THE CONTRIBUTION OF FOREIGN PROFESSORS TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF INFORMATION SCIENCE IN BRAZIL

Abstract

Information Science received the contribution of foreign professors in the pedagogical development of the Master's course in Information Science at the Brazilian Institute of Library Science and Documentation in the 1970s. The specific objectives of this study were to identify these professors, investigate their academic training and experience, the subjects they taught, the courses they created and their intellectual production. In order to understand the process of institutionalization of the area, an investigation was carried out into the historical context of scientific policies in information, science and technology implemented in postgraduate studies, the infrastructure and performance of the body that implemented the experimental course project and, above all, the contribution of these professors by means of a literature review as part of the methodological strategies. Based on the results, it was concluded that international scientific collaboration was fundamental to the creation of the first Master's Course in Information Science in Brazil, Latin America and the Caribbean, enabling the professional training of new librarians, the continuity of the area and epistemological development in Documentation, Information Retrieval, Bibliometrics, Classification Theory and Knowledge Organization.