DIPLOMA IN OFFICE MANAGEMENT AND TECHNOLOGY

(Online Database)

OBM 301: Information and Research Skills for Office Professionals

(Blended Learning)

NAME: NUR MAYA DELIMA BINTI IMRAN

UITM ID: 2019997769

CLASS: BA1185A

LECTURER: SHAMSUL ANNUAR BIN HAJI SULAIMIN

DUE DATE: 25 JULY 2021

Article Information literacy: Empowerment or reproduction in practice? A discourse analysis

Title approach

Journal Journal of Documentation

Title

Author Geoff Walton, Jamie Cleland

ISSN/DOI 0022-0418

Year 2017

Volume Volume 73

Issue No. No 4

Page 582-594

Publisher Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Article https://www-emerald-com.ezaccess.library.uitm.edu.my/insight/content/doi/10.1108/JD-04-

URL 2015-0048/full/html

Description:

This article discussing on the topic

1. The purpose of this paper is to present a qualitative investigation into whether undergraduate

students can demonstrate their information literacy (IL) capacities as a discursive competence and

socially enacted practise through online textual postings created as part of an undergraduate

programme. They also proved that the concept of "references" (information artefacts such as journal

articles) has a purpose in repeating an academic discipline's discursive practises as an agreed-upon

construct amongst tutor, student, and librarian. This paper approach the Foucault’s notion of discursive

competence and the separate but complementary concept of practice architectures (specifically

focussing on “sayings”) devised by Lloyd were used as thematic lenses to categorise online discussion

board postings from a formative online peer assessment exercise created for first-year UK

undergraduate students. Online postings were the node of analysis used to identify patterns of
language across online conversation. These postings were inductively analysed through manual

content analysis. Subject’s responses were initially categorised using open coding. This research uses

practice architectures and discourse analysis to analyse students’ IL capabilities and the context in

which they are developed. An approach not employed hitherto. This has practical ramifications for how

academics and librarians expose students to their discipline's academic language, as well as the

characteristics of information production, communication, and exchange in academic settings.

Introduction

This study's main question is whether information literacy (IL) is actually empowering, as many claims,

or only a tool for the reproduction of current structures and power relations. The discussion furnished

here examines both IL as a set of capacities and IL as part of wider academic discourse. These are

mutually interdependent, with the former primarily focussing on learners’ skills and the latter centred on

IL as a theoretical construct:

Secker and Coonan, 2013: There are many claims made for IL’s potential in terms of its benefit to the

individual.

Obama, 2009: society generally that it is empowering and essential for engaged citizenship.

Leaning, 2009, Whitworth, 2014: A large body of scholarship and research exists on the topic, yet it

remains a highly contested area with its origins in economic pragmatism rather than engaged

democratic citizenship.

Lloyd (2012): IL is more akin to a socio-cultural or socially enacted practice. The concept of socially

enacted practice embodies the notion of the negotiation of meaning which is a concept central to

discourse analysis, the methodological lens employed in this study.

Literature review

Most modern IL models align with constructivist perspectives of teaching and learning, which claim that

learning is an experiencing and empowering process that involves the ongoing building, correcting, and

finally altering of existing knowledge systems. First-year undergraduate students exhibit IL five discrete

levels of information discernment:

Level 1 (lowest): the person operating at this level tends to express the need to evaluate information in
terms of quantity, e.g., “You have only used some references” (critical) “You use lots of references”

(uncritical).

Level 2: those operating at this level tends to express their view in terms of a range, e.g., “Nice and

varied amount of references”.

Level 3: at this level the person is aware of the need to evaluate information but sees it in terms of

types of reference where the quality is implied, “You have used websites as references, try to use more

books and journals”. This implies the notion of authority in information discernment which is also

highlighted by Lankes (2007).

Level 4: here the use of specific evaluation criteria is mentioned, e.g., references are relevant and

support the information presented (NB: relevance was the most common evaluation criterion mentioned

by participants in this study).

Level 5 (highest): typically expressed as the linking of references to specific content or concepts to

support an argument, e.g., “You have looked at both sides by including references (sic) that oppose

each other such as the reference that stated there was no change and then another reference that

stated there was a change”.

Discourse analysis and its relevance to IL

Discourse analysis is proposed as a suitable tool for this, although it does not appear to be widely used

in IL research and practise, with the exception of some recent studies.

Methodology

In brief, this study is a qualitative examination into whether undergraduate students can demonstrate

their IL capacities as a socially performed technique through online dialogue generated through

comments to a discussion board. It also wonders if this online engagement reflects power dynamics

among students, instructors, and librarians. The following four research questions are provided to

address these overarching goals:

RQ1: To what extent does online text-based conversation reveal students’ information practice?

RQ2: In what ways could this online text-based conversation be used as a basis for summative

assessment of their work?

RQ3: In what ways does online peer assessment embody complex and asymmetrical power relations
between tutors, students and librarians?

