Information Studies Research

All of our sessions will include about two hours on our focal activity (most often, engagement with the research literature from one of our "modules" and about a half hour on some other topic (such as discussion of an upcoming assignment). All readings must be completed before class, even if you have read them before, and all assignments are due at the class start time.

Due at the start of class:

• List of three countries (no more than two per continent) that you would be happy to choose as your personal focus through the course, in most-preferred-first order.

Readings:

• Read at least one of these three articles:
  1. Gary M. Olson and Jonathan Grudin, The Information School Phenomenon, Interactions, 16(2)15-19, 2009.
  (via Maryland Libraries)
  2. Jacob O. Wobbrock, Andrew J. Ko, Julie A. Kientz, Reflections on the Future of iSchools from Inspired Junior Faculty, Interactions, 16(5)69-71, 2009.
  (via Maryland Libraries
  3. Martha E. Pollack, Reflections on the Future of iSchools by a Dean Inspired by Some Junior Faculty, Interactions, 17(1)66-68, 2010.
• Julia Angwin, Nick Wingfeld, Emily Steel, Justin Scheck and Tom McGinty What They Know, Wall Street Journal, 2010. Read "The Web's New Gold Mine: Your Secrets" and at least one other story on that Web site.
• Allison Druin, Paul T. Jaeger, Kenneth R. Fleischmann, Jennifer Golbeck, Jimmy Lin, Yan Qu, Ping Wang and Bo Xie. The Maryland Modular Method: An Approach to Doctoral Education in Information Studies. Journal of Education for Library and Information Science, 2009.

Our focal topic this week will be the nature of research in information studies. We'll start out by trying to define both the scope of the field and what we mean by research. Then we'll adopt the four-lens view that we'll apply throughout the course and we'll discuss the topic from the perspective (i.e., "lenses") of people, information, systems, and environments.

Our second topic this week will be the structure of the course. Please review the information on this Web site on Tuesday or Wednesday before class (even if you have looked through it before) and come prepared with questions and suggestions.

The overarching lens in this course will be countries as environments. Too often, we study issues with reference to the location where we and our authors happen to live and work. This can make it harder to separate fundamental ideas from the application of those ideas in specific contexts. As a way of partially mitigating that risk, each student will select one country for which they will do additional reading each week to understand how the ideas we are discussing play out in that national context. Countries are in some ways a problematic unit of analysis, but they are useful for our purposes because they provide a way of packaging geographic, demographic, cultural, legal, economic, and linguistic variation in ways that have been extensively analyzed. I will select one country from your list in a way that will provide us with a useful diversity of perspectives and I will let everyone know the assignments by email on the Friday following this class so that you will have time to do some background reading on your country before our second session.

Module: System Design for User-Centered Information Sharing and Access

Due at the start of class:

• Unless you are already assigned a paper for Sep 16, submit a list of four papers (no more than three per module) for which you would be happy to serve as discussion leader, in most-preferred-first order. For simplicity, please refer to the papers by the associated "student number" in this syllabus. As with all assignments, you should submit this to me by email unless before the due date I indicate some other preferred submission method. Please always include LBSC888: (with no space) at the start of your subject line so that I can find your email easily.

Paper Discussion

• (Taylor, 1962) led by Doug Oard
• (Baeza-Yates and Ribeiro-Neto, 1999) led by Doug Oard
• (Baolog, 2008) led by Doug Oard

This week we will begin our analysis of individual papers, which will extend for six weeks and encompass three two-week modules. This week, I will lead the discussion of three papers, demonstrating three different ways of doing so. In addition to learning from each of the discussions, you'll want to use this as a on opportunity to begin to craft a personal process for helping others to analyze the content of a research paper. This is a common activity in reading groups, which you will likely use throughout your career as a way of remaining current, mastering new topics, and sometimes for building a shared perspective as a solid foundation for a new collaboration.

