On the border between France and Spain in the Pyrenees

On the border between France and Spain in the Pyrenees
According to legend, the Brèche was cut by Roland, supposedly a nephew of Charlemagne, with his sword Durendal, while attempting to escape the Saracens during the Battle of Roncevaux Pass. This geological gap, if you will, seems like an appropriate metaphor for my personal attempts at Sense-Making.

Monday, January 14, 2008

ALISE 2008

I attended the annual meeting of the Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE) in Philadelphia the first week of January. Thankfully, the weather was unusually warm and pleasant.


I went a couple of days early in order to drive down to the eastern shore of Maryland to visit Rev. Eugene and Beverly Rasmussen. Professor Rasmussen was my faculty adviser years ago at Mid-America Nazarene College and started me on the path of sociology studies. It was great to catch up on old times and play a couple of games of Scrabble.



My primary purpose for attending ALISE was to compete in the doctoral student poster competition with 31 other LIS doc students from around North America. While I did not win an award, it was a great time meeting some other students and seeing the various research everyone is conducting. It was especially rewarding to meet T. Patrick Milas from Florida State University whose dissertation research is entitled: "The Role of Faith in Information Behavior: A Study of Theological Research." While his methodology is much more quantitative than mine, it appears that our area of interest is very similar and we are looking forward to opportunities for collaboration in the future. Stay tuned for more postings on the differences and similarities of our research on the clergy profession from the LIS perspective.

Philadelphia is not one of my favorite places to visit, but I did discover the Reading Terminal at 12th and Market and enjoyed browsing the various food stalls and vendors in this expansive indoor market. My colleague, Waseem Afzal, and I enjoyed some wonderful Indian food at Nandee's and I experienced some of the local brew, Yuengling's, at the indoor beer garden.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I thought that your research and Patrick's were among the most innovative approaches at that poster session. I know from experience that what wins at the poster competion isn't necessarily what wins the dissertation competition later on. I look forward to reading your work. Best of luck to you both!