Graduate School of Library and Information Studies

Summer 2009
LSC544--Visual Information Science 
Dr. Yan Ma, Professor
Tel.: 401-874-2819 (O) 401-419-8487 (Cell)
Email: yanma@uri.edu
Classroom: WebCT
Time and Date: 6:30 p.m. - 9:15 p.m. on Thursdays
      The above class time provides a time frame to post answers and/or necessary class materials of each week. You will need to post your assignments by the designated class time without a deduction from your grade. You do not need to be at your computers during the designated class-time.

Course Description

Course Objectives

Course Objectives:

1.     Study the nature of information in textual and visual forms.

2.     Study the interdisciplinary nature of visual information science.

3.     Study information and visual information and communications theories.

4.     Understand and analyze needs and uses for both textual and visual information. User information seeking behavior for both textual and visual information.

5.     Discuss information policy, intellectual property, and copyright for both textual and visual information.

6.     Understand the theory and practice of information storage and retrieval systems for both textual and visual information.

7.     Understand and study issues relating to user interface design. 

8.     Explore information technology for visual information science

9.     Study bibliometrics and other research methods for textual and visual information.

10. Become familiar with important journals, books, and authors.

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Course Requirements

Read assigned readings; participate in discussions, such as analyze, critique, and synthesize the readings; complete assignments as instructed, and pass one exam. A final term paper will be your choice of a topic relating to visual information science.  Confer with the instructor on your topic.

Required Textbooks  (They are available at the URI Bookstore and the Rhode Island Book Company).  

Moore, David and Dwyer, Francis.  (1994). Visual Literacy: A Spectrum of Visual  Learning.   Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educational Technology Publications.   (Required. It is only available at the Rhode Island Book Company. It is called the LSC544 Course packet of "Moore's Visual Literacy Book" )

Rubin, Richard. (2004). Foundations of Library and Information Science. New York : Neal Schuman. (Required) 

Barry, Ann Marie. (1997). Visual intelligence: perception, image, and manipulation in visual communication.  Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. ISBN: 0791434362 (Recommended)

 

Tufte, Edward R. (2001). The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, 2nd ed. Cheshire, CT: Graphics Press. ISBN: 0961392142   (Recommended)

Tufte, Edward R. (1990). Envisioning Information. Cheshire , CT : Graphics Press.   (Recommended)

Tufte, Edward R. (1997). Visual Explanations : Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative.  Cheshire , CT : Graphics Press.

You May Purchase the books from:

URI Bookstore

Memorial Union Building

Kingston, RI 02881

Tel: 401-874-2721

Fax: 401-789-9590

Text@etal.uri.edu   or    bookstor@etal.uri.edu

 

Rhode Island Book Company

99 Fortin Road
Kingston, RI 02881
(401)789-8530
(401)789-8532-fax
(888)RIBOOKS-toll free

 http://ribooks.com

You can order them from Amazon.com. http://www.amazon
Ebay Textbook Bookstore: http://half.ebay.com/

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Recommended Texbooks on Reserve at the URI Library

Atherton, Pauline and Johnson, Eric H.  (1999). Visualizing subject access for 21^st century information resources. (Eds). Champaign , IL : The GSLIS Publications Office, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.  

Barry, Ann Marie Seward.  (1997).  Visual Intelligence: Perception, Image, and Manipulation in Visual Communication.  Albany , NY : State University of New York .  

Horn, Robert E. (2000). Visual Language Global Communication for the 21st Century. Bainbridge Island , WA : MacroVU Inc.  

Lancaster, F. Wilfrid and Warner, Amy.  (1993). Information Retrieval Today. Arlington VA: Information Resources Press.  

Lancaster, F. Wilfrid. (1999). Indexing and Abstracting in Theory and Practice. (2^nd). Champaign , IL : The GSLIS Publications Office, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Tufte, Edward R. (2001). The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, 2nd ed. Cheshire, CO: Graphics Press. ISBN: 0961392142  

Tufte, Edward R. (1990). Envisioning Information. Cheshire , CO : Graphics Press.  

