Key Timeline

  • Deadline for Proposals: December 15, 2024
  • August, 2025, IFLA Library History SIG Sponsored Author’s Symposium to workshop and discuss chapter drafts.
  • Full chapters will be due in April of 2026.
  • The book will be published in 2027 by De Gruyter academic publishing.

Editors:

  • Steven Witt, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA
  • Peter Lor, University of Pretoria, South Africa
  • Anna Maria Tamaro, University of Parma, Italy
  • Jeffrey Wilhite, Oklahoma University, USA

Inquiries: Steve Witt, Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign ([email protected])

To mark the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions’ (IFLA) centenary, the IFLA Library History SIG seeks proposals for book chapters that investigate IFLA’s history. We seek broad and interdisciplinary perspectives that draw upon established historiographical methods and primary source materials. We encourage and welcome chapters that take regional perspectives while also seeking submissions focused on topics and themes of both information and transnational/global history as they relate to the impact and activities of IFLA on society, culture, and the information professions. Authors are encouraged to adopt analytical and critical, as distinct from annalistic and celebratory, approaches.

IFLA was founded in 1927 during a period marked by intense interest and development in the potential for organized knowledge to advance individuals and societies, accelerate science and technology, develop economies, and promote international peace and cooperation. Efforts in the library and information science field spawned ambitious projects to catalog human knowledge, standardize practices, and promote access to information through the proliferation globally of public libraries and information bureaus. In the ensuing 100 years, IFLA weathered economic depression, world war, the Cold War, regional conflict, and the continuing information revolutions. At the same time, libraries as institutions, cultural touchstones, and places of refuge played an important role in societies, advancing development, spreading literacy, and supporting governance at all levels. Libraries and the LIS professions have also served as cultural symbols that both inspire hope for social change and engender debate about the role of information and books in advancing contested values.  In short, libraries and organizations such as IFLA have helped to shape both individuals and societies throughout the past 100 years.

Submissions:

Chapter proposals of no more than 1,000 words exclusive of the cover page and references are welcome.

Please include the following to facilitate the peer review process:

Cover Page that includes:

  • Author’s Name
  • Contact Information
  • Institutional Affiliation
  • Names of additional authors

Proposal with following elements:

  • Chapter Abstract (up to 1000 words) and with following elements:
  • Significance to both the history of IFLA and history of information and libraries
  • Temporal and geographical scope
  • Theme and topics covered (with reference to below organization and themes)
  • Archival and primary source materials to be used to support research
  • Bibliography containing relevant secondary source materials

Authors may submit proposals that are derived from historical research projects that have been completed or that are still in progress.

All proposals will undergo peer review.  Decisions will be communicated after the editorial committee’s review of the proposal and a full timeline and guide for authors will be provided to authors at that time.

Upon acceptance of the proposal, authors will be asked to provide a draft chapter for presentation, review, and comment at an author’s invitational symposium of the IFLA Library History SIG to be held in August of 2025.  Revised and complete chapters will be due for final review in April of 2026 to enable publication of the book in 2027.  Following review, chapters should range from 4,000 to 10,000 words inclusive of titles, abstract, manuscript, and references.  These will be submitted using the Chicago Manual of Style notes and bibliography system.

Although the final book will be published in English, the Library History SIG would like to encourage authors from diverse linguistic backgrounds to submit proposals.  The editors will work with authors who wish to write in a language other than English to facilitate translations.

Please send all submissions to the following address: [email protected] with the following subject line: Chapter Proposal

Organization and Themes

The book aims to include both transnational and regional perspectives on IFLA and the history of libraries and the information society over the past 100 years.  The editors plan to organize the volume under the following broad themes:

  • Informational utopia – networks, knowledge organization, and the global rise of libraries
  • Cold War and the dawn of information technology
  • Information for All – access and information justice amidst globalization
  • The future of libraries in an era of ubiquitous information

Within these broad themes, regional perspectives are encouraged from the IFLA Regions:

  • Asia Oceania
  • Europe
  • Latin America and the Caribbean
  • Middle East and North Africa
  • North America
  • Sub-Saharan Africa

In addition, themes and topics to consider with this broader framing include yet are not limited to IFLA’s history as it relates to:

  • Free Access to Information Movement
  • Cultural Heritage
    • Disasters
    • Climate change
    • Committee of the Blue Shield
    • Memory of the World and UNESCO
  • Impact on social, economic, and/or political development
    • Libraries
    • Associations
    • Civil society / governance
  • Post-colonial societies
  • Globalization of information
  • Global political economy of libraries and information
  • Global governance of information and technology
  • Development of public libraries, school libraries, and other library types
  • Public library politics program
  • Relations with international Organizations or associations: League of Nations, UNESCO, WIPO, FID, etc.
  • Relations with foundations and national funding bodies: Carnegie, Bill and Melinda Gates, Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) etc.
  • IFLA sections, units, and programs
  • Leadership development – related to grants and funding for conference attendance
  • Building strong library associations initiatives
  • IFLA during periods of war and social strife
  • Expansion of IFLA as truly global organization inclusive of global south etc

 

During various planning sessions and presentations over the past several years, a number of themes have been identified and suggested for the centenary book.  These have been compiled by Peter Lor, one of the book editors, and are available in “Sources and themes for the historiography of IFLA”.