Information Systems in a Transdisciplinary Perspective: Leaping to a Larger Stage

Kroeze, Jan H.; Travica, Bob; Zyl, Izak van

doi:10.29086/2519-5476/2019/sp24.2a2

Cited by 9 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…CRiT has one additional layer: the notion of CRiT having, on the one hand, the intention of being discipline-specific:, a form of CRT developed for information-specific context. On the other hand, CRiT theory building is both interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary based on information as omnipresent phenomena (Awan, 2022;Choi & Pak, 2006;Kroeze et al, 2019). As such, an ongoing challenge for the early stages of CRiT theory building will be the continuous process of identifying and working within a balance between, "Practitioners [who] typically throw anything and everything at practical problems, while scholars often slice problems into such small segments that practical understanding is severely limited" (Swanson & Chermack, 2013, p. 2).…”

Section: Closing It Outmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussing Critical Race Information Theory Informatics and ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Every information context is a CRiTical Race information Theory opportunity: informatic considerations for the information industrial complex

Dunbar

2023

DTS

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PurposeThis paper is an extension of a panel presentation delivered in response to a joint call for panels by the Social Informatics and Information Ethics and Policy Special Interest Groups for the 2022 Association for Information Science and Technology conference. The purpose is to introduce critical race frameworks and tenets as a lens to develop, assess and analyze the social informatics (SI) within information science (IS) research, professional discourse, praxis and pedagogical paradigms. This paper spotlights one of the presentations from that panel, an iteration of Critical Race Theory (CRT) designed specifically for information studies: CRiTical Race information Theory (CRiT).Design/methodology/approachJust as importantly, using SI as part of the context, the paper also includes a discussion that illustrates research and theory building possibilities as both counter and complement to the technocratic advances that permeate society at every level (macro, mezzo and micro), which can also be reasonably framed as the information industrial complex. Thus, CRiT joins other forms of critical discourse and praxis grappling with deconstructing, decolonizing, demarginalizing and demystifying the influence and impact of information technologies. While CRiT has global intentions and implications, this specific discussion has an extensive American focus.FindingsIf we consider the rapid pace in which techno-determinism is moving toward the vise grip of techno-fatalism controlled by frameworks generated from the information industrial complex, we can reasonably consider that humanity on a global basis is living within a meta-large technocratic crisis moment. This crisis moment is both acute and chronic. That is, the technocratic crisis is continuously moving quickly while simultaneously worsening over an extended period of time with no remedies and few responses to substantively address the crisis.Research limitations/implicationsPart of the nature of information and data is measurability. Thus, identifying compatible nomenclature connecting the descriptiveness of intersectionality (a seminal CRT tool) as a qualitative research method to the measurability of data connected to quantitative research, a mixed method approach moves from possible to plausible. Additionally, within IS, there are often opportunities to measure human engagement, such as social media content, search engine use, assessing practices of categorizations, and multiple forms of surveillance data as a short list. Hence, the descriptiveness of intersectional qualitative research “mixed” with the measurability of quantitative research within information settings implies exponential methodological possibilities.Practical implicationsCRiT is multilayered, on the one hand, with the intention of being a discipline-specific, information-specific form of CRT. On the other hand, CRiT theory building is interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary based on information as omnipresent phenomena. An ongoing challenge for CRiT theory building is identifying and working within a balance between, practitioners who typically throw anything and everything at practical problems, while scholars often slice problems into such small segments that practical understanding is severely limited. Embracing and integrating the dynamic interplay between developing ideas and using them is the key to evolving CRiT within the social sciences.Social implicationsThere is plenty of room as well as a need for additional narrative discussing or challenging the use or appropriation of information from a technocratic approach, a counter to the information industrial complex.Originality/valueCRiT is emerging and cutting edge in discussion that addresses the technocratic determinism found in most scholarly discourses.

