Critical Issues in Information Systems

Critical Issues in Information Systems BUSS 951 Lecture 13 Researching Organisations and Systems

Recall • last week we described • describe several theories of one useful strata- genre and apply it to SFL to an actual IS in its workplace- ALABS • use our substantive knowledge of IS to alter the theory • apply this theory to some features of the ALABS system

Agenda • overtime we can see shifts in the genre structure of texts associated with these workpractices and a system features... • NOTE: case studies conducted over time are referred to as longitudinal studies, or diachronic studies • we can do this because we can study systems features using texts, remembering that there is a relationship between text and context! • we can ask question why did this change to take place?

Agenda (1) • Language/Discourse • its not just Vocabulary that is different between Groups in Organisations- its Language (or Discourse) • it helps us explain why users and developers have difficulties in understanding each other! • this could be used as a theoretical basis for participation- a way of making an interactive method out of systems analysis

Agenda (2) • We will recap important aspects of the course (to assist you in doing the examination) • we will also restate the critical issues covered in this subject with a review of the content of this course

Language/Discourse as a technology

Language/Discourse (1) • Language and Discourses in general are tools- they do things (achieve work in organisations) • that is why they have evolved and therefore it is their functionality that determines their character • but discourses are semiotic tools (and therefore tacit or unconscious) • they are therefore taken for granted in discussions of 20C technology

Language/Discourse (2) • at this time in our history we have focused on designed tools- the material products of conscious invention • but it is the unconscious and evolving discourses of our cultures which engender all purpose-designed systems

Language/Discourse (3) • without an understanding of our material technology- our information systems- in our cultures, then the ways in which it can be mastered (and masters us) is necessarily incomplete • by understanding the discourses, we can facilitate intervention in the process of changing and improving workpractices • language is just not theorised in information systems

Language/Discourse (4) • written language is extremely important in information systems • it is primarily the resources of written language through which the discipline of IS has, like others, evolved • as with most language learning, we learn the discourses of IS- literally to be IS practitioners- by copying written directly from IS texts and related reference materials

Language/Discourse (5) • We are tacitly familiar with a number of these written language patterns that we often see in textbooks and journal articles associated with science and technology: • Report Genre- description-oriented texts • Explanation Genre- reason-oriented science with a taxonomising function • Exposition Genre- reason-oriented argument

Language/Discourse (6)Language of Deliverables • the deliverables used in IS are technical in nature because they are concerned with building up an uncommon sense interpretation of the world • to do this we take common sense as a starting point and ‘translate’ it into specialised knowledge

Language/Discourse (7)Language of Deliverables • the basic semiotic resource available for this translation is called elaboration • at the clause rank this meaning is constructed through the relational identifying clause(Halliday 1985 112-128) • favoured clause type in science and technology

Language/Discourse (8)Language of Deliverables • Where: • The data store... Value • ‘is called’ Process • ‘Awards’ Token • Identifying Clause Example (NB these are reversible) • The data store used in changing pays scalesis called Awards • Awardsisthe data store used in changing pays scales

Language/Discourse (9)Language of Deliverables • Elaboration is also found at the group and word rank once again to translate common sense into specialized knowledge • traditionally this is called paratactic expansionor more traditionally as apposition

Language/Discourse (10)Language of Deliverables • used in science to ‘remind’ readers of the way we talk technically • the technical term is glossed rather than explicitly defined: reduces or [as we say in IS]compresses the file size • the term compresses can now be ‘taken for granted’

IS and User Language

Grammatical Differences • IS language (scientific texts) • foregrounds identifying relational processes which are used to define technical terms • User language (historical texts) • relies on attributive relational processes to assign participants to familiar classes

Semantic Differences • IS language (scientific texts) • more likely to realise, and therefore foreground, logical connections between clauses and sentences • User language (historical texts) • more likely to bury the reasoning inside the clause

Grammatical Metaphor • differences between relational processes and conjunction patterns (IS practitioners and Users) • therefore, grammatical metaphor plays a different role in mediating between grammar and semantics in respective discourses

IS Discourse Nominalisation & Grammatical Metaphor • nominalisation is strongly associated with definitions • nominalisation is used to accumulate meanings so that a technical term can be defined • grammatical metaphor distills

User Discourse Nominalisation & Grammatical Metaphor • nominalisation is strongly associated with realising events as participants so that logical connections can be realised inside the clauses • nominalisation is deployed to construct layers of thematic and information structure in a text • grammatical metaphor scaffolds

IS and User DiscourseRegister Differences • IS Discourse: • science is concerned with constructing taxonomies and implication sequences • emphasis is focused on field • “knowledge’ constructed is more transcendent (‘beyond experience’) • scientific taxonomies and implication sequences tend to function as system

IS and User Discourse Register Differences • User Discourse: • concerned with constructing text • emphasis is focused on mode • ‘knowledge’ constructed is more experientially based than transcendent • historical generalizations and explanations tend to function as text not system • users tend to refer to their work texts in order to find out what work means

