AI for the Information Professional
A Critical Guide
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Facet Publishing
Publishing:17th Sep '26
£50.00
This title is due to be published on 17th September, and will be despatched as soon as possible.
Is artificial intelligence (AI) a question answering machine, a helpful companion, a persuasive storyteller, a deceitful often hidden system, or a global industry?
In this authoritative and thought-provoking guide, Andrew Cox invites library and information professionals to reflect on the exciting and troubling concept of AI and the impact it is having on their work and the library and information sector more broadly. Blending practical tips and activities with critical insight, the book equips readers to make informed choices about when – and how – to use AI, answering a range of key questions such as:
- What is AI and what is the history of the idea?
- How is AI changing information behaviour?
- What are the ethical issues around AI?
- How can we make sense of AI’s impact on the environment?
- How can we boost the AI capability of our own library?
- What should every librarian know about AI?
- What are the elements of AI literacy or competency?
- How is AI changing research and what are the implications for libraries?
- How will libraries employ their own chatbots?
- What is the future of AI?
With a distinctive narrative approach, AI for the Information Professional is an engaging, accessible exploration of the stories we tell about AI – and how those stories influence its role in our institutions. Written by one of the leading experts on AI in the sector, this book is an essential, hands-on companion for librarians and information professionals seeking to navigate uncertainty, champion responsible innovation, and shape the future of their field.
Who better than Andrew Cox, author of so many influential publications about AI for information professionals across the previous decade, to write the definitive book in this domain? He builds on that corpus here to deliver a critical guide, as the subtitle promises, taking readers well beyond the hype and enabling them to make up their own minds about how best to approach and integrate AI. Cox achieves this through a highly informed, authoritative and well-balanced perspective, rich with resonant examples, on current and future implications across multiple dimensions embracing information services, operations, skills and ethics.
-- John Cox, former University Librarian, University of Galway and author of The Strategic Positioning of Academic LibrariesAI for the Information Professional delivers on its promise to provide an ‘accessible, engaging, practical, future-oriented and critical introduction to AI’. Delightfully, it does so in a tone that will appeal to librarians with its balanced and considered approach to the various challenges posed by generative AI. The non-technical overview of the issues at hand will be as useful for senior strategy leaders as the practical activities in each chapter will be for instructors.
-- Dr Gavin Boyce, Head of Faculty & Research Partnership, The University of Sheffield LibISBN: 9781783306862
Dimensions: 234mm x 156mm x 11mm
Weight: unknown
216 pages