Tufte, Edward R. (1997). Visual Explanations : Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative.  Cheshire , CO : Graphics Press. (Recommended)

 Articles on E-Reserve at the URI Library

Bates, Marcia. (1999). The invisible substance of information science. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50 (12): 1043-1050.

Chen, Chaomei, Paul, Ray J. and O’Keefe, Bob. (2001). Fitting the jigsaw of citation: Information visualization in domain analysis. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 52 (4): 315-330.  

Cooper, Linda Z. (2008). Support Visual Literacy in the School Library Media Center: Developmental, socio-cultural, and experiential considerations and scenarios. Knowledge Quest, 36 (3): 14-19

De Vaney, Ann. (2000). Technology in Old Democratic Discourses and Current Resistance narratives: What is Borrowed? What is abandoned? What is New? In DeVaney, Ann, Gance, Stephen, and Ma, Yan.  (Eds.).  Technology and Resistance: Electronic Communications and New Alliances Around the World, (pp. 9-50).  New York:  Peter Lang.

Greene, Stephan, Marchionini, Gary , Plaisant,Catherine. (2000). Previews and overviews in digital libraries: designing surrogates to support visual information seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(4): 380-93

Harris, Benjamin R (2006). Visual information literacy via visual means: three heuristics. Reference Services Review,

34 (2): 213 21

Hill, Linda, et al. (2000). Alexandria digital library: user evaluation studies and system design. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51 (3): 245-259.

Hochheiser, Harry and Shneiderman, Ben. (2001). Using interactive visualizations of WWW log data to characterize access patterns and inform site design. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 52 (4): 331-343.

Joswick, Kathleen E. and Stierman, Jeanne Koekkoek.  (1997).  The core list mirage: A comparison of the journals frequently consulted by faculty and students. College and Research Libraries, 58 (1): 48-55. 

Wen-Cheng; Lin, et al. (2007). Integrating textual and visual information for cross-language image retrieval: A trans-media

 dictionary approach. Information Processing & Management, 43 (2): 488-502

Lucky, Robert.  (1989).  A theory of information.  In Silicon Dreams, pp. 37-48.  New York : St Martin 's, pages 37- 48.

Ma, Yan. (2002). A design analysis model for developing World Wide Web sites. Journal of American Society for Information Science, 53 (7): 531-535.      

Ma, Yan. (2000). Chinese Online Presence: Tiananmen Square and Beyond.  In DeVaney, Ann, Gance, Stephen, and Ma, Yan.  (Eds.).  Technology and Resistance: Electronic Communications and New Alliances Around the World, (pp. 139-151).  New York:  Peter Lang.

Ma, Yan. (1999). Visual information science: its need and place in the curriculum of library and information science education. In Griffin, Robert .E., Gibbs, William J., and Weigmann, Beth. (Eds.). Visual Literacy in an Information Age (pp. 235-239), Blacksburg, VA: The International Visual Literacy Association.

Ma, Yan and Diodato, Virgil. (1999). Icons as visual form of knowledge representation on the World Wide Web: A semiotic analysis. In Woods, Larry. (1999). (Ed.). ASIS’ 99 Proceedings of the 62^nd ASIS Annual Meeting Washington, D. C. October 31 – November 4, 1999. (pp. 181-193). Medford, NJ: Information Today, Inc.

Marty, Paul F. (2000). On-line exhibit design: the sociotechnological impact of building a museum over the World Wide Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51 (1): 24-32. 

Paolini, Paolo, et al. (2000). Visiting a museum together: how to share a visit to a virtual world. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51 (1): 33-38.

Rorissa, Abebe (in press 2008). User-generated descriptions of individual images versus labels of groups of images: A comparison using basic level theory. Information Processing & Management.

Rowley, Jennifer.  (1994).  The controlled versus natural indexing languages debate revisited: A perspective on information retrieval practice and research.  Journal of Information Science, 20 (2): 108-119.

Shannon, Claude & Weaver, Warren. (1949). The Mathematical Theory of Communication Urbana , IL , University of Illinois , pages 6 - 12.