RQ4: How is academic discourse rehearsed, negotiated, reproduced and its meaning shared through

online text-based conversation?

Discourse analysis

The online peer evaluation activity, which is comprised of online postings made by students and

instructors during the module, is the node for analysis in this study. From 2007 to 2012, the study's

socio-historical environment was a UK Higher Education institution. The participants were first-year

undergraduate students enrolled in the course.

As a result, students' discursive competence and information practise in IL appeared to be embodied

in postings, particularly their level of information discernment and what constituted a good "reference"

for an assignment.

Conclusion:

As a result of the findings, is asserted that the methodology furnished here provides a prism through

which IL outputs, in this case online postings, can be critically analysed and set within the broader

context of the environment in which they occur. Discourse analysis provides a means for examining IL

practice by revealing the constraints imposed by specific discursive contexts and in so doing furnishes

a more nuanced approach to IL research. It also provides the potential for re-envisaging IL means for

critiquing academic discourse enabling students to become participants in its discursive practice rather

than merely conforming to it.

Article The business actor and business management

Title

Journal IMP Journal

Title

Author Munksgaard, K.B.

Ford, D.

ISSN/DOI 2059-1403

Year 2017

Volume Volume 11

Issue No. No 2

Page 327-347

Publisher Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Article https://www-emerald-com.ezaccess.library.uitm.edu.my/insight/content/doi/10.1108/IMP-06-

URL 2015-0022/full/html

Description:

This article discussing on the topic

The purpose of this paper is to discuss what it is to be a manager in the complex interactive business

landscape and the capabilities needed by business managers. IMP literature has developed the

conceptualisation of a business landscape comprised of varying combinations of more or less

interdependent activities, resources and actors, the form of which are defined by the interactive

processes in which they are involved. This paper analyses work examines the developing semantics of

the concepts of the interactive business actor in some of the literature linked with the IMP research

tradition using the software Leximancer. The study examines how concepts about the business actor

and business acting have evolved over time in the literature. The analysis identifies some of the gaps

in the development of these notions and suggests some potentially useful avenues for future

conceptual and empirical research.

Introduction

Over the last 40 years, the IMP literature has grown to include thousands of articles and a number of

books that aim to analyse the complexity of the business landscape and the processes that exist within
it. This study has been at odds with the current tendency in managerially focused marketing and

purchasing literature from the start. This managerially oriented literature has attempted to separate a

set of discrete sub-processes from the complexities of business that may be connected with one or

more managerial responsibilities. In contrast, IMP literature has highlighted the environmental

complexity in which business management operates and the limits to managerial knowledge and

discretion.

The development of the imp conceptualisation of business management

The research demonstrates how the concept of the link has been constantly related with IMP literature

throughout its development. In the four books, the term "relationship" refers to a continuous and

meaningful process of contact that occurs between two or more firms and has an impact on their

resources, operations, and individuals and subgroups associated with both of the companies. Further

research reveals how the relationships with which a firm is related are utilised to characterise a

company's place in the business environment, or to more clearly define the identity of that organisation

in later work.

The development of the concept of the business actor

Leximancer concept map displaying the differences between the four books. The figure displays the

nine most common themes displayed as circles. File tags (marked with black letters) are placed in the

four corners of the map to graphically show the distinctions between the four volumes. The novels from

1982 to 2011 are in the lower portion of the map, while the books from 1995 to 2009 are in the upper

part. The publications from 1995 and 2009 are the most closely related to the concept of "actor"

(displayed in the upper part of the map).

1982: questioning the language and practice of business management

The first IMP book, introduced and discussed the interaction approach as both an analytical concept

and a methodological tool to investigate the processes through which companies and the individuals

within them develop complex, dyadic relationships.

1995: developing a network perspective

The second IMP book, is similar to the 1982 book by being based on a large number of case studies

undertaken in several countries. The 1995 book developed the idea of business interaction as a
multiple-level process involving the three elements of activities, resources and actors (ARA).

2009: the characteristics of the business network

The Håkansson et al.book elaborates on the networks of resources, activities and actors that form the

structure of the business landscape. This book has the strongest focus on the business actor.

2011: managing relationships

The 2011 reemphasises the centrality of the relationship to an understanding of management in the

business landscape. The book starts with the statement that, “business relationships are quite simply

the basis of business, and without them no company can operate” (p. 1). The book takes as its theme

the development of the managerial tasks that are associated with the adaptation, development and

exploitation of activities and resources within business relationships.

As a result, the paper integrates the analysis into a preliminary framework for describing the

characteristics of the interactive business actor. The paper concludes by using this framework to

suggest some of the capabilities that are required by the interactive business actor.

Conclusion:

As a result of the findings, the examination of the evolution of the concept of the business actor within

IMP literature uses the Leximancer software. The purpose of this research study also is to express the

characteristics of a business actor and to investigate how theories about business actors and business

acting have changed in the literature over time.