The Association for Information Science & Technology (ASIS&T) has announced two winners of the Best Information Science Book Award for 2026. They are “Archiving Machines: From Punch Cards to Platforms” by Associate Professor of Library and Information Science Amelia Acker and “The Patina of Distrust: What People Do with Misinformation,” co-authored by Assistant Professor of Journalism and Media Studies Celeste Wagner.
The purpose of the award, ASIS&T wrote, “is to recognize the outstanding book in information science published during the preceding calendar year. The award is given to the author(s) whose book is judged to have made the most outstanding contribution in the field of information science during the year.”
Archiving Machines: From Punch Cards to Platforms
Published by MIT Press
By Amelia Acker
In its nomination of Acker’s book, ASIS&T wrote, "In this ambitious and meticulously researched volume, Acker traces the emergence of data archives from their origins in pre-digital scientific and academic collections to their current incarnation as privately owned, ‘born networked’ resources managed via mobile apps and proprietary platforms.
"‘Archiving Machines’ shows how the societal value and traditional power of archives has collided with the fast-moving, profit-driven logic of contemporary digital platforms.
"The book moves between these sites with remarkable fluency, revealing the deep historical continuities that connect punch cards and magnetic tape to the infrastructures that now govern how we store, access, and use information."
Notified that she was the recipient of the award, Acker told ASIS&T, “I am thrilled to receive this recognition from ASIS&T. ‘Archiving Machines’ brings questions from archival science, computing history, and contemporary information science together, so it is an honor to have the book recognized by colleagues in our truly interdisciplinary field. I am grateful for the award and excited to continue these conversations.”
Acker researches the intersection between digital technologies, information infrastructure, and cultural memory in contemporary society. Her interdisciplinary work combines empirical studies, historical case analysis, and theoretical inquiry, often in collaboration with technologists, historians, archivists, librarians, and artists.
The Patina of Distrust: What People Do with Misinformation
Published by MIT Press
By Eugenia Mitchelstein, Pablo J. Boczkowski, Celeste Wagner, and Facundo Suenzo
“The book offers a novel, human-centered exploration of information behavior that directly addresses the core mission of information science,” wrote ASIS&T in its nomination. “While traditional scholarship often isolates the supply and circulation of misinformation, this work investigates the 'missing link' of contemporary information processes: how users assess, interpret, and utilize information in their everyday lives."
Wagner said, "We are incredibly honored to have jointly received this award. Our book looks at an understudied area in (mis)information studies: what people actually do with information in their everyday lives. The central argument is that distrust is not necessarily a corrosive force in democratic life; it can emerge as a historically learned stance of awareness that helps people navigate the information environment critically."
Wagner’s research examines how and why everyday people embrace or resist social change, with a focus on gender issues and feminism. She also studies media reception more broadly, including how audiences engage with news and entertainment. She has conducted panel studies, interviews, virtual focus groups, nationally representative surveys, survey experiments, and other cross-national mixed-method research. Her recent publications analyze feminist advocacy in Argentina and the U.S. (Journal of Communication), reception of Turkish TV dramas in Argentina (Journal of Communication), global communication as epistemology (Media, Culture & Society), and emotional experiences with news and misinformation in the U.S. (Journalism, Digital Journalism).
The Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) is the only professional association that bridges the gap between information science practice and research. For nearly 90 years, ASIS&T has been leading the search for new and better theories, techniques, and technologies to improve access to information.
Learn more about the Rutgers School of Communication and Information on the website.
