INFO 285-10
Research Methods in Library and Information Science
Topic: Historical Research Methods
Fall 2021 Syllabus

Dr. Anthony Bernier, MLIS, MA, Ph.D.(History) 
E-mail
Home/Office: (707) 721.1551
Office Hours: by appointment

Canvas Information: This course will be available beginning Thursday, 19 August, 6 AM (Pacific).

You will be enrolled in the Canvas site automatically.

Our class begins officially with Week #1 on Thursday 19 August. Weekly units end on Sundays at 11:59 PM (Pacific) and that will be the due time for all of our assignments (save for the final). Our first task is due at the end of Week #1 (on Sunday 22 August)

Course Description

This course examines research methods covering fundamental principles, processes, skills, resources, and roles of research for professional application in information organizations. Note, this is not a conventional "history" course. Students will become critical consumers of historical research and the steps required to produce it. Emphasis will concentrate on developing, planning, and producing a quality research proposal.

This section of research methods (Historical Methods) will introduce students to applying theory and methods of historical research and writing.  It explores the ways in which scholars develop and frame research questions; assess current literature on historical topics; locate and critically use tertiary, secondary, and primary sources; and formulate viable and worthwhile research proposals.  Emphasis will be placed on the research skills, resources, and tools academic historians use and the value information professionals offer in supporting them.

Waiver of INFO 285: If a student has taken and passed a graduate-level research methods course within the last 5 years (as documented by an official transcript), the student can petition the Coordinator of Admissions and Academic Advising to waive the INFO 285 requirement.

Please send an electronic copy of the transcript (scanned as a pdf file) to the Coordinator of Admissions and Academic Advising.

A waiver, if granted, does not reduce the total units required for the MLIS degree. It simply means that you are not required to take INFO 285 as one of your MLIS classes.

Course Requirements

• Canvas Discussions pertaining to historical research and history information sources. 20 points (10 discussions, 2 points each)

• IRB Certification. (5 points). Complete the Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) online ethics workshop. Completion of this workshop is required of all INFO 285 students. You may complete this workshop at any point during the semester. It requires about two hours. When you have finished the workshop, you will submit your completion certificate to me. Further details are contained in our separate Course Outline.

• Prepare a critical annotated bibliography. (10 points) An analytical review of reference (aka "tertiary") sources that inform searching of secondary and primary sources on the history of the information community you studied in INFO 200.
• Historiographic Essay. (20 points). Locate and review 12-15 scholarly historical studies on your broadly defined information community topic. This secondary material should cover a combination of scholarly writing (i.e., monographs and refereed journal articles, but exclude writing from non-history or professional or practitioner media).

• Primary Source Survey. (15 points) Locate, survey, and describe plausible primary sources you expect might be useful in a hypothetical future research project.
• Proposal Peer Review. (5 points) Provide a short critical review of a classmate’s research proposal draft based on established criteria.
• Research Proposal. (25 points) Deliver a formal research proposal. The proposal will build on earlier assignments and culminate in an overview of the topic and its significance, a critical literature review (historiographic essay), a discussion of methodology and primary sources, and an outline of proposed chapters.

All assignments must be turned at 11:59 PM (Pacific) on the day they are due. Late submissions will be reduced by 20% of the total points possible for that assignment.

Course Calendar and Grading

Optional Zoom Office Hours: Optional

Holiday Observances
Only University-recognized holidays will be recognized for this class. See the SJSU Academic Calendar on the University’s website for specific details.

Incompletes
Please avail yourself of the policy for incomplete coursework on the School’s website: https://ischool.sjsu.edu/incompletes

Dropping the Course
The last day to drop this course without an entry on your permanent record and to receive a full-tuition refund is Tuesday 31 August, after which no tuition refund is allowed.

Required Style Manual

Historical research requires the critical evaluation of the scholarship of other historians and the effective communication of research findings.   An important aspect of this scholarly communication is understanding and using the standard citation formats and conventions for historical scholarship.  Because of its use of footnotes and the extensive details required in citation formats, historians and history publications use The Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition).  

