This paper critically examines the notions of the ‘knowledge society’ and ‘access to knowledge’ to uncover some underlying assumptions, with special reference to sub-Saharan Africa. We borrow from constructivist learning theory and argue that it is helpful to see knowledge as a process rather than as an outcome or state. In discussions of access to knowledge, much emphasis has been placed on the physical dimension of access (connectivity, bandwidth and the digital divide) and on the legal, economic and political dimensions that form the embattled terrain of the ‘Access to Knowledge’ movement. However, if knowledge is conceptualized as a process, the concept of ‘access’ has to be extended to the epistemological dimension, which takes into account the construction of knowledge in the mind of the individual while interacting with the community. This has important implications for libraries. We suggest the deployment of re-skilled and re-motivated information intermediaries working in and around libraries to motivate, teach, interpret and facilitate ‘access’ to knowledge.
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