Marginalized Knowledge: An Agenda for Indigenous Knowledge Development and Integration with Other Forms of Knowledge

Information seeking

Kingrey (2002: n.p) says that “The term information seeking often serves as an umbrella overarching a set of related concepts and issues. In the library world, discussions of database construction and management, community information needs, reference services, and many other topics resonate with the term. Yet, a single, serviceable definition remains elusive.” Kingrey (2002: n.p) further states that “Like any other complex concept, information seeking means different things in different contexts. In the simplest terms, information seeking involves the search, retrieval, recognition, and application of meaningful content. This search may be explicit or implicit, the retrieval may be the result of specific strategies or serendipity, the resulting information may be embraced or rejected, the entire experience may be carried through to a logical conclusion or aborted in midstream, and there may be a million other potential results.”
Another definition of the information seeking process is provided by Lallimo, Lakkala and Paavola (2004: 2), who state that information seeking is a term used widely in information sciences to encompass the entire process, from recognizing the need for information, to finding and using it. The process focuses on the interaction between the information seeker and information resources. It is a cyclic or iterative process by nature, and involves more than simply gathering information. Thus, it also encompasses posing and identifying the question, exploring available information, coming back to refine the question, gathering and evaluating further information, and synthesizing and using it. This cyclic process of gathering, sorting, evaluating, and refining may be carried out a number of times.
According to Lines (2003: n.p), information-seeking research looks at how individuals go about finding the materials that they need in order to satisfy informational needs, both professionally and recreationally. Nel (n.d: 24) echoes the aforementioned views, stating that information seeking is always embedded in the larger tasks of work, learning and play. Of similar thought is the University Of Michigan School of Information, Information Seeking Behavior’s Instructor Rieh (2004: n.p) who says “Information seeking is a complex information and communication activity requiring access to diverse information systems and resources in order to deal with work-related, personal, and social information problems.”