Adapting to the evolving scholarly record

This presentation will discuss the evolving scholarly record and the changing roles of collecting, organizing, making available, and preserving the scientific heritage.

As scholarly inquiry is experiencing fundamental change, the boundaries of the scholarly record are both expanding and blurring, driven by changes in research practices and in perceptions of the long-term value of certain forms of scholarly materials. Understanding the nature, scope, and evolutionary trends of the scholarly record is an important conceptual exercise, as libraries struggle with many of the related curation tasks, such as selection, recording, archiving, version control, re-usability, etc.

OCLC Research conducted a series of workshops with research libraries and experts in the field to advance the thinking about the scholarly record and the role of libraries in a rapidly changing environment. The workshop discussions strengthened the awareness that the preservation of the scholarly record cannot be effectively secured with strategies designed for print materials. It was equally clear, that it is very difficult for traditional players in the field to rethink their practices and roles in new or disruptive ways.

This presentation will elaborate on the findings from the workshops and stimulate further discussion by sharing some perspectives from the think piece on digital heritage (“The paradox of selection in the digital age”).