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Reviewed by:
  • Spanning the Theory-Practice Divide in Library & Information Science
  • Stephen E. Wiberley Jr.
Spanning the Theory-Practice Divide in Library & Information Science, Bill Crowley. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2005. 239p. $45.00 (ISBN 0-8108-5165-2)

The gaps between the ivory tower of academe and the real world of professional practice, academics in professional schools and practitioners in the field, and theory and practice have existed since at least the rise of the research university, have grown over the years, and are very much with us today. Recently, for example, Warren G. Bennis and James O'Toole explained how business schools' research has become more respectable academically but their curricula more impractical ("How Business Schools Lost Their Way," Harvard Business Review 83 (May 2005): 96–104). Bill Crowley, professor in the Graduate School of Library and Information Science, Dominican University, and a former practitioner of many years, tells a tale comparable to that of Bennis and O'Toole in this work. Just as important as his account of the gap between the worlds of library and information science (LIS) faculty and of practicing librarians are his arguments that we are most likely to bridge this divide by following the philosophy of cultural pragmatism to develop useful theories.

Cultural pragmatism, Crowley explains, is a philosophy that contends "'truths' . . . must be continually tested in a variety of contexts," that "everyday truths tend to be culture specific," (p. 202) and that cultural pragmatism's philosophical competitors, including religious beliefs, can provide theories worth testing. Useful theory is theory that predicts what will happen in the real world of working situations, is in accord with the experience of those who will apply it, and solves problems more effectively than its competitors. To be successful in developing useful theory, it is important to create "interlanguages," terminology and understandings that practitioners and theorists mutually accept and that facilitate collaboration and problem solving.

The chief developers of theory for practicing librarians are faculty in schools of LIS. Crowley delineates at considerable length both the social and especially the intellectual contexts in which these faculty work. Over time, different paradigms have governed the academy. Most recently postmodernism has largely replaced modernism, but even postmodernism is being pushed aside, and cultural pragmatism, Crowley argues, should be its replacement. At all times, successful academics in LIS as well as other fields have met the norms of their disciplines and of the academy by developing theory that builds upon or replaces previous theory and more often than not has little relevance to practice.

Crowley urges LIS faculty to develop useful theories and to work to make the academy an environment more receptive [End Page 580] to them. He argues that library theorists need to draw on manifestations of the tacit knowledge of practitioners including "how we did it good" studies and accounts of best practices. He addresses implications for theory and practice of practitioners teaching in library schools, of knowledge gained through consulting, and of the need in the United States to take into account religious beliefs in developing theory.

Crowley's down-to-earth writing style and his ideas are easy to comprehend and persuasive. If LIS faculty take his arguments seriously, they will be motivated to begin (or to continue) to translate their theoretical work into terms understood by practitioners. Practitioners who read his book will better understand the intellectual and social environment in which LIS faculty work and, I would hope, make greater effort to understand LIS faculty theory.

Crowley occasionally strays from his main argument as, for example, when he presents—wise as they are—his "tricks of the teaching trade" for practitioners who teach in library schools. The closing chapters about practitioners and theory, consultants and theory, and the place of religious traditions in theory development would have been stronger if each had one fully developed (if hypothetical) example of theory development. And I was surprised by the absence of discussion of the gap between theory and practice caused by some practitioners' lack of knowledge of quantitative methods.

These reservations, however, are minor points compared to the bottom line. Bill Crowley has written a book that will inform many and have a useful...

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