The Elements of Knowledge Organization is a unique and original work introducing the
fundamental concepts related to the field of Knowledge Organization (KO). There is no other
book like it currently available. The author begins the book with a comprehensive discussion of
knowledge and its associated theories. He then presents a thorough discussion of the
philosophical underpinnings of knowledge organization. The author walks the reader through the
Knowledge Organization domain expanding the core topics of ontologies taxonomies
classification metadata thesauri and domain analysis. The author also presents the compelling
challenges associated with the organization of knowledge. This is the first book focused on the
concepts and theories associated with KO domain. Prior to this book individuals wishing to
study Knowledge Organization in its broadest sense would generally collocate their own
resources navigating the various methods and models and perhaps inadvertently excluding
relevant materials. This text cohesively links key and related KO material and provides a
deeper understanding of the domain in its broadest sense and with enough detail to truly
investigate its many facets. This book will be useful to both graduate and undergraduate
students in the computer science and information science domains both as a text and as a
reference book. It will also be valuable to researchers and practitioners in the industry who
are working on website development database administration data mining data warehousing and
data for search engines. The book is also beneficial to anyone interested in the concepts and
theories associated with the organization of knowledge. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia is a
world-renowned author who is well published in the Knowledge Organization domain. Dr. Smiraglia
is editor-in-chief of the journal Knowledge Organization published by Ergon-Verlag of
Würzburg. He is a professor and member of the Information Organization Research Group at the
School of Information Studies at University of Wisconsin Milwaukee.
