Bibliography

Bibliography (from Greek βιβλίον biblion, 'book' and -γραφία -graphia, 'writing'), as a discipline, is traditionally the academic study of books as physical, cultural objects; in this sense, it is also known as bibliology (from Greek -λογία, -logia). Carter and Barker (2010) describe bibliography as a twofold scholarly discipline—the organized listing of books (enumerative bibliography) and the systematic description of books as objects (descriptive bibliography). Bibliography (from Greek βιβλίον biblion, 'book' and -γραφία -graphia, 'writing'), as a discipline, is traditionally the academic study of books as physical, cultural objects; in this sense, it is also known as bibliology (from Greek -λογία, -logia). Carter and Barker (2010) describe bibliography as a twofold scholarly discipline—the organized listing of books (enumerative bibliography) and the systematic description of books as objects (descriptive bibliography). The word bibliographia (βιβλιογραφία) was used by Greek writers in the first three centuries AD to mean the copying of books by hand. In the 12th century, the word started being used for 'the intellectual activity of composing books'. The 17th century then saw the emergence of the modern meaning, that of description of books.Currently, the field of bibliography has expanded to include studies that consider the book as a material object. Bibliography, in its systematic pursuit of understanding the past and the present through written and printed documents, describes a way and means of extracting information from this material. Bibliographers are interested in comparing versions of texts to each other rather than in interpreting their meaning or assessing their significance. Bibliography is a specialized aspect of library science (or library and information science, LIS) and documentation science. It was established by a Belgian, named Paul Otlet (1868-1944), who was the founder of the field of documentation, as a branch of the information sciences, who wrote about 'the science of bibliography.' However, there have recently been voices claiming that 'the bibliographical paradigm' is obsolete, and it is not today common in LIS. A defense of the bibliographical paradigm was provided by Hjørland (2007). The quantitative study of bibliographies is known as bibliometrics, which is today an influential subfield in LIS. Carter and Barker (2010) describe bibliography as a twofold scholarly discipline—the organized listing of books (enumerative bibliography) and the systematic description of books as physical objects (descriptive bibliography). These two distinct concepts and practices have separate rationales and serve differing purposes. Innovators and originators in the field include W. W. Greg, Fredson Bowers, Philip Gaskell, G. Thomas Tanselle.