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Section: Closing It Outmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussing Critical Race Information Theory Informatics and ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Every information context is a CRiTical Race information Theory opportunity: informatic considerations for the information industrial complex

Dunbar

2023

DTS

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“…Knowledge across, between and beyond disciplines should interact in ways that result in emergence of desired properties. Transdisciplinary enables researchers to move beyond their disciplinary ontology and epistemology to be able to address complex problems through open ontology and epistemology that that allows high level knowledge synthesis [45]. Transdisciplinary is moving beyond at macro disciplines level, meso fields' level; micro ontology and micro epistemology levels.…”

Section: Need For Transdisciplinary Approachesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Aligning Software Engineering and Artificial Intelligence With Transdisciplinary

Mambo¹

2022

tjes

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Study examined AI and SE transdisciplinarity to find ways of aligning them to enable development of AI-SE transdisciplinary theory. Literature review and analysis method was used. The findings are AI and SE transdisciplinarity is tacit with islands within and between them that can be linked to accelerate their transdisciplinary orientation by codification, internally developing and externally borrowing and adapting transdisciplinary theories. Lack of theory has been identified as the major barrier toward towards maturing the two disciplines as engineering disciplines. Creating AI and SE transdisciplinary theory would contribute to maturing AI and SE engineering disciplines. Implications of study are transdisciplinary theory can support mode 2 and 3 AI and SE innovations; provide an alternative for maturing two disciplines as engineering disciplines. Study’s originality it’s first in SE, AI or their intersections.

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“…The difference between an interdisciplinary and a transdisciplinary approach is the widening of focus to more complex heterogeneous domains that include stakeholders from academia, government and civil society (Lawrence, 2010;Dorst, 2018;Kroeze, Travica and van Zyl, 2019).…”

Section: Interdisciplinary and Transdisciplinary Learning Spacesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This siloed approach is not conducive to the understanding of complex or wicked problems encountered in an interconnected digital world. Wicked problems transcend a single discipline such as pressing problems around the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that are multi-dimensional and non-linear and should be addressed by a combination of theories and approaches (Kroeze, Travica and van Zyl, 2019). This prompted the engagement with the properties of interdisciplinary perspectives within student projects that explore the complexities of systemic problems within communities.…”

Section: Interdisciplinary and Transdisciplinary Learning Spacesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring Interdisciplinary Collaborative Online Learning Spaces through Sociomateriality in Cape Town, South Africa

Berg

Verster

2022

EJEL

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With the rapid adoption of online learning spaces since the advent of COVID-19, more and more calls are being made in higher education to move from emergency remote teaching and learning to appropriate online education. Although much has been written about the designing of online learning from both a technological and pedagogical perspective, limited contemporary literature is available to understand the complexity of interdisciplinary collaborative online learning. This limitation is investigated in this paper that reports on the first iteration of a Design-Based Research (DBR) study. Within this iteration, a qualitative exploratory research design that applies an inductive approach between researchers from Information Systems (IS) and Urban Planning (URP) is discussed. The aim was to develop design principles for interdisciplinary collaborative online learning spaces. This paper reports on the data generated during a semester-long, inter-institutional, interdisciplinary student project that was embedded in co-creating social digital innovations for pressing environmental problems faced by marginalised communities in Cape Town, South Africa. The participants for this study are 38 Honours degree IS students and 22 Advanced Diploma URP students (N=60). Participants, individually and in groups, completed a total of three reflective structured questionnaires using Google Forms during the semester that generated the dataset for this paper. The theoretical framing that underpins this research study is sociomateriality. The attraction to sociomateriality is its ability to not merely shift attention from the human to the non-human but rather a focus on entanglements and the interrelated nature of components that constitute the learning space. This focus on entanglements is needed for an understanding of the complexities associated with interdisciplinary collaborative online learning. Engaging this complex learning space through the data has revealed four design principles namely: (1) creating immersive context-sensitive learning experiences, (2) designing opportunities to collaboratively (co)-construct knowledge, (3) focusing on the intra-action of socio-technical and socio-cultural entanglements and (4) foregrounding relationality as a tool to foster agency. It is argued in this paper that the aforementioned design principles are necessary for developing interdisciplinary collaborative online learning spaces that afford students a complex learning experience. Complex learning is considered fundamental in developing abilities in students to appropriately respond to the myriad 21st-century societal challenges that await.

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Information Systems in a Transdisciplinary Perspective: Leaping to a Larger Stage

Cited by 9 publications

References 42 publications

Every information context is a CRiTical Race information Theory opportunity: informatic considerations for the information industrial complex

Every information context is a CRiTical Race information Theory opportunity: informatic considerations for the information industrial complex

Aligning Software Engineering and Artificial Intelligence With Transdisciplinary

Exploring Interdisciplinary Collaborative Online Learning Spaces through Sociomateriality in Cape Town, South Africa

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