Regardless of the technique you adopt, the key to preparing well is to identify the contributions of the paper, prioritize which ones you (not necessarily the authors!) wish to focus on, master any required background, and then critically assess the strengths and weakness of the presentation. To do this well, it is important that you be interested in the topic of the paper, which is why I have asked that you identify three of the papers that we will be reading during weeks 4 through 7 for which you would be happy to lead the discussion. I will let you know by the Monday following this class which paper you will lead the discussion for so that you will have at least 10 days to prepare. The one exception is the three second-year students to whom I have pre-assigned to papers in week 3 -- they do not need to submit their preferences because (to make the schedule work) I have already done that for them!

I will demonstrate three styles for managing a discussion, all of which build on that, and all of which assume that the participants in the discussion (in this case your fellow students) have read the paper. In one, I will provide a handout to structure our discussion. In another, I will use a brief powerpoint presentation for that purpose (this offers more scope for using graphics). In the third, I will work extemporaneously using the whiteboard (which can encourage interaction better than the other two approaches, at least when done well).

At the end of this session, we will have our first discussion about your final paper. We will discuss the final paper throughout the semester, more than any other topic, so in this first session we will focus principally on how to choose a suitable focus and a suitable scope for your paper. Your paper must be novel, so second year students must select a topic different from the topic of their first year paper. Your paper must also be integrative in the sense that it must draw on two or more distinct literatures; we will discuss what this means. The principal goal of this session is to give you the information you need to select a topic and a scope so that you can begin work on your abstract.

Module: System Design for User-Centered Information Sharing and Access

Due at the start of class:

• List of three student-authored modules that you would be prefer be chosen as our fifth module, in most-preferred-first order, chosen from the following list (please refer to each by number for simplicity). Some modules are not on the current Doctoral Wiki; for those, scroll down and click on "Modules by students" in the "historical sites" section.
  1. Mobile Technology
  2. Culture, Learning Styles, and Educational Technology
  3. Virtual Communities Communication
  4. Participatory Learning to Support Emerging Literacy
  5. Information Privacy Online
  6. Law and Policy
  7. The Digital Divide: Where are we now?
  8. NLP and Political Science
  For each module that you list, give your reasoning for selecting it.

Paper Discussion

• (Kelly and Teevan, 2003) led by Tan Xu
• (Thomas and Cook, 2006) led by Dongming Zhang
• (Oard et al, 2010) led by Irene Eleta

At the end of this session, we will talk about different types of abstracts, and how to write a good one for your final paper (a draft of that abstract is due next week).

Module: Information Economics

Due at the start of class:

• Write a one-page indicative abstract that describes the focus, scope, content, and perspective that you propose for your final paper. See the detailed requirements for assignments for additional details.

Paper Discussion

• (Frank, 2003) chapter 1, led by student 4
• (Frank, 2003) chapter 8, led by student 5
• (Stiglitz, 2000) sections I and II, led by student 6
• (Stiglitz, 2000) sections III and IV, led by student 7

Unlike the first module, this module and the next one have four assigned readings per week. Scheduling things in this way allows each student to lead the discussion of one paper by the end of the third module. Because of this, we will spend a bit less time on each paper than we have in previous weeks, so we will need to be careful to stay on schedule.

At the end of this session, we will discuss reasons for writing an outline, ways of outlining a paper before you start writing, and what role your outline can and should play as you actually write.

Module: Information Economics

Due at the start of class:

• List in most-preferred-first order the dates on which you could make your final presentation. Saturday morning, Sunday afternoon, and Thursday normal-class-time sessions are available (specific times are shown in the syllabus entry for week 15). You should not list dates on which you absolutely cannot be present on campus, but because each date is limited to six students you must list at least two dates. I will let you know the date of your final presentation by the Monday following this session.
• List in most-preferred-first order the three dates on which you would prefer to work with a team to lead the discussion of one of the last two modules (these dates are Oct 28, Nov 4, Nov 18, and Dec 2). If there is one person with whom you would particularly like to be paired, you can let me know that, but if you do please also explain why. Please don't try to form an entire four-person team on your own, however -- having a balance of skills and perspectives on each team is important, and locking down the membership of one or more teams before the others are formed would likely leave me with too little flexibility when forming the other teams.

