A comparative analysis of instructional course themes in LIS and museum studies programs in the USA

摘要

Purpose - Considerable overlap exists between the disciplines of library and information science and museum studies. Exploiting the overlap and examining those areas were library/museum instruction courses diverge may provide valuable insights for how to improve the quality of these courses and better prepare students for instructional roles in both disciplines. Design/methodology/approach - Word frequency and thematic analysis of the instructional course descriptions for all 52 American Library Association-accredited Master of Library and Information Science programs in the USA and 49 museum studies and affiliated (e.g. MA in anthropology with museum studies concentration) programs is performed. Findings - Each discipline has some specific language to describe tasks specific to itself (e.g. museums), but these comprise a small percentage of the total language usage. Among other terms and themes, overlap occurs at a rate of about 50%. The remaining 3545% of terms and themes reveal areas that are emphasized in only one discipline, but could be beneficial to incorporate in the curriculum/content in both disciplines. Research limitations/implications - This research builds on a growing corpus of work demonstrating relations between museum studies and library and information science, and their status within a metadiscipline of information; this research presents a comparison of course content that may inform future curriculum/content development. Originality/value - To the best of the authors' knowledge, no study of this type has been performed with museum studies courses, nor has a comparison between the two disciplines been investigated at this level.