Database Ethnography and Provenance

Oct-12 : In this lesson, we will investigate and document data's history and social context.

Reading

• Tullis, J. A., and B. Kar. 2021. Where Is the Provenance? Ethical Replicability and Reproducibility in GIScience and Its Critical Applications. Annals of the American Association of Geographers 111 (5):1318–1328. DOI:10.1080/24694452.2020.1806029

Resources

• USGS Metadata Wizard 2.0 and installers
• ISO Standards for geographic information and metadata
• GeoNode is an open source geographic data server and metadata catalogue
• GeoNetwork is an open source geographic metadata catalogue server

Reference

• Schuurman, N. 2008. Database Ethnographies Using Social Science Methodologies to Enhance Data Analysis and Interpretation. Geography Compass 2 (5):1529–1548. DOI:10.1111/j.1749-8198.2008.00150.x
  • I suggest starting at the end of this paper, with the pragmatic Where are database ethnographies needed? section; then the first three subsections of Literatures that bear on database ethnographies: The proliferation of boundary objects, semantic data interoperability, and the role of tacit knowledge in scientific communities.

Main Page