{"id":15873,"date":"2017-09-26T23:53:39","date_gmt":"2017-09-26T23:53:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/pnr\/?p=15873"},"modified":"2026-02-03T17:24:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T17:24:09","slug":"data-literacy-what-it-is-and-why-you-should-care","status":"archive","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/data-literacy-what-it-is-and-why-you-should-care\/","title":{"rendered":"Data Literacy: \u201cWhat It Is and Why You Should Care\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open data\u2026 big data\u2026 data management\u2026 These terms swirl around us, and often we just let them flow past. But, to understand and navigate the rapidly changing landscape that is data, we need certain skills, and these are characterized as \u201cdata literacy\u201d. One definition of data literacy, from DataPopAlliance.org, is \u201cthe desire and ability to constructively engage in society through and about data\u201d (click here<\/a> if you want to know the thinking behind this and here<\/a> if you want to see a quick video). But I like this one, from the wonderful Data Journalism Handbook<\/a>, better:<\/p>\n

\u201cJust as literacy refers to \u201cthe ability to read for knowledge, write coherently and think critically about printed material\u201d, data-literacy is the ability to consume for knowledge, produce coherently and think critically about data. Data literacy includes statistical literacy but also understanding how to work with large data sets, how they were produced, how to connect various data sets and how to interpret them.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The graphic here<\/a> (and at the bottom of this post) is a good representation of how the skill sets needed for data literacy intersect. I think some of us worry that we don\u2019t have the necessary statistical literacy in particular to really feel data-literate, but if you are someone who thrives on orderly arrangements of information\u2014perhaps a library classification system?? \u2013you are fine! Orderliness goes far, as does a critical eye towards credibility, currency, reliability, and all those other good criteria we use to assess information every day. Those are essentially the messages of this piece, \u201cBecome Data Literate in Three Steps<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n

Which brings me to, why should we care? To answer that question, I commend to you the below quote from a wonderful article which appeared recently in Public Library Quarterly<\/em>, \u201cOpen Data: What It Is and Why You Should Care<\/a>\u201d (hence the quotation marks in this post\u2019s title!). It\u2019s aimed at librarians, but it has a message for all of us:<\/p>\n

\u201cAs librarians, we know that data is distilled into information; information is distilled into knowledge; and knowledge drives better decision-making. When librarians help patrons, students, business owners, community members, and public servants harness information, we are helping them make better decisions in their communities, business, and lives\u2026And most importantly, in a time with increasing threats to information and media literacy, where public data is being removed from the public sphere, it is more important than ever to ensure that government-funded and government-derived data remains data of the people, by the people, and for the people.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Convinced it\u2019s worth learning more about data literacy? For fun, check out the HipHopLibGuide\u2019s Data Literacy page<\/a>. Because, speaking data-wise, who DOES have the largest Hip Hop vocabulary?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Open data\u2026 big data\u2026 data management\u2026 These terms swirl around us, and often we just let them flow past. But, to understand and navigate the rapidly changing landscape that is data, we need certain skills, and these are characterized as \u201cdata literacy\u201d. One definition of data literacy, from DataPopAlliance.org, is \u201cthe desire and ability to… Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15873","post","type-post","status-archive","format-standard","hentry","category-data-science"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15873","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15873"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15873\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15878,"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15873\/revisions\/15878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.nnlm.gov\/region_5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}