• Hi. I'm a doctoral candidate in the Faculty of Health, Arts, and Design at Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia. My supervisors are Professor Lisa Given and Dr. Kim Thompson.

     

    I study people's information experiences in everyday life. I'm especially intrigued by the role of the body and the senses in our information experiences. With my thesis research I'm investigating how people feed themselves and their families, focusing on the role of often-tacit embodied information and knowledge within these activities.

     

    I also work as a librarian at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada.

     

    News and whereabouts:

    • June 2017: Served as Peer Mentor at the Librarians' Research Institute, London, ON (Canadian Association of Research Libraries)
    • June 2017: Presented work at the Canadian Association for Information Science annual meeting, Congress, Toronto (with Lisa Given, Heidi Julien, Lauren Carlson)
    • May 2017: Presented results from the latest Canadian survey of librarians' instructional practices at WILU (with Heidi Julien)
    • May 2017: Led qualitative methods workshop for the Canadian Health Libraries Association (with Denise Koufogiannakis)

    Get in touch: spolkinghorne@swin.edu.au

     

  • Publications

     

      In addition to my doctoral work, I have also investigated librarians' experiences with teaching and with social media.

       

      Recent publications include:

      • Critical consciousness and search: an introductory visualization. (2016). In N. Pagowsky & K. McElroy (Eds.), Critical library pedagogy handbook. Chicago: American Library Association. [Link]

      • Unpacking and overcoming 'edutainment' in library instruction. (2015). In the Library with the Lead Pipe. [Link] [open-reviewed]

    • Presentations

       

        Recently, I've presented:

        • Institutions, ways of knowing, and critical information literacy. (2017, February). Guest lecture for LIS 598, Knowledge Production, Diffusion, and Reception, School of Library and Information Studies, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB.

        • Embodied information in workplace contexts. (2016, October). Symposium of the Special Interest Group for Information Needs, Seeking, and Use (SIG-USE), Annual Meeting of the Association of Information Science and Technology, Copenhagen. (with Thane Chambers) [Link]

        • What I do to #critlib my teaching. (2016, April). IL Palooza [information literacy symposium], MacEwan University, Edmonton, AB.

      • Practice

         

          As a librarian, the core of my practice is supporting students and faculty members in the University of Alberta's Departments of Art & Design, Drama, and Psychology.

           

          My primary responsibilities include:

          • Creating and offering discipline-specific searching consultations and teaching
          • Advising students and faculty members on issues such as scholarly communications, open access, and research data management
          • Coordinating Rutherford Library's exhibitions program

        • Service

           

            Some recent service roles include:

          • Awards

             

              My awards include:

              • Best Overall Paper, Canadian Association for Information Science (with Lisa Given and Lauren Carlson) (2017)
              • Tuition Fees Scholarship, Swinburne University of Technology (2017-)
              • OCLC/ASIS&T Student Prize (2016)
              • Faculty of Education Resource Funding, Charles Sturt University (2016)
              • Research Support Fund Grant, University of Alberta Libraries (2016, 2012)
              • Librarian Recognition Award, University of Alberta (2014)
              • Best Paper by a Practitioner, Canadian Association for Information Science (2013, 2012)
              • Sponsored Place Award at i3 (information: interactions and impact), Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, Scotland (2013)
              • SSHRC Canada Graduate Scholarship (2003)

              • Curriculum Vitae

                Please feel free to view or download the complete chronicle.

              This work is licensed under a

              Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

               

               

              Banner image by Kelly Tindall.