Taylor, R.S.  (1968). “Question negotiation and information seeking in libraries.” College and Research Libraries, 29, (1968),178-189.

Walsh, Peter. (2000). The neon paintbrush: Seeing, technology, and the museum as a metaphor. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51 (1): 39-48.

Warren, Scott Alan (2001). Visual displays of information: a conceptual taxonomy Libri v. 51 (3): 135-47

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Grading Policy

            2 Definition papers                                                            15%

            7 Responses to the Readings: postings in WebCT        35%

            Mode of information report                                                15%

            Online Postings and Discussions                                    10%

  Final Project                                                                        25%

Assignments   (Click here: Instruction for Assignments)	%	Post before 6:30 p.m. on	Individual
What is Information?	5%	May 28 (Week 2)	x
What is Visual Information?	10%	June 4 (Week 3)	x
Mode of Information report	15%	June 18 (Week 5)	x
#1 Response to the Readings on visual information seeking	5%	June 18 (Week 5)	x
#2 Response to the Readings on interface design	5%	June 26 (Week 6)	x
#3 Response to the Readings on organizing visual information	5%	July 2 (Week 7)	x
#4 Response to the Readings on communication theory, perception, perceptual aesthetics	5%	July 9 (Week 8)	x
#5 Response to the Readings  on visual cognition	5%	July 9 (Week 8)	x
#6 Response to the Readings on meaning and interpretation of visual information, cultural, social, and … of visual information	5%	July 16 (Week 9)	x
#7 Response to the Readings on visualization of information, information design	5%	July 16 (Week 9)	x
Final project	25%	July 23 (Week 10)	x
Presentation and Discussion	10	Every Week	x

 

If you post your assignment after 6:30 p.m. on date specified, there will be 50% deduction of the grade for that assignment.   

                                                                                                                               

Resources                                                                                        Top of Page

International Visual Literacy Association http://www.ivla.org/

Visual Literacy Bibliography: http://www.ivla.org/bibliography/intro.htm

The Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory at the University of Maryland http://www.cs.umd.edu/projects/hcil/

Information Visualization Resources on the Web http://www-graphics.stanford.edu/courses/cs348c-96-fall/resources.html

Atlas of Cyberspaces http://www.cybergeography.org/atlas/atlas.html

Guides to Quality in Visual Resources Imaging  http://www.diglib.org/pubs/dlf091/

Katy Börner & Chaomei Chen (Eds): Visual Interfaces to Digital Libraries. Springer Verlag, LNCS 2539, 2002. http://link.springer-ny.com/link/service/series/0558/tocs/t2539.htm

Computer Facilities on the URI Campus

You can finish your projects in any computer labs on campus or at home. The Information Technology Instruction Lab in Library Room 107 is equipped with the most up-to-date hardware and software for GSLIS education.

• Computing and Internet Support at URI.
• Free Virus Protection Software for URI Students and Faculty.
• Downloading shareware at URI

** Students with special test and note-taking needs should contact the instructor as early as possible for accommodations.

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Class Schedule:                                         Top of Page

Week 1
        (May 21)

                        Introduction to the Course  

                        Nature of Information

Readings : Rubin’s Chapters 1-2; Bates, Marcia. (1999). The invisible substance of information science. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50 (12): 1043-1050.

                        Assignment: View PPT Lecture of "Information"

                        A two-page paper on What Is Information?            

            Discussion questions:

            1. Why is information so difficult to define?

                        2. What are the characteristics of information?

Back to Class Schedule

Week 2
          (May 28)

Interdisciplinary Nature of Information Science 

                        The Information Profession

                        The Information Society/The Information Age

              Present and Post your first exercise to WebCT.

                        Readings : Rubin’s Chapters 2-3.

              Ma, Yan. (1999). Visual information science: its need and place in the curriculum of library and information science   

              education. In Griffin, Robert .E., Gibbs, William J., and Weigmann, Beth. (Eds.). Visual Literacy in an Information      

             Age (pp. 235-239), Blacksburg, VA: The International Visual Literacy Association.