Paper Discussion

• (Shapiro and Varian, 1999) led by student 8
• (Benkler, 2002) led by student 9
• (Kollock and Smith, 1999) led by student 10
• (Stigler, 1961) led by student 11

At the end of this session, we will discuss how to actually get started at writing. Although we often think of writing as a way of communicating ideas, it is actually also a process for shaping and organizing ideas. Much good writing is therefore iterative, working through several drafts before the final version emerges. We'll talk about some strategies for getting started despite the fact that you may not know at the start exactly where you're headed.

Module: Diversity in Information Education and Professions

Due at the start of class:

• Submit your revised abstract, which should incorporate any necessary changes based on my comments and on your personal research since submitting your draft abstract. The actual abstract of your final submitted paper can, of course, be different, but this revised abstract will be graded in the form that it is submitted now.

Paper Discussion

• (Adkins and Espinal, 2004) led by student 12
• (Becvar and Srinivasan, 2009) led by student 13
• (Burnett et al, 2009) led by student 14
• (Pruitt, 2010) led by student 15

At the end of this session, we will discuss the student-written modules that will be due in a few weeks. We'll talk about why we ask you to write a module, why our modules are structured as they are, what your module should (and should not!) include, and how to recognize examples of very good modules from among those that have been written previously.

I will also send you (by email, before class) the reviewing matrix (which indicates who is assigned to review each of your four reviewed items) and the team assignments for the team-led discussions in your lats two modules. If you have any concerns about those assignments, please raise them with me by email (by the end of this week) or in person after class this week. In order to permit stable planning, those assignments will become final the following Monday (without any further announcement if these are no changes).

Module: Diversity in Information Education and Professions

Due at the start of class:

• Submit your outline. This is not a draft -- it is the version that will be graded. You will also receive comments on your outline next week from a reviewer.

Paper Discussion

• (Franklin and Jaeger, 2007) led by student 16
• (Gollop, 1999) led by student 17
• (Josey, 1999) led by student 18
• (Lazar and Greenidge, 2006), led by student 19

At the end of this session, we'll talk about how to write a good review. Reviewing is an important part of the professional activity of a researcher, and doing it well can both benefit your professional reputation and make important contributions to your field. Your first review (of a classmate's outline) will be due next week, so we will use that assignment as a concrete example during this discussion.

Integrative Analysis and Synthesis

Due at the start of class:

• Submit your outline review to your assigned partner and to me. You should read their final abstract along with the outline so as to get the best sense of what is intended. Your comments should generally be one page, and they should focus on at least:
  • The scope of the planned paper. Is it to ambitious? Too modest?
  • The overall organization of the paper. Does it seem appropriate for the content? Is it consistent with a generally accepted style in its field?
  • Apparent gaps. Is there something that needs to be added to make the work complete?
  Don't focus on spelling or grammar -- if the outline is clear, focus on what you understand, not on how the outline is presented. If the outline is not clear, say so!

Readings:

Read two integrative papers that resulted in advancement to candidacy for an iSchool doctoral student (all available integrative papers can be found on the Doctoral Wiki)

To this point in the semester, we will have focused principally on atomistic analysis of individual papers. While that is an essential building block, our ultimate goal is to learn to look across a wide range of work on a topic, first analyzing what we see and then synthesizing our own integrated view. In this rather grandly named session, we will discuss the stages of that process, which you will apply in the module that you create (which may be used in future semesters), the paper that you write, and, ultimately, in the "integrated paper" that you write to advance to candidacy.

Our basic approach will be to look at how students before you have actually approached the process of writing an integrative paper. We'll start with what we know -- how did they analyze the papers that they selected. But then we'll start to look some things that are not immediately apparent, such as (1) how did they know what papers they might have chosen to draw on?, and (2) how did they decide on the particular papers that they chose? Then we'll look at how they drew connections between the papers that they had chosen to work with, with particular attention to how they developed a personal conception of the issues that had been addressed that was not necessarily tied to the way any one author had chosen to name or describe those issues. Once we understand that, we can begin to look at how they identified and chose to focus on gaps in the literature that they could fill through their own contributions. Finally, we will look back at each paper from a different perspective, trying to understand how the author then crafted a story that would help the reader to see and understand the points that they wished to make. Mastering this distinction between the development of your ideas and the presentation of those ideas is essential if you are to both have interesting and important things to say and to say them in clear and cogent ways.

