Hide Advanced Options
Courses - Spring 2024
INST
Information Studies
Open Seats as of
07/26/2024 at 06:30 PM
INST802
Pragmatic and Methodological Foundations for Information Studies
Credits: 3
Grad Meth: Reg, Aud
Credit only granted for: INST888 or INST802.
Formerly: INST888.
Information Studies' eclectic interdisciplinarity is both its greatest strength and its most significant weakness. As an increasingly multi/inter/trans/non-disciplinary intellectual community, Information Studies embraces a wide variety of conceptual frameworks, theories, methodological approaches, and intellectual traditions. As such, it is necessary to be able to bring many different intellectual perspectives to bear on the complex, nuanced, phenomena that are its focus. The variety in the intellectual toolbox of Information Studies is central to its ability to avoid reduction of its focal topics to trite, simplistic characterizations. However, the field's paradigmatic richness places particular burdens on the individual researcher. The purpose of this seminar is to help students develop a reflective practice that they can rely on to turn their interests into valuable new insights in an interdisciplinary domain like Information Studies.