I'm scared about doing research in this new world...

Hi my name is Shadia and I'm a second year MI student in the ISD path.  

I have a little bit of experience with qualitative methods of research since I took a few Anthropology courses during my undergraduate degree.  I learned mostly about writing ethnography, which is very much integral to the Anthropology field.  Anthropologists write ethnography based on participant observation which they believe to be the best way to gain insight into a culture's way of life.  Unfortunately, as I learned in my classes this method can also bring about skewed results since some participants are enticed with cigarettes for information which can mostly be incorrect because of the method in which it was obtained.  In addition, many traditional scholars of the social sciences tended to disregard findings that were produced out of an ethnography because they lacked factual data and the findings could not be reproduced to form theories.   

In my fourth year, I designed and conducted a research project on the coffee consumption habits of York university-but my research was mostly inclusive.  

I decided to take research methods because Empirical research skills is quickly becoming important for information professionals to have.  I really want to learn more about how to conduct effective participatory research or participatory action research, where community members are actively involved in an ongoing partnership with officials to build services that suit their needs and wants.  Reading the first few chapters of the Luker text has already has me convinced that I will learn how to conduct effective research in the new info-glut world since she understands the new ways that knowledge is produced.  She notes that knowledge is now produced through making connections across disciplines and traditional boundaries-"going wide rather than deep" (13).  She also acknowledges that traditionally knowledge was produced by academics who produced "legitimate findings" and were based in "prestigious universities" However, she argues that theory on the social world can now be produced by anyone in this web 2.0, "info-glut" day and age and some of it is great and reputable and some of it is garbage. I'm intrigued and want to learn more...but I have to admit I'm also a bit intimidated...