This contrasts with the LIS convention of APA (American Psychological Association) style.

If you are serious about historical writing and publishing I encourage you to invest in a copy of the Chicago MOS and to use it faithfully.  Kate L. Turabian’s A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations (9th edition) is a derivative of Chicago MOS and an acceptable substitute.

Please consider purchasing your textbooks from the iSchool e-Bookstore (a project of Amazon Affiliates program) because it generates revenue exclusively for iSchool student scholarships: iSchool eBookstore 

Other articles and resources will be assigned throughout the term, referred to in our separate Course Outline, and available either through the King Library’s full-text databases, the web, or furnished to you through our class Canvas site.

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Course Workload Expectations

Success in this course is based on the expectation that students will spend, for each unit of credit, a minimum of forty-five hours over the length of the course (normally 3 hours per unit per week with 1 of the hours used for lecture) for instruction or preparation/studying or course related activities including but not limited to internships, labs, clinical practica. Other course structures will have equivalent workload expectations as described in the syllabus.

Instructional time may include but is not limited to:
Working on posted modules or lessons prepared by the instructor; discussion forum interactions with the instructor and/or other students; making presentations and getting feedback from the instructor; attending office hours or other synchronous sessions with the instructor.

Student time outside of class:
In any seven-day period, a student is expected to be academically engaged through submitting an academic assignment; taking an exam or an interactive tutorial, or computer-assisted instruction; building websites, blogs, databases, social media presentations; attending a study group;contributing to an academic online discussion; writing papers; reading articles; conducting research; engaging in small group work.

Course Prerequisites

INFO 285 has no prequisite requirements.

Course Learning Outcomes

Upon successful completion of the course, students will be able to:

1. Understand the difference between primary and secondary research.
2. Demonstrate knowledge of fundamental principles and processes of conducting research.
3. Articulate the research method(s) covered in the course, appropriately apply them, and understand their strengths and liabilities.
4. Understand appropriate data collection/analysis tools, and ethical concerns related to research.

Core Competencies (Program Learning Outcomes)

INFO 285 supports the following core competencies:

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Textbooks

Required Textbooks:

• Maza, S. (2017). Thinking about history. University of Chicago Press. Available through Amazon: 022610933X

• Presnell, J. (2018). The information-literate historian (3rd ed.). Oxford University Press. Available through Amazon: 019085149X

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Grading Scale

The standard SJSU School of Information Grading Scale is utilized for all iSchool courses:

In order to provide consistent guidelines for assessment for graduate level work in the School, these terms are applied to letter grades:

• C represents Adequate work; a grade of "C" counts for credit for the course;
• B represents Good work; a grade of "B" clearly meets the standards for graduate level work or undergraduate (for BS-ISDA);
  For core courses in the MLIS program (not MARA, Informatics, BS-ISDA) — INFO 200, INFO 202, INFO 204 — the iSchool requires that students earn a B in the course. If the grade is less than B (B- or lower) after the first attempt you will be placed on administrative probation. You must repeat the class if you wish to stay in the program. If - on the second attempt - you do not pass the class with a grade of B or better (not B- but B) you will be disqualified.
  
• A represents Exceptional work; a grade of "A" will be assigned for outstanding work only.

Graduate Students are advised that it is their responsibility to maintain a 3.0 Grade Point Average (GPA). Undergraduates must maintain a 2.0 Grade Point Average (GPA).

University Policies

Per University Policy S16-9, university-wide policy information relevant to all courses, such as academic integrity, accommodations, etc. will be available on Office of Graduate and Undergraduate Programs' Syllabus Information web page at: https://www.sjsu.edu/curriculum/courses/syllabus-info.php. Make sure to visit this page, review and be familiar with these university policies and resources.

In order to request an accommodation in a class please contact the Accessible Education Center and register via the MyAEC portal.

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