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Tiffany Veinot to join SI faculty in fall 2008
(Mar 2008) Tiffany Veinot will join the faculty of the School of Information as an assistant professor. Her primary academic field is Library and Information Services.
Veinot will begin her teaching and research duties on September 1. She holds a bachelor's degree in women's studies and a master's degree in library sciences from the University of Toronto. She is a doctoral candidate in information and media studies from the University of Western Ontario.
Veinot says she was attracted to the School of Information because of its "dynamic, multidisciplinary, and collaborative environment" through which to pursue a research agenda regarding health information practices and service models.
"At SI, I see the potential for developing rich research collaborations with scholars in other information specialties and related health disciplines to address significant questions in our field. I believe that there is virtually no other academic environment in which I could so easily find collaborators in such a wide range of cognate areas. Additionally, SI's strengths in community informatics offer a strong foundation for pursuing my interests in community-based, participatory research strategies in the information field."
Veinot says she was also drawn to SI's strength as an educator of new information professionals, and she values teaching and engaging with high caliber students.
"I am also excited by the range of specializations that students can pursue in concert with one of my primary areas of instruction, Library and Information Services. Moreover, SI's dual-degree programs with health disciplines such as medicine, nursing, and social work offer the opportunity to chart new territory at the intersections of these disciplines.
"Truly, I think that SI has been at the forefront of defining professional education in the information field, and I look forward to helping to shape its future in my new role."
Veinot's dissertation is on "HIV/AIDS Information Exchange in Rural Communities: A Mixed Methods Study of Social Capital in Rural Ontario, British Columbia and Newfoundland."
Veinot's research falls into three principal areas. She describes them as understanding health-related information behavior within communities, investigating service models for marginalized populations, and using sociological theories of lay health and scientific knowledge to understand the socio-cultural production of information and information practices.
"In my research, I pay particular attention to the roles of intermediate (meso) levels of social organization, including networks and local organizations, in facilitating information exchange within communities, " she says. "In my dissertation research, I examine information exchange using a form of social capital theory that defines social capital as 'networks of social relations that provide access to needed resources,' and that sees information as a key resource that is shared through these social networks.
"Extending this perspective, I adopt a critical approach that focuses on the development and distribution of networks and resources (social capital) for HIV/AIDS information exchange in three rural Canadian communities. I plan to build upon my dissertation research with future, comparative investigations of HIV/AIDS information exchange within different types of communities so as to develop a broader view of community-based health information exchange."
Veinot says her second line of research is strongly informed by 10 years of experience as an information specialist, in which she provided information services and training to marginalized populations, implemented a number of community development and outreach initiatives, and conducted program evaluation research.
"Academically, I pursue these interests using community-based research strategies, such as in my previous collaborative research regarding treatment information provision for HIV-positive youth via the Internet. In the future, I plan to extend my dissertation research through subsequent investigations of HIV/AIDS information provision strategies for rural residents," she adds.
Veinot says her third area of research draws primarily on practice theory, as in her research on information practices in a blue-collar occupation. "In a recent study, I also use Foucauldian discourse analysis to examine government policy discourses regarding 'empowerment' through consumer health information. I anticipate that my future research in this area will focus on my emerging interest in the socio-cultural production of consumer health information by health social movements."
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