ISKO UK

The British Chapter of ISKO to be known as ISKO UK, was established in February 2007. The Chapter is presided by an Executive Committee, consisting of:

Chairperson: Vanda Broughton (v.broughton[@t]ucl.ac.uk)
Vice Chairperson: Bob Bater (bbater[@t]infoplex-uk.com)
Secretary: Aida Slavic (info[@t]iskouk.org)
Treasurer: Leonard Will (treasurer[@t]iskouk.org)
     
Programme and Event Advisors:

Stella Dextre Clarke, Mark Field, Alan Gilchrist, Silver Oliver, Graham Robertson
Meeting Reporter: Robert Rosset

ISKO UK is a not-for-profit scientific/professional association with the objective of promoting research and communication in the domain of knowledge organization, within the broad field of information science and related disciplines, through the following means:

  • development of liaisons between communities of researchers and practitioners in the domains, sectors and scientific disciplines of the field of knowledge organization
  • organization of study days, seminars, workshops and, in particular, the organization of a biennial conference of ISKO UK in the years alternative to the International Conferences of ISKO
  • all other activities that conform to the objective of the association.
Profile of the present ISKO UK members:
  • by profession/affiliation/job title: independent information consultants/IT specialists, university lecturers, librarians, editors of the universal classification systems
  • by interest/expertise: authors of books, research papers, standards in the field of knowledge organization and indexing languages, specialists in building and implementing indexing languages (classifications, thesauri), specialists for knowledge organization in particular sectors/domain (libraries, KM, museums etc.)

In the coming months, ISKO UK will be working on shaping its agenda, under the broader scope of ISKO, and will seek to establish links with all groups and fora in the U.K. involved in information and knowledge organization.

ISKO INTERNATIONAL

Founded in 1989, the International Society for Knowledge Organization (ISKO) is the leading international society for the organization of knowledge. The Society has a broad and interdisciplinary scope. Its mission is to advance conceptual work on knowledge organization in all kinds of forms, and for all kinds of purposes such as databases, libraries, dictionaries and the Internet.

Scope

As an interdisciplinary society, ISKO brings together professionals from many different fields, with more than 500 individual and institutional members from all over the world, working in fields such as information science, philosophy, linguistics, computer science or special domains such as medical informatics.

More specifically, ISKO aims to

  • promote research, development and applications of knowledge organization systems that advance the philosophical, psychological and semantic approaches for ordering knowledge
  • provide the means of communication and networking on knowledge organization for its members
  • function as a connecting link between all institutions and national societies, working with problems related to the conceptual organization and processing of knowledge

Preamble of the ISKO Charter

1. It is the declared purpose of the International Society for Knowledge Organization to provide personal contacts and opportunities for cooperation to the world-wide community of colleagues who devote themselves to the creation, expansion, revision and application of tools for the organization of knowledge according to conceptual points of view.

2. The International Society for Knowledge Organization therefore considers itself in the first and foremost place as an association of personal members which, however, does not bar institutions from likewise acquiring membership together with their personal representatives.

3. Thus, responsibility and initiative to make this society their worldwide forum lies in the hands of the personal members collaborating in their concern for knowledge organization in common efforts, refraining therefore from pursuing their subjective interestes and respecting the postulates of integrity and truth, mutual recognition and assistance

ISKO ORGANIZATION

ISKO is a non-profit organization with its legal seat in Frankfurt (Germany). Its constitution includes the following bodies:

ISKO ACTIVITIES

Among ISKO’s most important activities are

ISKO cooperates with international and national organizations such as UNESCO, and ISO. In addition, links are established with IFLA, in particular the section on Classification and Indexing, ASIS SIG/CR (Special Interest Group on Classification Research), and Infoterm.