IS and User Discourse Generic Differences • IS Discourse • organised as large Report Genres with embedded Explanation Genres and Experiment Genres • User Discourse • organised as long, generalsied Recount Genres, with embedded Report Genres and more occasionally Exposition Genres

IS and User DiscourseTable of Differences

Summary (1) • semiosis at all levels constructs discourses as truth or at best as hypothesis about what is and what happened that can be proved and disproved • the discourses of IS and of Users in workplaces are • constitutive of their subjectivity • and negotiable • is an idea which is hidden in the IS discipline- but it is an idea that can change this discipline

Critical Issues in IS

Critical Issues • Critical Issues • Are organisations really systems? • What is information? • What does the IS Discipline do? • Further Issues • How might organisations be theorised? • How can we improve IS Development Practices?

Information-theoretic basis of the Discipline • data is easy to identify but information depends on who, what, where, how and when • organisations are not axiomatic (rule determined) since members can change the internal and external processes of the organisation

Data & Information • IS concept of information (Shannon & Weaver, defines information in terms which preclude meaning • in other words the second basis of our discipline (the concept of information) is theoretically inappropriatefor use when developing systems

Systems Design as Social Activity (1) • social processes are always at workduring the analysis, design, development and implementation of systems • all these activities take place in organisational and institutional settings

Systems Design as Social Activity (2) • need to ‘locate’ social processes and human interactions within historical and organisational contexts • some justification is required for this approach...

Systems Design as Social Activity (3) • communication processesand social interactionswithin the developer community are of great importance • changes in systems development practices, whether related to technology or organisational issues, are always driven and mediated by social factors

Systems Design as Social Activity (4) • systems development is a complex bridgingprocess linking areas of specialized and diverse expertise; the domain of the IT professional and the domain of the user • systems development concerns itself with IT innovation, application and diffusion- all social

Effects of Shannon & WeaverIS Methods • skews the types of IS methods that get produced and therefore used • IS methods come with inbuilt with individualism as a theoretical assumption • rather communication gets reduced to exchange

Effects of Shannon & WeaverPolitical Effects (2) • if this model is about ‘transmission’ then who has the role of the sender becomes a political act(in an organisation or a society) • that is: • who can ‘speak’ • who is allowed to ‘speak’ • who has the authority to ‘speak’

Effects of Shannon & WeaverPolitical Effects (4) • adopting Shannon & Weaver, means we adopt a theoryof communication which privaledges: • those who have the power to speak over those who may only be permitted to listen! • systems development in organisations is therefore political

Communication & Power • there is always a close relationship between communication and power • therefore, we must look for other models of communication • the limits in practicewhich constrain communication depend on the political and ideological outlook of the reader

Summary (2) • we communicate because sets of concepts reoccur in our culture and language • but we don’t need to share meanings, we only need to think that we can in order to communicate

Use Semiotic Approaches • the discipline which studies meaning-making (or semiosis) is called semiotics • some semiotic analysis has been criticised as nothing more than arid formalism

Use Semiotic Analysis • purely structuralist semiotics does not address authorial intentionsor audience interpretation • it ignores particular practices, institutional frameworksand the cultural, social, economicand political contexts.

Use Semiotic Analysis • semiotics emphasizes that signs are related to their signifieds by social conventions which we learn • we become so used to such conventions in our use of various media that they seem natural or commonsense

Use Semiotic Analysis • semiotics can help to make us aware of what we take for granted in representing the world • we are always: • dealing with signs, not with an unmediated objective reality • that sign systems are involved in the construction of meaning

Semio-informatic Dilemma (1) • their are great difficultiesfaced by any semio-informatic approach which relies on models of the sign • we have seen that signs are everywhere, that we utilise many systems of signs simultaneously to signify meaning

Semio-informatic Dilemma (7) • the use of higher level semiotic structuresconfuses many researchers who have only ever seen semiotics defined in terms of signs- semiotics is the study of signs according to many • it is the semio-informatics researchers’ responsibility to theorise the higher level semiotic structures

Language and social contextApplied to IS • SFL gives two complementary perspectives • can look at the perspective of language: IS as text • can look at the perspective of context: IS as social organisation • applying SFL to examining systems is very different to traditional IS approaches • a given text provides only a partial perspectiveabout a work practice

Language and social contextApplied to IS • in the short term a linguistic analysis provides only a small part of the overall picture • traditional IS practices are applied top-down: gives a very broad picture poor on details • SFL methodology is applied bottom-up: provides a very detailed view of work practices which then need to be integrated across various sites

Language and social contextApplied to IS • need to look at many actual textsin a social context in order to find out about work practices • only by shunting between language and social context (the work practice and the organisation) can we perform a meaningful analysis • in one of your assignments you were asked to collect a small set of texts • you would need to collect many texts of the same type of transaction before you understood it (see all the variations)

Language and social contextApplied to IS • how many texts to collect?: well its difficult to know • you need to include those people involved in the work practicesinto the analysis • so this SFL approach to understanding work practices MUST be participative

Critical Issues in Information Systems