Sarah Polkinghorne, PhD
Hello! I'm a researcher and a librarian.
This page shares current highlights.
To read my full CV, please reach out. I'd be happy to hear from you.
Research
A brief introduction
My research focuses on information practices, including information organization and searching practices, which are unexamined, tacit, or assumed to be mundane. My research illuminates how people's everyday information practices are not mundane at all; they are complex, meaningful, and co-constitutive with identity. In my doctoral research, I worked with participants to capture their everyday food activities and the embodied information practices within them.
I also have an abiding interest in how language choices, such as those of information professionals, reflect power relations, norms, and ways of thinking. I document information experiences that are often taken for granted, and question how such practices are predominantly or habitually discussed.
My current research focuses on people's experiences of online health misinformation, particularly how people navigate embodied misinformation. I also have research on the go in the areas of information literacy and scholarly communication.
Teaching
Recent
Publications
In progress & recent
Presentations
Upcoming & recent
Practice
As an academic librarian
Currently, the core of my work as a librarian is leading monograph collections at the University of Alberta, including ebook frontlists, approval plans, demand-driven acquisition, and assessment.
Before this, I worked as a public services librarian. I helped people find and use information, manage research data, and work through processes such as making their publications openly available.
Service
Recent & ongoing commitments
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Banner image by Kelly Tindall.