Isto Huvila, Olle Sköld and Lisa Börjesson
Sharing information about work processes has proven to be difficult. This applies especially to information shared from those who participate in a process to those who remain…
Abstract
Purpose
Sharing information about work processes has proven to be difficult. This applies especially to information shared from those who participate in a process to those who remain outsiders. The purpose of this article is to increase understanding of how professionals document their work practices with a focus on information making by analysing how archaeologists document their information work in archaeological reports.
Design/methodology/approach
In total 47 Swedish archaeological reports published in 2018 were analysed using close reading and constant comparative categorisation.
Findings
Even if explicit narratives of methods and work process have particular significance as documentation of information making, the evidence of information making is spread out all over the report document in (1) procedural narratives, (2) descriptions of methods and tools, (3) actors and actants, (4) photographs, (5) information sources, (6) diagrams and drawings and (7) outcomes. The usability of reports as conveyors of information on information making depends more on how a forthcoming reader can live with it as a whole rather than how to learn of the details it recites.
Research limitations/implications
The study is based on a limited number of documents representing one country and one scholarly and professional field.
Practical implications
Increased focus on the internal coherence of documentation and the complementarity of different types of descriptions could improve information sharing. Further, descriptions of concepts that refer to work activities and the situation when information came into being could similarly improve their usability.
Originality/value
There is little earlier research on how professionals and academics document and describe their information activities.
Details
Keywords
The purpose of this paper is to explore and explicate documentation ideals parallel to information policy, and by means of this analysis demonstrate how the concept “documentation…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore and explicate documentation ideals parallel to information policy, and by means of this analysis demonstrate how the concept “documentation ideals” is an analytical tool for engaging with political and institutional contexts of information practices.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper is based on a case study of documentation ideals in a debate about quality in archaeological documentation. The methodology draws on idea analysis, and on the science and technology studies’ controversy studies approach.
Findings
The paper explicates three documentation ideals, how these ideals allocate responsibility for documentation to different actors, how the ideals assign roles to practitioners, and how the ideals point to different beneficiaries of the documentation. Furthermore, the analysis highlights ideas about two different means to reach the documentation ideals.
Research limitations/implications
The case’s debate reflects opinions of Northern European professionals.
Social implications
The paper illuminates how documentation ideals tweak and even contest formal information policy in claims on the documentation and on the practitioners doing documentation.
Originality/value
Documentation ideal analysis is crucial as a complement to formal information policy analysis and to analysis guided by practice theory in attempts to understand the contexts of information practices and documentation, insights central for developing information literacies.
Details
Keywords
The purpose of this paper is to nuance the perception about professional documentation (a.k.a. “grey literature”), assuming perception of documentation being a cultural aspect of…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to nuance the perception about professional documentation (a.k.a. “grey literature”), assuming perception of documentation being a cultural aspect of accessibility.
Design/methodology/approach
The study explores variations within the archaeological report genre through a bibliometric analysis of source use. Source characteristics are explored as well as correlations between report authors and source originators. Statistical frequency distribution is complemented by a correspondence analysis and a k-means cluster analysis to explore patterns. The patterns are interpreted as “frames of references” and related to circumstances for archaeological work. The study also discusses source representations.
Findings
The source use patterns reveal a latent variation, not visible in the general analysis: a professional/academic frame of reference (mainly among authors affiliated with incorporated businesses and sole proprietorships) and an administrative frame of reference (mainly among authors affiliated with government agencies, foundations, and member associations) emerge.
Research limitations/implications
The study focuses on Swedish field evaluation reports. Future research could test the results in relation to other types of reports and go beyond the document perspective to explore source use in documentation practices.
Social implications
The results on variations in frames of references among report writers have implication for report readers and user. The results should also be considered in archaeology management and policy-making. On the level of source representation the results call for clarifications of vague representations and possibly omitted sources.
Originality/value
This study contextualizes archaeological information use and focuses on variations in professional archaeology which has received little previous research attention. The bibliometric approach complements previous qualitative studies of archaeological information.
Details
Keywords
Timothy J. Dowd, Kathleen Liddle and Maureen
Research on creative workers speaks to the relative lack of job opportunities available, the role that changing production logics play in shaping such opportunities, and gender…
Abstract
Research on creative workers speaks to the relative lack of job opportunities available, the role that changing production logics play in shaping such opportunities, and gender disparities in success. Tracking 22,561 hits found on Billboard's mainstream charts, we examine various factors that may spur or hamper the success of female recording acts. We find that the expanding logic of decentralized production eliminates the negative effect of concentration on the success of female acts and that the presence of successful female acts in one period bodes well for subsequent female acts, until a glass ceiling of sorts is reached.
Information practices become highly complex in biodiversity citizen science projects due to the projects’ large scale, distributed setting and vast inclusion of participants. This…
Abstract
Purpose
Information practices become highly complex in biodiversity citizen science projects due to the projects’ large scale, distributed setting and vast inclusion of participants. This study aims to contribute to knowledge concerning what variations of information practices can be found in biodiversity citizen science and what these practices may mean for the overall collaborative biodiversity data production in such projects.
Design/methodology/approach
Fifteen semi-structured interviews were carried out with participants engaged with the Swedish biodiversity citizen science information system Artportalen. The empirical data were analysed through a practice-theoretical lens investigating information practices in general and variations of practices in particular.
Findings
The analysis shows that the nexus of biodiversity citizen science information practices consists of observing, identifying, reporting, collecting, curating and validating species as well as decision-making. Information practices vary depending on participants’ technical know-how; knowledge production and learning; and preservation motivations. The study also found that reporting tools and field guides are significant for the formation of information practices. Competition was found to provide data quantity and knowledge growth but may inflict data bias. Finally, a discrepancy between practices of validating and decision-making have been noted, which could be mitigated by involving intermediary participants for mutual understandings of data.
Originality/value
The study places an empirically grounded information practice-theoretical perspective on citizen science participation, extending previous research seeking to model participant activities. Furthermore, the study nuances previous practice-oriented perspectives on citizen science by emphasising variations of practices.