection, though one clear sign of the quality of this book is the number of ques- tions it raises and the issues it presents for future research. The intent here was to have scholars work with documents left by actual readers who are deemed “ordi- nary.” These documents include diaries, commonplace books, fan mail, booksell- ers’ reports, and student papers. The es- says included here cover several histori- cal periods, deal with books written by prominent authors, and touch on a num- ber of literary genres and cultural groups. Add to this another working premise of this collection, that scholarship can begin with the reader’s perspective, the ways in which ordinary people—in this case mean- ing nonreviewers and nonscholars—re- sponded to and used their reading. This is achieved with a great variety of perspectives. The first essay by Elizabeth B. Nichols asks the question, Was there a gap between the experiences of elite New England women readers in the early na- tional period, as recorded in letters and diaries, and prescriptions of what was proper reading for women? Alison Scott’s “This Cultivated Mind” chronicles the reading of an immigrant woman, Mary Ann Wodrow Archbald, through a study of her journals, letter books, commonplace books, and her surviving library, complete with extensive marginalia. Scott uses these << /ASCII85EncodePages false /AllowTransparency false /AutoPositionEPSFiles true /AutoRotatePages /All /Binding /Left /CalGrayProfile (Dot Gain 20%) /CalRGBProfile (sRGB IEC61966-2.1) /CalCMYKProfile (U.S. Web Coated \050SWOP\051 v2) /sRGBProfile (sRGB IEC61966-2.1) /CannotEmbedFontPolicy /Warning /CompatibilityLevel 1.3 /CompressObjects /Tags /CompressPages true /ConvertImagesToIndexed true /PassThroughJPEGImages true /CreateJobTicket false /DefaultRenderingIntent /Default /DetectBlends true /DetectCurves 0.0000 /ColorConversionStrategy /CMYK /DoThumbnails false /EmbedAllFonts true /EmbedOpenType false /ParseICCProfilesInComments true /EmbedJobOptions true /DSCReportingLevel 0 /EmitDSCWarnings false /EndPage -1 /ImageMemory 1048576 /LockDistillerParams false /MaxSubsetPct 1 /Optimize true /OPM 1 /ParseDSCComments true /ParseDSCCommentsForDocInfo true /PreserveCopyPage true /PreserveDICMYKValues true /PreserveEPSInfo true /PreserveFlatness false /PreserveHalftoneInfo true /PreserveOPIComments false /PreserveOverprintSettings true /StartPage 1 /SubsetFonts false /TransferFunctionInfo /Apply /UCRandBGInfo /Preserve /UsePrologue false /ColorSettingsFile () /AlwaysEmbed [ true ] /NeverEmbed [ true ] /AntiAliasColorImages false /CropColorImages false /ColorImageMinResolution 151 /ColorImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK /DownsampleColorImages true /ColorImageDownsampleType /Bicubic /ColorImageResolution 300 /ColorImageDepth -1 /ColorImageMinDownsampleDepth 1 /ColorImageDownsampleThreshold 1.10000 /EncodeColorImages true /ColorImageFilter /DCTEncode /AutoFilterColorImages true /ColorImageAutoFilterStrategy /JPEG /ColorACSImageDict << /QFactor 0.15 /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1] >> /ColorImageDict << /QFactor 0.15 /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1] >> /JPEG2000ColorACSImageDict << /TileWidth 256 /TileHeight 256 /Quality 30 >> /JPEG2000ColorImageDict << /TileWidth 256 /TileHeight 256 /Quality 30 >> /AntiAliasGrayImages false /CropGrayImages false /GrayImageMinResolution 151 /GrayImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK /DownsampleGrayImages true /GrayImageDownsampleType /Bicubic /GrayImageResolution 300 /GrayImageDepth -1 /GrayImageMinDownsampleDepth 2 /GrayImageDownsampleThreshold 1.10000 /EncodeGrayImages true /GrayImageFilter /DCTEncode /AutoFilterGrayImages true /GrayImageAutoFilterStrategy /JPEG /GrayACSImageDict << /QFactor 0.15 /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1] >> /GrayImageDict << /QFactor 0.15 /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1] >> /JPEG2000GrayACSImageDict << /TileWidth 256 /TileHeight 256 /Quality 30 >> /JPEG2000GrayImageDict << /TileWidth 256 /TileHeight 256 /Quality 30 >> /AntiAliasMonoImages false /CropMonoImages false /MonoImageMinResolution 600 /MonoImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK /DownsampleMonoImages true /MonoImageDownsampleType /Bicubic /MonoImageResolution 1200 /MonoImageDepth -1 /MonoImageDownsampleThreshold 1.16667 /EncodeMonoImages true /MonoImageFilter /CCITTFaxEncode /MonoImageDict << /K -1 >> /AllowPSXObjects false /CheckCompliance [ /None ] /PDFX1aCheck false /PDFX3Check false /PDFXCompliantPDFOnly false /PDFXNoTrimBoxError true /PDFXTrimBoxToMediaBoxOffset [ 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 ] /PDFXSetBleedBoxToMediaBox true /PDFXBleedBoxToTrimBoxOffset [ 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 ] /PDFXOutputIntentProfile () /PDFXOutputConditionIdentifier () /PDFXOutputCondition () /PDFXRegistryName () /PDFXTrapped /False /CreateJDFFile false /Description << /ENU (IPC Print Services, Inc. Please use these settings with InDesign CS4 \(6.x\). These settings should work well for every type of job; B/W, Color or Spot Color. Contact Pre-press Helpdesk at prepress_helpdesk@ipcprintservices.com if you have questions or need customized settings.) >> /Namespace [ (Adobe) (Common) (1.0) ] /OtherNamespaces [ << /AsReaderSpreads false /CropImagesToFrames true /ErrorControl /WarnAndContinue /FlattenerIgnoreSpreadOverrides false /IncludeGuidesGrids false /IncludeNonPrinting false /IncludeSlug false /Namespace [ (Adobe) (InDesign) (4.0) ] /OmitPlacedBitmaps false /OmitPlacedEPS false /OmitPlacedPDF false /SimulateOverprint /Legacy >> << /AddBleedMarks true /AddColorBars false /AddCropMarks true /AddPageInfo true /AddRegMarks false /BleedOffset [ 9 9 9 9 ] /ConvertColors /ConvertToCMYK /DestinationProfileName (U.S. Web Coated \(SWOP\) v2) /DestinationProfileSelector /DocumentCMYK /Downsample16BitImages true /FlattenerPreset << /ClipComplexRegions true /ConvertStrokesToOutlines true /ConvertTextToOutlines true /GradientResolution 300 /LineArtTextResolution 1200 /PresetName ([High Resolution]) /PresetSelector /HighResolution /RasterVectorBalance 1 >> /FormElements false /GenerateStructure false /IncludeBookmarks false /IncludeHyperlinks false /IncludeInteractive false /IncludeLayers false /IncludeProfiles true /MarksOffset 9 /MarksWeight 0.250000 /MultimediaHandling /UseObjectSettings /Namespace [ (Adobe) (CreativeSuite) (3.0) ] /PDFXOutputIntentProfileSelector /NA /PageMarksFile /RomanDefault /PreserveEditing true /UntaggedCMYKHandling /LeaveUntagged /UntaggedRGBHandling /UseDocumentProfile /UseDocumentBleed false >> << /AllowImageBreaks true /AllowTableBreaks true /ExpandPage false /HonorBaseURL true /HonorRolloverEffect false /IgnoreHTMLPageBreaks false /IncludeHeaderFooter false /MarginOffset [ 0 0 0 0 ] /MetadataAuthor () /MetadataKeywords () /MetadataSubject () /MetadataTitle () /MetricPageSize [ 0 0 ] /MetricUnit /inch /MobileCompatible 0 /Namespace [ (Adobe) (GoLive) (8.0) ] /OpenZoomToHTMLFontSize false /PageOrientation /Portrait /RemoveBackground false /ShrinkContent true /TreatColorsAs /MainMonitorColors /UseEmbeddedProfiles false /UseHTMLTitleAsMetadata true >> ] >> setdistillerparams << /HWResolution [2400 2400] /PageSize [612.000 792.000] >> setpagedevice