School of Information and Library Science
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Introduction

Session 1, January 11: Frameworks, models, and theories; Scope of this course

• Kuhn, T. (1977). Objectivity, value judgment, and theory choice. In The Essential Tension: Selected Studies in Scientific Tradition and Change. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 320-329. [Davis Library - Q175 .K954]
  • Reprinted in Balashov, Y., & Rosenberg, A. (eds.) (2002). Philosophy of Science: Contemporary Readings. London: Routledge, 421-437. [Davis Library - Q175.3 .P49 2002; copy in Sakai resources]
  • In this short piece, Kuhn (famous for his book on paradigm change in the conduct of science) discusses the criteria that we can use to evaluate the quality of a given theory. In particular, he focuses on the role of a scientist's values in making a choice between two theories.
• Delanty, G., & Strydom, P. (eds.). (2003). Part 6: New directions and challenges. In Philosophies of Social Science: The Classic and Contemporary Readings. Maidenhead, UK: Open University Press, 365-377. [SILS Library - H61.15 .P48 2003; copy in Sakai resources]
  • Delanty and Strydom summarize several (postmodern) trends in the social sciences since the 1980s and how they affect our epistemological and methodological perspectives. They include reflexivity, standpoint, rational choice, constructivism, cognitivism, and realism.

Session 2, January 18: Scientific reasoning; The role of theory in science

• No additional readings yet identified

Applying a Theory in a Particular Study

Session 3, January 25: Dangers and pitfalls when applying an existing theory

• Examples of information science theories
• Examples of theories from other disciplines

Session 4, February 1: Applying existing theories

• Examples of information science theories
• Examples of theories from other disciplines

Session 5, February 8: Applying existing theories, continued

• No additional readings yet identified

Session 6, February 15: Applying existing theories, continued; Discussion of plans for paper

• No additional readings yet identified

Session 7, Testing/validating a theory

• No additional readings yet identified

Development of Grounded Theory

Session 8, March 1: Inducing theory from observation

• Additional readings listed in course wiki

Session 9, March 8: Data collection

• Additional readings listed in course wiki

March 15, Spring Break: No class meeting

Session 10, March 22: Coding and memo writing

• Additional readings listed in course wiki

March 29, Holiday: No class meeting

Session 11, April 5: Theoretical sampling

• Additional readings listed in course wiki

Session 12, April 12: Constructing grounded theory

• Additional readings listed in course wiki

Session 13, April 19: Presentations

• Brief oral presentations for each seminar participant's study proposal

Session 14, April 26: Recap on role of theory in science

• Nagel, E. (1961).The cognitive status of theories. In The Structure of Science: Problems in the Logic of Scientific Explanation. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 106-152. [Davis Library - Q175.N22]
  • Reprinted in Balashov, Y., & Rosenberg, A. (eds.) (2002). Philosophy of Science: Contemporary Readings. London: Routledge, 197-210. [Davis Library - Q175.3 .P49 2002]

Syllabus / Schedule / Assignments / Sakai class site

The INLS 887 website, UNC-CH, 2011, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. Address all comments and questions to Barbara M. Wildemuth at wildemuth@unc.edu. This page was last modified on January 4, 2013, by Barbara M. Wildemuth.