Classification and categories

Watch this and consider how the Library of Congress classification system operates

Glushko.Foundations for Organizing Systems.book

Readings

Read pages 237-275, Classification: Assigning Resources to Categories.

by Robert J. Glushko, Jess Hemerly, Vivien Petras, Michael Manoochehri, and Longhao Wang, in Robert J. Glushko's The Discipline of Organizing, MIT Press, 2013.

Pay particular attention the section on p. 237, 7.1.2 Classification vs. Tagging. Think about how this text considers social classification and folksonomies with how the next reading considers them.

books.Weinberger.Everything-is-miscellaneous.jpg

Read chapter 3, The geography of knowledge

pages 46-63 in Weinberger, D. (2007). Everything is miscellaneous: The power of the new digital disorder. New York: Times Books.

Compare Weinberger's discussion of collaborative filtering on pages 60-63 with Glushko's treatment of social classification.

  • Which one holds more resonance for you?
  • Which viewpoint seems to relate more to the world you inhabit?

Continue to think about how you organize your information worlds

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