University of Washington
Application Deadline: 25 October 2024
The University of Washington Information School (iSchool) is accepting applications for a tenure-track faculty position at the Assistant Professor level starting September 1, 2025.
We are seeking a scholar of Library and Information Science (LIS). This position will be expected to engage in creative, collaborative, and forward-thinking research and education, to support the Information School’s goal of forging a more just and sustainable future.
As a highly interdisciplinary unit, we encourage our faculty to engage in information-based approaches to understand and to address systemic challenges and to make social impact. This position will be expected to contribute to our research and teaching portfolio in LIS. Duties include conducting original and innovative research that examines the critical roles and evolving landscape of libraries, archives, and other knowledge organizations in a diverse, networked, and information-rich world, in one or more of the Information School’s current strategic areas: climate change, health and wellness, healthy information environments, and responsibility in artificial intelligence.
The UW iSchool places an emphasis in research and teaching on a deep understanding of social and ethical dimensions and issues in LIS and to how we can use data and digital technologies to empower diverse communities and to advance informational justice. We also seek applicants who will contribute through LIS research to one or more of the iSchool’s strategic areas. The successful candidate’s scholarship and teaching focus may be in particular focus areas such as:
libraries and archives as catalysts for intellectual freedom, decolonization, and the democratization of civic engagement, including through partnerships with community organizations and professionals such as social workers and public health experts;
cultural, social, and ideological politics and practices of knowledge organization, representation, metadata and categorization, and management of digital content and cultural heritage collections;
building, managing, and deploying emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence for and in libraries;
facilitating learning of all types with children and youth that leverages the strength of libraries and archives as learning institutions;
the role of libraries and archives in advancing Indigenous knowledges and data sovereignty;
improving community health and decreasing health disparities through libraries and other knowledge organizations;
the design, delivery, and assessment of ethically informed information systems sensitive to the needs of diverse communities;
addressing cultural heritage concerns amid the climate crisis and advancing sustainability in and via libraries and archives.
Candidates with interests in other cutting-edge LIS-related topics are also encouraged to apply. Successful candidates will conduct research and teaching that either centers on or strongly aligns with libraries and archives.
The faculty member hired for this position will be expected to develop expertise and a strong research trajectory in order to contribute to fostering a more informed, just, and equitable society through libraries, archives, and the wider information world. We expect that candidates will help augment the educational mission of the iSchool’s highly-ranked MLIS degree program in preparing future information professionals to responsibly develop and use information technologies.