At the end of this session, we will talk about how the teams that will lead our discussions of the next two modules can draw on what we have discussed today to look holistically at work on some topic. Because two teams will lead discussions of each module (one team per week, for two weeks), I'll suggest several ways in which the teams might approach their task.

Module: Digital Humanities

Note: This module is expected to be available by October 7

Due at the start of class:

• Post a draft of your module on the Doctoral Wiki. The draft you post must not be changed for a period of one week after class begins (if you want to work on it in that time frame, make a copy on your own computer and then you can post your changes after next week's class).

Integrated Discussion led by Team 1

• (Cohen, 2010)
• (Drucker, 2009)
• (Kirschenbaum, 2010)

This session will be the first in which a team of four or five students will lead an integrative discussion of a topic. In this first week, most of the class will have read only the three listed readings, but of course together the members of the team leading the discussion will need to have read much more than that. The team that is leading the discussion will, therefore, want to craft ways of bringing perspectives from beyond the readings into the discussion.

At the end of this session, we will have a mid-term feedback session in which you will have an opportunity to assess our progress to date and to make recommendations for any changes to the way in which we make use of our time.

Module: Digital Humanities

Due at the start of class:

• Submit the your module review to me and to your assigned module author. In your review, you should focus on:
  • Whether the scope of the module is sufficiently broad and sufficiently well targeted to be potentially useful as one of five modules in a future semester of this course
  • Whether the module has sufficient focus and coherence to support the learning objectives articulated for this course.
  • Whether the description, discussion points, and lens are sufficiently clear and cogent to foster a rich and productive discussion.
  • Whether there are an appropriate number of readings (roughly 6) and whether those readings are well chosen.
  • Whether the module, and particularly the bibliography, is properly formatted.
  Grammar and spelling should also be commented on, since the module will become a public document that may actually be used in future semesters.

Integrated Discussion led by Team 2

• (Kraus, 2011)
• (Ramsay, 2008)
• (Waldrip-Fruin, 2008)

This will be our second integrative session on the same topic, so the team that is leading the discussion this week will need to structure the session in such a way that it complements, rather than duplicates, what we talked about last week. Doing this well will help to illustrate that there are many quite different ways of taking an integrative perspective on the same body of work.

At the end of this session, we will talk about how to give a good presentation. We will focus on scholarly presentations, and therefore we need to recognize that different scholarly communities have different norms for how presentations are best made. Nonetheless, there are some issues that will shape any presentation that you give, including message management, story structure, complementarity between what you say and what you show, being heard and understood clearly, and time management. We'll talk about both preparation and deliver, and we'll also talk about what to do if things go wrong (as they sometimes do!).

Due at the start of class:

• Put your module up on the Doctoral Wiki in final form (replacing your draft). Do not change this for one week after the start of class (to permit grading).

Student Module Presentations

Each student will have 7 minutes to present their module, which will leave no time for discussion. The audience should therefore write notes reacting to each presenter and send them after class (one file per person, preferably posted to the wiki for easy access).

At the end of this session, we will discuss the first draft of your final paper that is due next week. By this point you should be well along in writing that draft -- don't try to write your first draft in a single week!. We'll run this session as a free flowing (but moderated) discussion in which people ask questions, offer each other advice, and react to the advice offered by others. I'll serve as the moderator. Bring a couple of questions based on your writing experience to date to help us get the discussion started.

Module: Mobile Technology

Note: This module will be selected by September 23.

Due at the start of class:

• Submit a complete first draft of your final paper. A complete draft is one that has text written (not just bullet points) in every section. This need not be the best text you will ever write on the subject, but it must completely address the issues that you intend to address. You can get full credit for unpolished work, but you cannot get full credit for an incomplete draft.

Integrated Discussion led by Team 3

• (Tang et al, 2001)
• (Parhi et al, 2006)
• (Wright et al, 2005)

At the end of this session, we will discuss the process of illustrating your ideas. This is an important aspect of both writing and presentation, and as you start to work on your second draft this is a timely topic. Different people learn in different ways, so there is no one good way of presenting your ideas -- you need to write and speak for a variety of readers and listeners. Different tasks also call for readers and listeners to look for different things in your work. One way of at least partially addressing these challenges is to design good graphics. These may be conceptual (as in "big picture" sketches of stakeholders and how their needs interact) or technical (as in graphs of how the performance of some system changes under changing conditions). And they may replicate what you have said or written (thus helping visual learners and people who are skimming to see the key ideas) or they may elaborate on it (using, for example, a tabular display of detailed data). This is a rich topic for which we will have time only to scratch the surface, so we will use our time to talk about what some of the key issues are and where you can learn more about this important issue.

