The Role of Design in the Development of Poole's Index to Periodical Literature: Implications for American Librarianship

Although American librarianship is traditionally conceptualized as a social science, this article proposes an alternative conceptualization: that American librarianship can be considered a design field, underlain by design epistemology. To explore this idea, this article investigates the ways in which design epistemology manifests in early American librarianship through the examination of a formative case: the development of Poole's Index to Periodical Literature. Critical examination and interpretation of primary and secondary source evidence from the development of Poole's Index reveals ways in which design epistemology has been present, albeit implicit, since the beginnings of librarianship as a formal profession in America, raising questions and implications for the field at large.