 

                        Assignments: View PPT Lectures of "Information Science" and "Visual Information Science";

                        Finish required readings. Work on the paper of "What is Visual Information?"

              Discuss these questions in WebCT. You can address all the issues in one discussion or address of one the major issues. But whatever you are going to discuss will need to be focused on the last question #6.

1.      Discuss Marcia Bates’ article. “in information science, we study the process in service of information transfer.” (p. 1048). Bates’ three BIG questions: a) the physical question: What are the features and laws of the recorded-information universe? b) the social question: How do people relate, seek, and use information? c) the design question: How can access to recorded information be made most rapid and effective?

2.      (Rubin) What will new technologies affect the mission of libraries?

3.      How will electronic publications and information be evaluated and selected?

4.      How will access to electronic information be provided, controlled, and paid for?

5.      How does technology affect the employees of the organization, and how can it be implemented for maximum productivity?

6.      (Ma) How visual information has played a role in this information age? In what aspects?

Back to Class Schedule

Week 3
       (June 4)                            

            Visual Literacy  

            Visual Information

                        Visual Information around Us

                        Work on your project of “Mode of Information” Report

                        Post to WebCT your two-page paper on What is Visual Information?

                        Readings : Moore ’s Chapters 1,6,8,11,12; Ma's article of "Visual Literacy: A Semiotic Analysis of Icons as Visual    

                        Information Representations on Library Homepages (2006) (In WerbCT)         

               Cooper, Linda Z. (2008). Support Visual Literacy in the School Library Media Center: Developmental, socio-cultural,  and experiential considerations and scenarios. Knowledge Quest, 36 (3): 14-19

                        Assignment: View PPT Lectures of "Visual Literacy"; "Icons--Semiotic Analysis"; "Icons--Semiotic Analysis

                        (Homepages)", and "Icons--US Library--Homepages" 

                        Work on a Mode of Information report.

Back to Class Schedule

Week 4
    (June 11)           

                        Information Theory

                        Intellectual Property Rights 

                        Information Policy Issues

                        Readings : Rubin’s Chapters 4-5, 8; Moore ’s Chapter 5

            Shannon, Claude & Weaver, Warren. (1949). The Mathematical Theory of Communication. Urbana , IL:

            University of Illinois , pages 6 - 12.

            Lucky, Robert.  (1989).  A theory of information.  In Silicon Dreams, pp. 37-48.  New York : St Martin 's, pages 37- 48.

            Assignments: View PPT Lectures of "Information Policy" and "Bibliometrics". Finish all readings. Pay attention to

            how information policy or intellectual property rights are covered for information other than textual information. 

            Finish all readings. Pay attention to how information policy or intellectual property rights are covered for information

            other than textual information.               

                       Discussion questions: (You can use one of the following questions to help you choose a topic for your final project)

            What is (are) visual communication theory or model(s)?

            What is the noise in visual communication?

  What are the current information policy or intellectual property rights for visual information? 

 Back to Class Schedule

Week 5
    (June 18)  

                         Post your “Mode of Information” report to WebCT.

                        Communication models.

                        Information Needs and Information Seeking

                        Information Rich and Poor

                        Nonverbal Communication

                        Readings : Readings : Moore ’s Chapter 9

                        Greene, Stephan; Marchionini,Gary; Plaisant,Catherine. (2000). Previews and overviews in digital

                        libraries: designing surrogates to support visual information seeking. Journal of the American Society for

                        Information Science, 51(4): 380-93

                        Taylor, R.S.  “Question negotiation and information seeking in libraries.”  College and Research  Libraries, 29,

                        (1968),178-189.

            Joswick, Kathleen E. and Stierman, Jeanne Koekkoek.  (1997).  The core list mirage: A comparison of the journals frequently consulted by faculty and students.  College and Research Libraries, 58 (1): 48-55.  

                        Harris, Benjamin R (2006). Visual information literacy via visual means: three heuristics. Reference Services Review, 34 (2): 213 21

            Ma, Yan. (2000). Chinese Online Presence: Tiananmen Square and Beyond.  In DeVaney, Ann, Gance, Stephen, and Ma, Yan.  (Eds.).  Technology and Resistance: Electronic Communications and New Alliances Around the World, (pp. 139-151).  New York:  Peter Lang.

