Plugging the “whole”: librarians as interdisciplinary facilitators

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine some of the obstacles to interdisciplinary research and examine some ways that academic librarians can help to overcome them.Design/methodology/approach – A broad review of the literature of the social sciences was reviewed for descriptions of difficulties that interdisciplinary researchers encounter. General developments in librarianship from library literature were then applied as a starting point for discussing ways that librarians can provide important services to interdisciplinary scholars.Findings – Librarians, as “meta‐scholars”, can provide useful services to scholars engaging in interdisciplinary research.Social implications – Interdisciplinary research has shown great potential for problem‐solving, being focused more on a problem than with disciplinary distinctions. This is a worthy area for librarians to target with their skills and services.Originality/value – This is a discussion of ways that librarians can break into new roles and responsibil...

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