About the Series

Building on a solid decade of original research into students’ information practices in the digital age, Project Information Literacy (PIL) has launched a new series of essays in 2021. Each essay makes an argument grounded in research, posing a question for the future: What haven’t we considered as the information landscape grows more complex? What new directions in information literacy and higher education should we be exploring? What fundamental aspects of student experiences with navigating information spaces have we overlooked? What fresh ideas can we surface to inspire librarians, educators, researchers, journalists, and policy-makers?

Reaching beyond any one discipline or, indeed, any singular notion of what “literacy” means today in all of its manifestations, each of these essays offers new insights, drawing from scholarship and the flow of current events, to provoke thought and conversation among practitioners and across boundaries. As with all PIL publications, the essays in this series are open access to encourage sharing and discussion. Ultimately, the goal is to improve teaching and learning while suggesting new avenues for inquiry and experimentation.

Series Staff

Become a Provocation Series Champion

Interested in helping us get the word out about this new occasional series from PIL, and promoting a larger discussion about these essays?

If your library, consortium, campus, or organization is interested in being listed as a supporter of the work that PIL does, and wants to further discussions about information literacy across your campus and beyond, please read more and sign up here. Being a Champion does not require a financial donation. To see a list of organizations pledging support the PIL Provocation Series, click here.

Submissions

Have an idea for a Provocation Series essay? Send us a 100-word summary of what you’d like to write about while demonstrating your writing ability to info@projectinfolit.org. Right now, our publishing schedule is pretty full, but drop us a line — we always like to hear what authors have in mind for our Series.

When preparing your summary for submission, consider the following:

• We publish 2,000–3,000-word articles in English about topics relatively new or not covered thoroughly in existing academic literature or mainstream press. Topics for the Provocation Series must be current, relevant, important, intriguing, and timely, and, honestly, ahead of what’s published elsewhere.
• We publish articles with a writing style that is highly readable, engaging, and journalistic rather than formal, scholarly, and structured like a research paper.
• We value well-developed and incisive arguments about a pressing information issue, which hasn’t been focused on but should, in libraries, classrooms, newsrooms and the media industry, local communities in the U.S. or well beyond.
• A large percentage of Provocation Series readers are not a part of academic libraries and may be students, educators, public library folks, K-12 teachers, journalists, organizations for media literacy, or new media scholars.
• There are absolutely no fees assessed to authors for their papers to be considered for review or publication in our Series. We’re always looking for great ideas and strong writing and an essay that is a “good read.”