Assignment: View PPT Lectures of "Users" and "Mode of Information--Fax"

        #1 Response to the Readings on visual information seeking is due to be posted in WebCT. Prepare one or more examples of how you or your patron(s) seeks verbal or visual information.  Write down your example(s) in no more than one page (600 words) Post your Response to  WebCT.               

                        Discussion questions: (You can use Use Discussion questions to help you focus your paper)

            1. How do we define visual information rich or poor? Or, visual information literate vs. illiterate? Can someone be visually rich, but not visually literate?

Back to Class Schedule

Week 6

    (June 25)                         

                        Organization of Information  

                        Information Retrieval Systems: Indexing

                        Information Retrieval Systems: Electronic Sources

                        Readings : Moore ’s Chapters 10, 13

            Rorissa, Abebe (in press 2008). User-generated descriptions of individual images versus labels of groups of images:  A         comparison using basic level theory. Information Processing & Management.

                    Warren, Scott Alan (2001). Visual displays of information: a conceptual taxonomy Libri v. 51 (3): 135-47

                      Visit the Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory at the University of Maryland                         http://www.cs.umd.edu/projects/hcil/

                        Lin Xia. Visual MeSH. URL: http://research.cis.drexel.edu/mesh/

                      Assignment: View PPT Lectures of  "Information Representation"; "Indexing"; "Inverted Files"; and "Icon Indexing".
                    #2 Response to the Readings on interface design is due to be posted in WebCT. Each of you will need to find one         most current quality article on the topics of today’s session. Share your summary with your classmates. Post your citation or
                     URL to the class WebCT. Prepare one good or one poor example of interface design of an information system. Post
                     your examples in WebCT. We may have a discussion on Cultural Differences in Interface Design with students from
                     another institution.

Back to Class Schedule

Week 7
    (July 2)  

                       Organization of Information  

                       Information Retrieval Systems: Searching

                      Information Retrieval Systems: Controlled Vocabulary

                        Readings : Rubin’s Chapter 6

           Rowley, Jennifer.  (1994).  The controlled versus natural indexing languages debate revisited: A perspective on         information retrieval practice and research.  Journal of Information Science, 20 (2): 108-119.

   Wen-Cheng; Lin, et al. (2007). Integrating textual and visual information for cross-language image retrieval: A

trans-media dictionary approach.  Information Processing & Management, 43 (2): 488-502.

"Revealing Things" The Smithsonian's Virtual Exhibit (note the interactive spider display to move from subject to subject!)

http://www.walkerart.org/salons/shockoftheview/space/disalvo/revealingthings.html

http://www.walkerart.org/salons/shockoftheview/space/disalvo/index.html

                        Assignment: View PPT Lectures of "Information Retrieval" and ""Controlled Vocabulary".

                        #3 Response to the Readings on organizing visual information is due to be posted in WebCT. Prepare one or more examples of how textual and visual information is organized.  For example, how do we exercise “Controlled Vocabulary” for textual or visual information? Write down your example(s) in no more than one page ((600 words). Post your examples to WebCT.

Back to Class Schedule

Week 8

    (July 9)

                        Communication Theory 

                        Perception

                        Perceptual Aesthetics

                        Readings : Moore ’s Chapter 2,5,7 

Assignments: View PPT Lectures of "Perception"; "Media and Race"; "Manikins".

#4 Response to the Readings on communication theory, perception, and perceptual aesthetics is due. How can you apply  these principles from the readings to your work or class projects or research? You can also cite examples from LIS field or other fields to demonstrate how these principles are used appropriately or inappropriately. Post your experience or example(s) in WebCT.

                        Visual Cognition

                        Images and Imagery Theory

                        Readings : Moore ’s Chapters 3-4

                        Assignment: View PPT Lectures of ""An Analysis of the Film "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and Fill out the the

                         "Survey of CTHD".

