Youth Information- Seeking Behavior II

Youth Information- Seeking Behavior II

Youth Information-Seeking Behavior II, edited by Mary K. Chelton and Colleen Cool, continues the work of the earlier volume of the same title published by Scarecrow Press in 2004. This collection of an introduc- tory article and ten further contributed chapters is not a purposeful or thematic sample of youth information-seeking research. Nonetheless, as with the earlier book, it provides a snapshot of this work at this par- ticular time, which will be useful to many people in a variety of ways. Individuals not familiar with young people’s information seeking— including students, practitioners, and established scholars in Library and Information Science (LIS) and related fields such as education— will appreciate this book as a first place to start exploring this topic. It is an excellent resource to support information behavior and youth ser- vices courses. It identifies, in one convenient place, many important researchers and research projects. And it will stimulate discussion and thinking among information behavior scholars and youth services librarians.

As with the ever-increasing use of new communications devices, fugi- tive literacy exhibits new manifestations of youth vocal chords. Youth communication is coming alive during our current technical age, defined by its prevailing features: instantaneity, temporariness, porta- bility, flexibility, and high customization . Neither do new communica- tions devices nor fugitive literacies rely completely on national demographic or marketing trends. They rely instead on the up-close neighborhood, the local concerns of students at XYZ High School, on particular music affinity groups, around specific and youth-defined life- style identities and youth culture rituals. For so many young people, literacy is a highly local affair. On the other hand, the rather sinister coinage of ‘‘fugitive’’ accurately implies the negative attitude with which our research and institutions currently approach these emerging trends in young adult information seeking, literacy, and culture.
Youth literacies, in all their manifestations, are quickly becoming an ever more complex and fantastically exciting landscape. And if we are responsive to these changes, at least more responsive than we’ve been in the past, we can look forward to enjoying better and richer relation- ships with young people than we have ever had before.

Mary K. Chelton Colleen Cool