IDeaSInterpretive Data Science

About

A community, not an institution

IDeaS is an informal international community of scholars, not a centre or an association. It has no membership fees, no bylaws, and no staff — only a recurring conference, a rotating set of hosts, and a shared commitment to interpretive work on data and algorithms.

The story

The emergence of data science and analytics has transformed society at large. To effectively understand this phenomenon, we believe we need an interpretive and cultural approach.

IDeaS began in 2019 as a collaboration between the University of Alberta and the University of British Columbia, growing out of the Alberta School of Business Data Analytics Group. The founding workshop in Edmonton brought fifty scholars together around a question that still organizes the community: how can we use data science and algorithms to develop new management theory?

The premise was that three groups of scholars who rarely talk to each other should. We strive to approach the field of data science from an interdisciplinary and interstitial perspective, bringing together scholarly communities who do not normally interact with one another — combining quantitative and qualitative methodologies with emergent and more formalistic theorizing.

A second workshop, planned for Imperial College London in 2020, was cancelled by the pandemic. A 2022 conference bridged the gap. The 2023 relaunch in Edmonton narrowed deliberately to the ethnography of algorithms in a small, developmental format, which 2024 scaled up under the banner of algorithmic organizing.

In 2025 the conference left Edmonton for the first time, hosted by the Telfer School of Management in Ottawa, and the frame broadened to assemblages, ecosystems, and fields. In 2026 the community finally reached London, adding a political turn: power, governance, accountability, and a closing panel on policy.

Our ultimate goal has not changed since the beginning: to reinvigorate the social sciences in a digital age, so that foundational theories can continue to matter as we live within and around AI and algorithms.

What every event is for

Four objectives have carried through every IDeaS event since the first:

  • Foster cutting-edge research that bridges ethnographic and computational scholarship.
  • Advance participants' work through intense, focused feedback rather than conference-style presentation.
  • Set the research agenda for interpretive work on data, algorithms, and AI in organizations.
  • Provide a genuine networking forum, with particular attention to doctoral students and junior scholars.

How the community works

A rotating host. Since 2025 the conference has moved between institutions — Ottawa in 2025, London in 2026 — with a local host handling logistics and contributing to the budget. Before that, events were run from the University of Alberta.

Small by design. Attendance has ranged from around eighteen to roughly fifty. Papers get thirty minutes or more, sessions leave white space, and meals are part of the program. Participants consistently report that the scale is the point.

Junior scholars first. Every event has offered travel stipends for doctoral students and postdocs, and has paired junior with senior scholars for extended discussion of work in progress. This is the community's most consistent commitment.

Funded by pledges. Events are financed by distributed contributions from organizers' institutions and chairs, usually with one anchor sponsor per event, rather than by registration fees.

No formal membership. There is no association to join. People take part by coming to events, presenting work, and staying in touch.

Seven years