Usuário e recuperação da informação

hiato ou ditongo?

Abstract

In the scope of Librarianship and Information Science, the user is seen, in theory, as the direction, as the guide of all actions developed by informational equipment. This is just a speech, contrary to the practice of professional librarians in their work with information. The user, from this conception, is understood as the main subject of the process, not only of reference, but encompassing all actions of libraries or, expanding, of informational equipment. An alleged concealment of interference, both from space and from those who work in it, tends to defend an impossible neutrality. Such neutrality, from the point of view of Librarianship and Information Science, would be evidenced by choosing the user as the ultimate purpose of what libraries and librarians do. With this look in perspective, we need to point out and discuss, in more detail, some items: - The first of them, and not necessarily in order of importance, is the idea that everything is done for the informational subject (or any other denomination present in the literature of the area and employed by those who work in it and those who formally research it) and the entire organization of the library is aimed at satisfying the informational needs, desires and interests presented by the user. This is not what actually happens and this is one of the proposals to be addressed in this text.