Abstract
In this paper we advocate the view of systems analysis as an activity where communication and social interaction within the developer community and between developers, users and other stakeholders is central. Analysis involves a complex bridging process (Quintas 1993) between IS professionals and users implying different backgrounds, knowledge, agendas and social relations of power. We need to study communication in organisational contexts to better understand how we can conduct effective systems analysis and also in order to improve our pedagogic practices. However while there is a general recognition of the importance of communication it is none-the-less a complex social phenomena that is not well understood within the IS discipline and not explicitly addressed in traditional methods and methodologies despite growing interest and recognition in various qualitative, interpretive and ethnographic approaches (Easterbrook 1993).
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Burch J, Grudnitski G (1989) Information Systems: Theory and Practice. 5th ed. John Wiley & Sons NY
Clarke RJ (2000) An Information System in its Organisational Contexts: A Systemic Semiotic Longitudinal Case Study. Unpublished PhD Dissertation Department of Information Systems University of Wollongong Australia
Clarke RJ (2003) The Discursive Organisation of Action and Language in Work-practice Descriptions. In: Goldkuhl G, Lind M, Ågerfalk PJ (eds) ALOIS 2003 — Action in Language, Organisations and Information Systems. VITS Research Network Linköping University Sweden 12th–13th March 2003
Easterbrook S (1993) Negotiation and the Role of the Requirements Specification. In: Quintas P (ed) Social Dimensions of Systems Engineering: People, Processes, Policies and Software Development. Ellis Horwood New York
Eggins S (1994) An Introduction to Systemic Functional Linguistics. Pinter Publishers London United Kingdom
Eggins S, Slade D (1997) Analysing Casual Conversation. Cassell London and Washington
Halliday MAK (1985) An Introduction to Functional Grammar. Edward Arnold London
Hasan R (1985) The Structure of a Text. In: Halliday MAK, Hasan R (1985) Language, Context, and Text: Aspects of Language on a Social-Semiotic Perspective. Deakin University Press Geelong Victoria
Martin JR (1992) English Text: System and Structure. John Benjamins Publishing Company Philadelphia/Amsterdam
Quintas P (1993) Introduction — Living the Lifecycle: Social Processes in software and systems development. In: Quintas P (ed) Social Dimensions of Systems Engineering: People, Processes, Policies and Software Development Ellis Horwood Series in Interactive Information Systems. Ellis Horwood Limited London
Sekaran U (1992) Research Methods for Business: A Skill Building Approach. Second ed. John Wiley and Sons USA
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2006 Springer Science-Business Media, LLC
About this paper
Cite this paper
Clarke, R.J. (2006). The Work that Analysts Do: A Systemic Functional Approach to Elicitation. In: Nilsson, A.G., Gustas, R., Wojtkowski, W., Wojtkowski, W.G., Wrycza, S., Zupančič, J. (eds) Advances in Information Systems Development. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-36402-5_28
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-36402-5_28
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
Print ISBN: 978-0-387-30834-0
Online ISBN: 978-0-387-36402-5
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)