The Actor-Network Theory and the Social Network Analysis in the continuing education of professionals in Library Science

This case study makes a critical interpretation of a practice developed in January 2020, where a course on the application of the Actor -Network Theory (TA-R, in Spanish) and the Social Network Analysis (ARS, in Spanish) in Library Science was taught at a Costa Rican public university. The aim of this work is to expose the findings encountered and visualize a future line of work. There were 13 participants, who were taught the basics of ARS. There was interest in building networks of authors and affiliations using documentary databases and it was found that the concepts of attribute and characteristic were confusing, so their questioning can be extended to other disciplines. It was concluded that, although the students understood the concepts of the ARS, it is necessary to find scenarios to further develop the topic, which is why we propose to promote new processes of continuing education for its usage in Library Science.