PhD supervisors of the Centre for Social Informatics invite applications from new students
The School of Computing at Edinburgh Napier University is currently advertising eight fully-funded PhD studentships across a wide range of subjects, from sound technologies to cybersecurity. Amongst these are four proposed by Centre for Social Informatics colleagues: Continue reading
Given that my last in-person research seminar was early last year on 19th February 2020 (when I was the speaker at an event at the University of Glasgow), I was very excited to venture onto campus ten days ago on 17th November 2021 to welcome a visitor to the Centre for Social Informatics. At the invitation of Dr David Brazier, Dr Morgan Harvey, Lecturer in Data Science and Information Retrieval in the Information School at the University of Sheffield, kindly travelled to Edinburgh to present the findings from some research that he conducted when employed at Northumbria University. He also took advantage of the trip north to work with David on revisions to a paper that they have recently co-authored. Continue reading
New Centre for Social Informatics colleagues, autumn 2021
Today the Centre for Social Informatics welcomes its newest member of staff: Dr Frances Ryan has taken up a lecturing post with us. This is a return to our group at Edinburgh Napier University for Frances: she graduated from Napier with a PhD in July 2019. In the intervening time, Frances has been engaged in postdoctoral research, first here at Napier and then at the Universities of Dundee and Aberdeen. Continue reading
Over the past couple of days I have achieved something that I would never have agreed to attempt in ‘normal’ times: I attended two PhD examinations on two different continents, 19 hours apart*. Continue reading
The way we were, December 2019. L to R: John Marshall, Peter Cruickshank, Lyndsey Middleton (now graduated with PhD), Katherine Stephen, Rachel Salzano, Marina Milosheva, Laura Muir (now retired), Hazel Hall, Leo Appleton (now graduated with PhD), Ella Taylor-Smith, David Haynes, David Brazier, Frances Ryan (now Research Fellow at the University of Aberdeen), Colin Smith, Wegene Demeke, and Bruce Ryan.
Just over a year ago, on 22nd December 2019, I summarised the the previous six months of activities of the members of the Centre for Social Informatics. I illustrated this account with a jolly photograph of us all bunched closely together around the table a few days earlier in room C34a of Edinburgh Napier University’s Merchiston campus. Continue reading
The December 2020 issue of Information Research is now available. Alongside the ‘regular’ papers and book reviews, this issue incorporates all the papers and posters from the Information Seeking in Context (ISIC) conference hosted online by the Department of Information Science, University of Pretoria, South Africa in September. Continue reading
This time last year on 18th December 2019, following our usual tradition, the Centre for Social Informatics staff and students marked the end of the year with an ‘All centre’ celebration of their achievements of the previous six months. This kind of get-together is completely impossible under the current pandemic restrictions. So, instead of the usual hilarity in room C34a of Napier’s Merchiston campus, during which I use my enormous egg timer to time five minute updates from everyone around the table over the course of two hours (glass of wine in hand), yesterday afternoon we gathered online for just 30 minutes of social fun. Continue reading
The Centre for Social Informatics flyer (version 11.2) has just been updated for the new academic year. Follow the link to read about the work of our group, including details of research expertise, funders, recent PhD completions, and recent publications. The flyer includes profiles of the group’s academic and research staff: Continue reading
Congratulations to our Centre for Social Informatics colleague Dr Iris Buunk on the award of her PhD yesterday. Normally we would have celebrated with Iris at the Edinburgh Napier University graduation ceremony at the Usher Hall. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, however, we had to find an alternative way to mark Iris’s achievement: a jolly drinks party on Zoom. Continue reading
The 2020 Information Seeking in Context (ISIC) conference is hosted this week by our colleagues at the Department of Information Science, University of Pretoria, South Africa.
Had circumstances been different, several members of the Centre for Social Informatics would be in South Africa now. The PhD students would be joining today’s doctoral workshop in person, and everyone preparing to present their papers and posters face-to-face over the course of the main conference from Tuesday to Thursday this week (as has been the case at past ISIC conferences, e.g. 2018 in Kraków, Poland, 2016 in Zadar, Croatia, 2014 in Leeds) . Continue reading
Hazel Hall 
