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

INLS 881/882, Research Issues and Questions I & II
Fall 2011 & Spring 2012

Syllabus

Course Description / Assignments and Evaluation

Schedule / Assignments / Sakai class site

Course Description

Overview. Intensive and systematic investigation of the fundamental ideas in information and library science. Exploration and discussion in seminar format.

The goal of this year-long course is to prepare students to become productive scholars. Students will be introduced to the range of research questions and issues that arise in the field of information and library science, with particular emphasis on the research interests of the current SILS faculty and doctoral students. The role of both theory and prior empirical research in generating research questions will be discussed. The variety of methods available to conduct ILS research will be reviewed.

The class members will participate in reading, reviewing, analyzing, and discussing, in some detail, relevant research literature. A part of this process of examination and discovery is formulating questions, and considering ways those questions might be addressed. For example, we will be asking questions about the ILS field and disciplines with which we often collaborate:

• Where are we going?
• Are there better/different ways to get there?
• Who gains and who loses?
• What is missing? Why?
• What should be done?

A second goal of this seminar is to assist the participants in being successful as doctoral students at SILS. This means that it is very important that each person has an opportunity to explore and cultivate their individual research interests as they move through the course.

Specifically, this seminar has the goal of helping you to:

• Develop a deeper sense of your research interests,
• Begin to form your own research agenda,
• Develop critical reading/thinking skills,
• Consider the role of research questions, theory, and methods,
• Develop an understanding of the writing requirements of scholarly communication,
• Develop a sense of scholarship and academic life in the information field, and
• Develop an understanding of faculty expectations and program procedures for SILS doctoral students.

Rationale and relationship to the current curriculum. It is required that students take INLS 881 and INLS 882 in consecutive semesters at or near the beginning of their doctoral studies. The discussions in this seminar will help students identify research questions of particular interest to them and will provide a context within which initial explorations of those questions can be conducted.

Assignments and Evaluation

The assignments for the two-semester seminar aim to foster your growth as a scholar and researcher in information and library science, through participation in discussions, reviews of current issues and the relevant literature, and development of research questions and proposals. They include:

• Final product (40%). This product, to be completed by the end of the second semester, may be a scholarly literature review, a proposal for a research study or an application for a fellowship, or an article resulting from a research project. Several intermediate products will be turned in throughout the second semester: a brief scope statement, an extended outline, and a presentation of your work. The final product will be due on the scheduled exam date for the spring semester.
• Seminar participation (20%). You are expected to be an active participant in the class, contributing to both face-to-face and electronic discussions, sharing interesting articles you have read, things you have learned, or questions to which you do not know the answer.
• Interviews with SILS faculty (5%). Each seminar member will make the effort to meet and discuss with 5 SILS faculty members about their research interests, current projects, and important theories and studies in their areas of interest. Students will identify faculty members of interest early on, but will engage in these discussions over the course of the semester.  The product of these discussions will be a 1-2 page description of the aspects of the faculty members' research interests that are of interest to the student .  Early in the spring semester, we will discuss some of these relationships.
• Philosophical presuppositions of your work (5%).Description of your background discipline and the theories, paradigms, practices and assumptions that have influenced your thinking. (Assignment 1)
• Interest group mini-review (10%). Based on your research interests, you'll work with one or more of your classmates to explore a topic in some depth. Your group will be expected to identify articles for the class to read, and to lead a discussion on the topic. In addition, the group will write up the review. The interest group discussions will occur in mid-October; the written reviews are due one week later.
• Individual mini-review (15%). You will review the literature in a specific area that is of interest to you. As with the group mini-reviews, you will present this review both orally and in writing. The oral presentations will occur in early December; the written reviews are due during the fall final exam period.
• Seminal work and/or inspirational work/event (5%). You will select a topic that will be discussed in class (see the class schedule) and identify a seminal scholarly article on that topic. For the purposes of this assignment, the article should be published before 1990 and be cited at least 50 times. During the appropriate class session, you will be expected to give a brief summary of the article and your reactions to it.  OR you may select an article or presentation that has inspired you or helped you to focus on your research question or that has helped you to think about an issue in a new way.  Students will  schedule their discussion of this work sometime during the second semester.
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Grading. Since this seminar lasts for two semesters, you will receive an "S" (assuming satisfactory progress) for the fall semester grade, and a grade reflecting the quality of your work and progress for the spring (H, P, L, or F). Throughout the year, you will receive evaluations of your participation and contributions to the class, as well as of your presentations and papers.

Honor Code. The Honor Code, which prohibits giving or receiving unauthorized aid in the completion of assignments, is in effect in this class.

Schedule / Assignments / Sakai class site