                        #5 Response to the Readings on visual cognition is due. Prepare one or more examples of how visual cognition has

                         played a role in information seeking, information storage and retrieval, etc. Write down your example(s) in no more

                         than one page (600 words). Post your examples in WebCT.

                        Discussion questions:  (You can use Use Discussion questions to help you focus your paper)

                        1. How visual cognition plays a role in human information processing? Information retrieval? Information seeking?

Back to Class Schedule

Week 9

     (July 16)                       

                       Meanings and Interpretations of Visual Information

                       Cultural, Social, Political, Technological Aspects of Visual Information

                      Readings : Moore ’s Chapters 16-21

            De Vaney, Ann. (2000). Technology in Old Democratic Discourses and Current Resistance narratives: What is Borrowed? What is abandoned? What is New? In DeVaney, Ann, Gance, Stephen, and Ma, Yan.  (Eds.).  Technology and Resistance: Electronic Communications and New Alliances Around the World, (pp. 9-50).  New York:  Peter Lang.

      

                       Assignment: View PPT Lectures of "A Book from the Sky" and "Code of Chinese Characters".

#6 Response to the Readings on meaning and interpretation of visual information, cultural, social, and technological issues of visual information is due. Prepare one or more examples of how meanings are constructed and interpreted in information systems, in information seeking process, in interface design, etc. Write down your example(s) in no more than one page (600 words). Post your examples to WebCT.

                        Discussion questions? (You can use Use Discussion questions to help you focus your paper)

                        1. Is meaning constructed/coded by the author/designer/producer?

                        2. Is meaning created by the reader/user/viewer?

 

Back to Class Schedule

          

Week 10

    (July 23)  

                    Visualization of Information

                     Information Design

                    Readings : Moore ’s Chapters 14-15 ( Moore ’s Chapters 16-21 from last session if you need more time to finish

                    readings them).

                     Assignment: #7 Response to the Readings on visualization of information and information design is due. Prepare one or more examples to illustrate how information is well/poorly designed. Or, you may prepare one or more examples of visualization of information in our field. Post your examples in WebCT.

Some suggested articles:

                 Chen, Chaomei, Paul, Ray J. and O’Keefe, Bob. (2001). Fitting the jigsaw of citation: Information visualization in domain analysis. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 52 (4): 315-330.  

                    Hochheiser, Harry and Shneiderman, Ben. (2001). Using interactive visualizations of WWW log data to characterize access patterns and inform site design. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 52 (4): 331-343.  

                    Rune Petterson’s and his articles and book on Information Design:

http://ww.idp.mdh.se/personal/rpn01/ (It did  not work on May 18th. Will check). 

Rune Pettersson's published papers:

http://www.idp.mdh.se/forskning/publikationer.asp (It did not work on May 18th. Will check).

Rune Pettersson's Book on Information Design published by John Benjamins Publiching company:

http://www.benjamins.com/cgi-bin/t_bookview.cgi?bookid=DDCS%203

 Visit the following sites.  For any site of your choice, What is “attractive” about the site?  What is useful in the site?

 Information Design sites:

http://www.dove-tail.com/

http://intensify.com.au/

http://flow.dreamhost.com/

http://www.sapient.com/

http://www.frankwords.com/

http://www.somepig.com/

                                                  

                Digital Libraries and Museums

                Readings: 

                Marty, Paul F. (2000). On-line exhibit design: the sociotechnological impact of building a museum over the World Wide Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51 (1): 24-32. 

                  Walsh, Peter. (2000). The neon paintbrush: Seeing, technology, and the museum as a metaphor. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51 (1): 39-48.

                  Assignment: View PPT Lectures of "Website Design Study"; "Digital Libraries"; "Digital Museums"; and "Tiananmen

                 Square Incident Digital Museum".

                  Find a digital library or a digital museum of your choice and share it with your classmates in WebCT. Use the theories and principles learned in this course to illustrate how the library/museum was designed from your point of view.

    Best of the Web: http://www.archimuse.com/mw2008/best/index.html

       

                       Final Project Presentations in WebCT                      

                      Final project is due today.

Back to Class Schedule

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