Research Seminar Series Archive

As put by Pablo Picasso, “Art is a lie that makes us realize truth.” We can see the products of knowledge organization work, systems such as classifications and ontologies, in much the same way: contrived, abstracted and simplified versions of reality designed to quickly tell us something truthful. What communities choose to represent of their knowledge, as opposed to what remains obscured or omitted, is a crucial area of inquiry in information science, the technical and ethical importance of which has only increased given emerging technological developments such as linked data and AI.

Many people make changes to their lives to provide a greater sense of value, purpose or coherence to their everyday existence. These changes may involve significant changes to one’s relationships, work, bodies or place of living. In this seminar I will report on two studies looking at the information aspects of making changes to ones’ lives.

“Ka mua, ka muri” is a Māori whakataukī (proverb) that speaks to time as a continuum, where the past, present and future are interwoven. This seminar explores 185 years of colonization in Aotearoa and its profound impacts on the preservation and transmission of “tikanga Māori” (cultural customs and values) and “mātauranga Māori” (Māori knowledge systems). It traces the challenges Māori have faced, the acts of resilience that have safeguarded knowledge across generations and how these lessons have strengthened communities today.

Globally, we are reckoning with questions of whether and how societies can function with AI. The same questions exist within information science as a field—what will a more automated and algorithmic future look like? In this talk, I will approach this question from the context of information, aging and human-computer interaction. For example, researchers once thought that every older person would have their own personal human-like robot that could replace human caregivers. However, there are myriad reasons why this vision is not currently a reality—from cost to creepiness. But what should care futures with AI entail? What should they exclude?

In addition to creating a lot of uncertainty in all of our lives, the pandemic did a lot to demonstrate just how disruptive uncertainty can be and to shine a light on the fact that many in society live with significant uncertainty. While some of this uncertainty may be short-lived during times of transition, other uncertainty is experienced on an ongoing basis.

The need to address marginalized communities' needs and to ensure consideration for diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility are key concerns in information science. The presentation will focus on an interdisciplinary information behavior research project conducted in South Africa and Uganda involving an industry partner from the UK. The study explored the information behavior of commuters who depend on informal transportation such as minibus taxis.

This research project investigates the academics' scholarly publication practices in Malaysian universities. Scholars in Malaysia face unique challenges and pressures in their publication choices, balancing the demand for high-impact publications with the need for broader dissemination of their research. Malaysian universities operate in a competitive global academic environment, with career incentives tied to publishing in Web of Science and Scopus-indexed journals. This focus on quantitative metrics and high-impact factors may limit scholars' opportunities to share their work more broadly, mainly through open-access channels.