You are invited to participate in this workshop. The workshop is of broad interest to the IS community, including researchers, research students, research supervisors and teachers of research methods. A variety of levels of participation are available, including short paper presentation and participation in group discussions.

http://lris-pre-ecis-2013.sim.vuw.ac.nz/

Pre-ECIS Workshop: 5 June 2013, 1:00 – 5:30

Fee: 70 euros

Deadline for submission of 2-page abstracts: 3rd March 2013

Notification of acceptance: 31st March 2013 to allow participants to benefit from the early bird registrations for the conference

General registration (participants who are not aiming to present at the workshop): Follows dates for main ECIS conference

 

It has been suggested that research literature is not “building up” into a cumulative tradition, but “piling up” into an unsorted and unsort-able heap (Dervin 2003). Typically, researchers espouse a neutral viewpoint and adapt the goal of “synthesising” previous literature. However, since research literature in many areas of IS is diverse and heterogeneous, this synthesis is not value neutral, but is a construction of the researchers.

Recently, there have been a number of exciting papers published in leading information systems journals and conferences such as the European Journal of Information Systems, Behaviour and Information Technology, and the European Conference on Information Systems that offer alternatives to the “narrative” literature review.

This workshop draws together the authors of several of these papers to discuss alternative approaches to reviewing information systems literature. It will also provide participants with an opportunity to present their own critical analysis of a specific body of research literature, or their suggestions about literature analysis approaches in research methods training.

 

Participation:

·      Participants who would like to present their work at the workshop are invited to submit 2-page abstracts for peer review. The workshop has a developmental focus. For this reason, we will endeavour to accept as many abstracts as possible, although some proposals may not be allocated individual presentation slots, and may not be selected for publication in the workshop proceedings. All participants will have the opportunity to contribute to a critical discussion.

·      Participants may register to attend this workshop without submitting an abstract. In the event that the maximum number of registrations is exceeded, preference will be given to those participants who have an accepted abstract.

 

Abstract submission:

Abstracts should use the ECIS conference template and format guidelines and should be no more than two A-4 pages long.

Abstracts should focus on the analysis and presentation of research literature and may cover, but are not limited to:

·      Theoretical perspectives on research literature.

·      Critical analysis of a specific body of research literature, with a focus on issues, disconnects, gaps and heterogeneity as opposed to seeking the “mythical centre”.

·      Innovative curricula and teaching methods for reviewing research literature.

·      Contrarian perspectives on research literature.

·      Innovative and rigorous techniques (beyond the “narrative” literature review) for building a cumulative research tradition from research literature.

Submission and Review Process:

Abstracts can be emailed to the workshop organizer mary.tate@vuw.ac.nz. Submitted Abstracts will be peer reviewed. Depending on the reviewer’s comments, abstracts may be selected for presentation at the workshop and/or publication in the workshop proceedings