1. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 1 Rodney J. Clarke School of Computing, Staffordshire University Beaconside, Stafford ST 18 0DG, United Kingdom  +44 (0)1785 35 3334 office  +44 (0)1785 35 3497  www.dsl.uow.edu.au/~rclarke/contact.htm  r.j.clarke@staffs.ac.uk Intertextuality at Work: Large-Scale Structure of Information Systems School of Computing Seminar Series: June 26th, 2002 Blue Theatre, Staffordshire University

2. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 2 Agenda Introduction: Research Problems and Approach Case Study: ALABS at the Microcomputer Laboratories Workpractice Theory: Systemic Semiotic Workpractice Framework Methodological Issues Systems Use: Workpractice Texts in Context Workpractice Change: Individual Elements Sequence Copying and Elaboration Intertextuality and Systems

3. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 3 Introduction Research Problems and Approach

4. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 4 Introduction Research Problems and Approach (1) although users of information systems do not have unmediated access to systems features, an elision exists in the literature between features and workpractices in contrast, systems features are negotiated through the enactment of workpractices in workplaces

5. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 5 Introduction Research Problems and Approach (2) failure to recognise the differences between them means that diachronic studies of systems can only be described in terms of acontextual changes to technical features if we want to study diachronic changes to information systems then this must be done by studying workpractices (pragmatics)

6. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 6 Introduction Research Problems and Approach (3) attempt to describe the relationships between organisations and systems development or utilisation of common theory, methods, and notations without reducing one to the other provision of a contextual and communicative framework creation of synoptic and diachronic levels of description

7. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 7 Introduction Research Problems and Approach (4) including: development of a semiotic/contextual framework for workpractices associated with information systems comprising both theory and methods apply it to a case study of an information system that has been used for a lengthy period of time- greater than the average half-life of an operational information

8. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 8 Case Study ALABS at the Microcomputer Laboratories

9. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 9 Microcomputer Laboratories High Demand- TES Incident (1998)

10. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 10 Microcomputer Laboratories Virtual Reality- Physical Facility (1996)

11. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 11 ALABS Automated Library And Borrowing System commissioned in 1986- crucial to supporting MCL day-to-day operations standalone system for the provision of disk-based software, manuals and hardware to students & staff used barcode technologies as used in shopping centres and spoken language service encounter genres to realise service transaction Novell Netware Servers ALABS

12. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 12 Workpractice Theory Systemic Semiotic Workpractice Framework

13. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 13 Workpractice Theory Systemic Semiotic Workpractice Framework in use an information system consists of many system features negotiated through the enactment of workpractices apply a composite of two semiotic theories to explain the structure and function of workpractices- referred to as systemic semiotics (Fawcett 1986)

14. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 14 Workpractice Theory Systemic Semiotic Workpractice Framework systemic semiotic workpractice framework utilises: systemic functional linguistics- a semiotic model of language, and social semiotics- a general semiotic theory which has developed out of systemic functional linguistics an exploratory study (Clarke 1996) revealed that both theories may at times be required

15. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 15 Workpractice Theory Systemic Semiotic Workpractice Framework to develop a suitable systemic semiotic workpractice framework requires a detailed understanding of exactly what each of these theorists is claiming many of these terms are not exact matches- use the concept of theoretical affinities at certain times we must drop one theory in favour of the other- conditions of use

16. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 16 Workpractice Theory Systemic Semiotic Workpractice Framework Social Semiotics (Bakhtin, Foucault, Althusser) Systemic Functional Linguistics (Halliday, Martin, Hasan) the model itself is a product of discourse context of culture and situation texts as product & process tenor relations discourse social context text emphasising process social subjectivity theoretical affinities

17. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 17 Workpractice Theory Bakhtin’s Dialogism (Clarke 1997) using social semiotic theory (Bakhtin), workpractices are considered as having a dialogical relationship to system features a monologic condition arises when users comply with the discourses negotiated in the workpractice a dialogic condition arises when users resist and attempt to renegotiate the discourses associated with the workpractice

18. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 18 Workpractice Theory Social Semiotic Theory incorporated recent social semiotic theory (Foucault, Althusser and Kress) together with dialogism (Bakhtin) to form a descriptive model of workpractices must be supplemented with compatible semiotic methods- systemic functional linguistics operational definition of workpractices as one or more texts together with zero or more actions

19. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 19 Workpractice Theory SFL Semiotic Model of Language used Systemic Functional Linguistic (SFL) theory to provide actual methods for conducting applied linguistic analysis of texts (Halliday 1985) the Stratal Model of SFL (Martin 1992) is derived in subsequent slides- useful in identifying which strata, systems, and units to consider in a specific study

20. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 20 Workpractice Theory SFL Context and Text solidary relationship- that is a relationship of unity- between texts and contexts context predicts text, text construes context note the similarity to Hjelmslev’s concepts a major influence for Martin’s reformulation of Halliday Context Text

21. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 21 Workpractice Theory SFL Bi-stratal Organisation of Context two types of context recognised by the theory (after Malinowski) Situational Context which provides secific situational ‘values’ to the text Cultural Context which provides a pattern or template that is portable across different situations within a national or organisational culture Language Cultural Context Situational Context

22. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 22 Workpractice Theory SFL Contextual Strata Situational Context is represented in SFL by Register consisting of field- social action and activities, tenor- who is involved in the language, and mode- how language is used Cultural Context is represented in SFL by Genre text staging involving sequence, selection, and iteration Language Genre Register

23. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 23 Workpractice Theory SFL Tri-stratal Organisation of Language unlike most semiotic systems, the meanings in language (content) are not directly realised into sounds or letters (expression) language is tristratal; the content (signified) involves meanings and wordings Genre Register Meanings Wordings Expression

24. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 24 Workpractice Theory SFL Language Strata meanings of a text are associated with the strata of Discourse Semantics… …are in turn realised in wordings (words and grammar) are associated with the strata of Lexico- grammar …are in turn given expression (sounds and letters) with the strata of Phonology/Graphology Genre Register Discourse Semantics Phonology Graphology Lexico-grammar

25. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 25 Workpractice Theory SFL Metafunctions while strata are responsible for major language units, metafunctions are responsible for the kinds of meanings simultaneously conveyed in texts: ideational metafunction- concerned with action interpersonal metafunction- concerned with reflection textual metafunction- concerned with connection Genre Register Discourse Semantics field Phonology Graphology Lexico-grammar experiential Transitivity Mood Theme textual inter- personal tenor mode

26. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 26 Workpractice Theory SFL Ideational Metafunction resolved in language as two distinct components- experiential meaning: expression of processes and other phenomena in the social world including the speakers’ own consciousness logical meanings: involves the mapping of experiential meanings into language Genre Register Discourse Semantics field Phonology Graphology Lexico-grammar experiential Transitivity Mood Theme textual inter- personal tenor mode

27. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 27 Workpractice Theory SFL Interpersonal Metafunction the metafunction of language by which: social groups are delimited and the individual is identified, represented and reinforced Genre Register Discourse Semantics field Phonology Graphology Lexico-grammar experiential Transitivity Mood Theme textual inter- personal tenor mode

28. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 28 Workpractice Theory SFL Textual Metafunction refers to the way the text is organised as a piece of writing Genre Register Discourse Semantics field Phonology Graphology Lexico-grammar experiential Transitivity Mood Theme textual inter- personal tenor mode

29. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 29 Workpractice Theory Appropriate SFL Methods stratal SFL model has useful properties, eg. for a given study appropriate linguistic methods can be determined in advance for workpractices associated with IS, metthods must be selected that emphasise the relationship between a text and its context, rather than the language system methods associated with the (organisational) of IS are used in the case

30. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 30 Methodological Issues

31. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 31 Methodological Issues Workpractices: Operational Definition workpractices are defined in terms of: one or more texts which can be described by text types (genres), or zero or more action types described using qualitative sequences formed by direct observation or activity reconstruction theoretical, methodological and notational similarities between genres and actions are described in Clarke (1999)

32. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 32 Methodological Issues Empty Corpus Problem empty corpus problem (Andersen 1992)- what can you do when you have no language to analyse- exactly the conditions in this project its partial resolution- is to ask stakeholder- elicit using a probe transform a potential empty corpus situation into a non-text situation

33. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 33 Methodological Issues Work Situations Text Situation (Spoken) Non-text Situation Text Situation (Written) Service Encounter Genre Action Sequence Instructional Procedure Genre

34. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 34 Methodological Issues Genre changed traditional SFL theory of genre: removed obligatory/optional element distinction and altered it from crisp to fuzzy formulation- still in progress! altered the classical notation to show: differences between successive versions of the same workpractice similarities between distinct workpractices

35. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 35 Methodological Issues Work Situations & Genre

36. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 36 Methodological Issues Register (1) field- whats going on Lexical and Indexical Lexical Items System Networks tenor- who is doing it Power (Equal/Unequal) Affective Involvement (High/Low) Contact (Frequent/Occasional)

37. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 37 Methodological Issues Register (2) mode- the role of language spatial/interpersonal distance (casual conversation/novel) experiential distance language as action- accompanying the social process / language as relection- constituting the social process

38. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 38 Methodological Issues Work Situations & Register

39. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 39 System Use: Workpractice Texts in Context

40. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 40 ALABS Student Loan

41. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 41 Negotiated Separation Student Loan Version 1 (a) into new form (b)

42. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 42 Workpractice Change: Individual Elements

43. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 43 Workpractice Change Cutting, Pasting, Elaboration (1) ALABS provides evidence for the purposeful manipulation of individual genres associated with workpractices three basic operators were operationally identified: cutting: the removal of genre elements pasting: the addition of genre elements elaboration: both of the above

44. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 44 Workpractice Change Cutting, Pasting, Elaboration (2) the evidence for purposeful manipulation of genres: changes are minimal and ‘optimal’ some genres appear to change together with respect to information systems genre re-use is preferred to genre reinvention- it may also be a general mechanism for genre change

45. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 45 Workpractice Change Cutting, Pasting, Elaboration (3) implications for end-user programming practices: was the programmer so intimately familiar with the code that they knew exactly which lines to add/remove or was the programmer so intimately familiar with the workpractice that they knew which code implemented which genre element

46. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 46 Element Pasting Student Loan (a) Version 2, (b) Version 3

47. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 47 Workpractice Change: Sequence Copying and Elaboration

48. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 48 Sequence Copying (a) Student Loan Version 1 (b) Append

49. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 49 Sequence Elaboration (a) Student Append (b) Student Renewal Chronemic

50. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 50 Sequence Elaboration (a) Student Loan Version 2/3 (b) Move Chronemic

51. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 51 Intertextuality and Systems

52. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 52 Structural Complements: Co-variation of System Features over Time structural complements evidence for the large scale structure of workpractices associated with IS elements in distinct but related workpractices that appear to enter into a kind of systematic co-variation- addition, persistence, and removal for example LO in Student Loan and LI in Student Return

53. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 53 Genre Assemblages (1) workpractices never exist by themselves- and so the texts associated with these workpractices never exist in isolation Conditions of Use form is associated with the Regulations & Enrolment (RE) element in Student Loan genre. genre assemblage diagrams show how texts associated with workpractices relate to each other

54. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 54 Genre Assemblage (2) Conditions of Use G SR IS E ALABS Student Loan RE SR MOF

55. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 55 Genre Assemblages (3) the Conditions of Use Regulatory Genre which dictates the rules and regulations involved solid line joining this genre to the service encounters is referred to as a genre association and is actually an intertextual relationship the association never obvious until a problem specified in the Conditions of Use form occurs

56. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 56 Genre Assemblages (4) in addition, the relevant people, agents, interactants or social subjects addressed by the genres can also be indicated on the genre assemblage diagram these social subjects are signaled by identifying tenor relations- use square boxes with the tenor role included

57. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 57 Genre Assemblages (5) become a significant organising principle for information systems multiple genres linked by common sets of social subjects organised using interterxtual relations of various kinds (the selection of which is bothe discursive or ’ideological’ as well as historical)

58. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 58 Genre Assemblages (6) the kinds of assemblage shown are also referred to as ’direct’ because all genres relevant to it are shown another form of genre assemblage can be formed, referred to as dependent assemblages, which seem to require other genres in other assemblages seem to be related to management work

59. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 59

60. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 60 Genre Assemblages (7) Reproduction of Social Subjects political problems ensued for the MicroLabs as they tried to get academic staff to return items promptly academics often needed to have an item for an entire session in response the ALABS system was altered by adding a completely new type of social subject Long (term) Staff member

61. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 61 Genre Assemblages (8) Reproduction of Social Subjects

62. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 62 Genre Assemblages (9) Reproduction of Social Subjects

63. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 63 ALABS Tutor Loan

64. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 64

65. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 65 Intertextuality Definitions Systemic Functional Linguistics: intertextuality is the direct reference one text can make to another Social Semiotic (Bakhtin): the ways texts embody meanings that have already been made, in one form or another in other texts- conventional, requiring familiarity not intuition- users understand specific workpractices (texts) because they have prior experience of them

66. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 66 Intertextuality Type of Reference <> Persistence No correlation between the persistence of workpractices and the type of intertextual references used For example, Class Loans & Returns did not have any direct or elliptical intertextual relations yet it was one of the most complicated assemblages and also one of the most persistent

67. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 67 Intertextuality Type of Reference & Order of Development is a relationship between the type of intertextual references and workpractice development initial workpractices employed direct intertextual references in their associations once established, additional related workpractices utilised elliptical intertextual relations dialogic intertextual references were used to associate additional workpractices assemblages which did not undergo changes to workpractices did not employ dialogic intertextual references

68. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 68 Intertextuality Student Loan/Return Assemblage Direct Elliptical

69. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 69 Intertexuality Types and Occurence

70. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 70 Conclusions (1) fundamental research into the relationship between distinct workpractices likely to relevant to a broad range of concerns within the IS discipline Organisational impact of IS/IT Systems Analysis Systems Development/Prototyping Systems Maintenance/Change Management

71. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 71 Conclusions (2) Workpractices don’t exist in isolation: Assemblages and Associations Users don’t create Systems!: Systems reproduce Users Knowing how to behave: Social Subjectivity in Organisations Workpractices Conserve Social Relations of Power

72. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 72 Conclusions (3) Mutual coexistence of Workpractices Intertextuality and workpractices: How users negotiate IS in Social Contexts Social Subjects involved in more than one Assemblage can act as vectors for system change

73. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 73 References Belsey, C. (1980) Critical Practice New Accents, London: Methuen Clarke, R. J. (1996) “The Persistence of Systems in Organisations: Genre Analysis of Systems Decommissioning” in Holmqvist, B.; Andersen, P. B.; Klein, H. and R. Posner eds/ (1996) Signs of Work: Semiosis and Information Processing in Organisations Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 59-106 Clarke, R. J. (1997b) “Eliciting current and proposed systems workpractices using genre: results of a pilot study” ASFLA 1997: Australian Systemic Functional Linguistics Association Conference, University of Wollongong, October 3-5, 1997, p.20 Clarke, R. J. (1997a) “Organisational Semiosis: Rethinking Integrationist and Separationist Views of Information Systems” in Sankey, M. R.; Gimate-Welsh, A. and P. Pellegrino eds/ (1997) La semiótica. Intersección entre la naturaleza y la cultura (Semiotics Bridging Nature and Culture): 6th International Congress on Semiotics Guadalaharo, Mexico, July 13-18, 1997, International Association for Semiotic Studies, Association Internationale de Sémiotique, and the Asociación Internacional de Estudios Semióticos pp.102

74. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 74 Clarke, R. J. (1998) “Systemic Semiotic Development Using SFX: Prototyping Genre-Based Representations of IS Workpractices” ISIC/CIRA/ISAS’98: IEEE International Symposium on Intelligent Control (ISIC), held jointly with the International Symposium on Computational Intelligence in Robotics and Automation (CIRA) and Intelligent Systems and Semiotics (ISAS), National Institute of Standards and Technology. Gaithersburg, Maryland, USA, September 14-17, 1998, 846-851 Clarke, R. J. (1999) “Systemic Semiotic relations between Workpractice Actions and Texts” Sign Processes in Complex Systems: 7th International Congress of the IASS-AIS: International Association for Semiotic Studies/ Association Internationale de Sémiotique Dresden, University of Technology, October 6-11, 1999 forthcoming Clarke, R. J. (2000) “An Information System in its Organisational Contexts: A Systemic Semiotic Longitudinal Case Study” Unpublished PhD Dissertation, University of Wollongong Freadman, A. and A. Macdonald (1992) What is this thing called “Genre”? Four Essays in the Semiotics of Genre Mount Nebo, Queensland, Australia: Boombana Publications Halliday, M. A. K. (1978) Language as social semiotic: The social interpretation of language and meaning Melbourne: Edward Arnold

75. Clarke, R. J (2002) Staffordshire: 75 Kling, R. and W. Scacchi (1982) “The Web of Computing: Computer Technology as Social Organisation” Advances in Computers 21, New York: Academic Press Scacchi, W. (1987) "Models of Software Evolution: Life Cycle and Process" Carnegie Mellon University: Software Engineering Institute SEI Curriculum Module SEI-CM-10-1.0, October Schirato, T. and S. Yell (1996) Communication and Cultural Literacy: An Introduction Australian Cultural Studies Series, St Leonards, Australia: Allen & Unwin