Thanksgiving

There will be no class this week because of the Thanksgiving holiday. I highly recommend scheduling a feast with family or friends during the usual time of our session.

Before you go, however, submit your comments for the Draft 1 that was assigned to you, both to me and to the author of that draft, by Wednesday November 24 at 5 PM. Your comments should generally be one or two pages, and they should focus on at least:

• The overall organization of the paper. Often, the first draft can reveal problems with the structure that were not evident in the abstracts and outlines that were prepared before any writing was actually done.q
• Adequacy of the references
• Deficiencies in the analysis
• Deficiencies in the synthesis
• Deficiencies in the presentation

You can, and should, comment on any other items that you wish (e.g., scope, or what's good about the draft). But the most important things to focus on are the four issues listed above. If some parts of the paper are still in outline form, focus on the parts that have been fleshed out (these will prevent the draft from getting full credit, but it should not prevent you from writing a useful review of the parts that actually have been written). You need not write complete sentences if bullet points are adequate.

Module: Mobile Technology

Due at the start of class:

• Submit the second draft of your final paper to me and to your reviewer. This should be as close to perfect as is possible because this is your last chance to get feedback. The paper need not be perfect to get full credit, however, but again it does need to be complete, and it does need to be quite good by this point to receive full credit.

Integrated Discussion led by Team 4

• (Burak and Sharon, 2004)
• (Jacucci ett al, 2007)
• (Tarasewich, 2003)

Writing Workshop

Due at 5 PM on Wednesday Dec 8:

• Submit your review of the Draft 2 that was assigned to you, both to me and to the author of that draft. Your comments should address the same points as specified for reviewing Draft 1 (note that you will not review the same author's work for Drafts 1 and 2).

There are no assigned readings for this week.

As the semester draws to a close, our time will be completely consumed by the process of writing (and reviewing the writing of our colleagues). This is, therefore, an excellent time to engage in serious inquiry about writing in a scholarly life. We will, therefore, devote most of this session to a panel discussion with a set of eminent writers. I will invite people who are well known for their books, for their articles, and for their conference papers. We'll begin by each panelist talking about why they write, how they write, and what they believe it means to write well. I'll then ask each of the panelists to talk a bit about how they evaluate the writing of others, both during peer review of individual papers, and as part of career progression events such as hiring and promotion decisions. We'll then proceed to a more interactive format in which our panelists, and your fellow classmates, respond to questions and observations from everyone present. This is an opportunity to step back and think about what you have learned, what you can now see you have yet to learn, and how you might structure your future activities to help you learn what you need to know.

At the end of this session, we will adjourn to R.J. Bentley's Filling Station, which is south of campus on Route 1, in search of beverages that are suitable for celebrating the end of an intense and productive semester.

Due at 8 AM on Friday Dec 17:

• Submit your final paper to me. Note that this due date is after your presentation, and you may make changes to your paper based on your experience during the presentation if you wish.

Final presentations

Each student will give a 20-minute public presentation of their paper, followed by 5 minutes for questions and discussion with the audience. Our session has adequate time for six such presentations, so there will be three such sessions on the Saturday, Sunday, and Thursday following our last session of the semester. The Saturday session will start at 10 AM, the Sunday session will start at 3 PM, and the Thursday session will start at our regular class time (2 PM). Each student is required to attend one session in its entirety (since you will be the audience for each other).

Regardless of the day on which you present, your final paper is due to me at 8 AM on Friday December 17. Because of grade submission deadlines, late papers will not be accepted; if your paper is not received by the deadline, your most recently submitted draft will be graded. You may (and should) therefore submit additional drafts beyond the required two as you complete them. Please label each draft with a version number as the last character(s) of the file name to help avoid confusion.