Interdisciplinarity
Interdisciplinarity is a type of academic collaboration in which specialists drawn from two or more
academic disciplines work together in pursuit of common goals.
Interdisciplinary programs sometimes arise from a shared conviction that the traditional disciplines are unable or unwilling to address an important problem. For example, social science disciplines such as anthropology and sociology paid little attention to the social analysis of technology throughout most of the twentieth century. As a result, many social scientists with interests in technology have joined
science and technology studies programs, which are typically staffed by scholars drawn from numerous disciplines (including
anthropology,
history,
philosophy,
sociology, and
women's studies). They may also arise from new research developments, such as
nanotechnology, which cannot be addressed without combining the approaches of two or more disciplines. Examples include
quantum information processing, which amalgamates elements of
quantum physics and
computer science, and
bioinformatics, which combines
molecular biology with computer science.
Many scientists believe that the most pressing problems facing humanity, including the
AIDS pandemic,
global warming, and the loss of
biodiversity, can be solved only by developing interdisciplinary approaches. At another level, interdisciplinarity is seen as a remedy to the intellectually deadening effects of excessive specialization.
There are varying types of inquiry that may be referred to as "interdisciplinary." In
multidisciplinarity, researchers from two or more disciplines work together on a common problem, but without altering their disciplinary approaches or developing a common conceptual framework. This approach is related to the
think tank model, where the objective is likely to be the solution of an immediate problem, rather than exploration of disciplinary perspectives. A less-recognized category is transdisciplinarity, in which one or more canonical standards of a discipline may be consciously defied for heuristic purposes. An example might be the use of
mass lexical comparison in the
Nostratic and
Proto-World language projects, rather than the phonological correspondence rules typical of work in
historical linguistics. Finally, there is "non-disciplinarity," which differs from dilettantism mainly in that it is a conscious and deliberate rather than ignorant disregard of the expectation that one should remain within the subject matter and methodology of a defined discipline; the approach may be taken by those working from a postmodern model of
bricolage, and may proceed from subversive intent or from an ambition to pursue larger questions.
Interdisciplinarity as the term is most often used in educational circles occurs when researchers from two or more disciplines pool their approaches and modify them so that they are better suited to the problem at hand, including the case of the team-taught course where students are required to understand how a given subject (for example,
land use) may appear differently when examined by different disciplines (e.g.,
biology and
economics).
Because most participants in interdisciplinary ventures were trained in traditional disciplines, they must learn to appreciate differing perspectives and approaches. For example, a discipline that places more emphasis on quantitative "rigor" may produce practitioners who think of themselves (and their discipline) as "more scientific" than others; in turn, colleagues in "softer" disciplines may associate quantitative approaches with an inability to grasp the broader dimensions of a problem. An interdisciplinary program may not succeed if its members remain stuck in their disciplines (and in disciplinary attitudes).
From the disciplinary perspective, much interdisciplinary work may be seen as "soft," lacking in rigor, or ideologically motivated; these beliefs place barriers in the career paths of those who choose interdisciplinary work. For example, interdisciplinary grant applications are often refereed by
peer reviewers drawn from established
disciplines; not surprisingly, interdisciplinary researchers may experience difficulty getting funding for their research. In addition, untenured researchers know that, when they seek
promotion and
tenure, it is likely that some of the evaluators will lack commitment to interdisciplinarity. They may fear that making a commitment to interdisciplinary research will increase the risk of being denied tenure.
Interdisciplinary programs may fail if they are not given sufficient autonomy. For example, it is a common practice to recruit new interdisciplinary faculty to a
joint appointment, with responsibilities in both an interdisciplinary program (such as
women's studies) and a traditional discipline (such as
history). If the traditional discipline makes the tenure decisions, new interdisciplinary faculty will be hesitant to commit themselves fully to interdisciplinary work. Other barriers include the generally disciplinary orientation of most scholarly journals, leading to the perception, if not the fact, that interdisciplinary research is hard to publish. In addition, since traditional budgetary practices at most universities channel resources through the disciplines, it becomes difficult to account for a given scholar or teacher's salary and time. During periods of budgetary retraction, the natural tendency to serve the primary constituency (i.e., students majoring in the discipline) makes resources scarce for teaching and research comparatively far from the center of the discipline as traditionally understood. For these same reasons, the introduction of new interdisciplinary programs is often perceived as a competition for diminishing funds, and may for this reason meet resistance.
Due to these and other barriers, interdisciplinary research areas are strongly motivated to become disciplines themselves. If they succeed, they can establish their own research funding programs and make their own tenure and promotion decisions. In so doing, they lower the risk of entry. Examples of former interdisciplinary research areas that have become disciplines include
neuroscience,
biochemistry and
biomedical engineering. These new fields are occasionally referred to as "interdisciplines."
Interdisciplinary programs may be founded in order to facilitate the study of subjects which have some coherence, but which cannot be adequately understood from a single disciplinary perspective (for example,
Women's Studies,
Medieval Studies). More rarely, and at a more advanced level, interdisciplinarity may itself become the focus of study, in a critique of institutionalized disciplines' ways of segmenting knowledge. Perhaps the most common complaint regarding interdisciplinary programs is the lack of synthesis -- that is, students are provided with multiple disciplinary perspectives, but given insufficient guidance in resolving the conflicts and achieving a coherent view of the subject. Critics of interdisciplinary programs feel that the ambition is simply unrealistic, given the knowledge and intellectual maturity of all but the exceptional undergraduate; some defenders concede the difficulty, but insist that cultivating interdisciplinarity as a habit of mind, even at that level, is both possible and essential to the education of informed and engaged citizens and leaders capable of analyzing, evaluating and synthesizing information from multiple sources in order to render reasoned decisions.
The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, was the first college to provide thematic interdisciplinary programs. Since opening its doors in 1971, Evergreen's entire curriculum has been taught through interdisciplinary studies.
The School of Interdisciplinary Studies (http://wcp.muohio.edu), also known as the Western College Program, was created in 1974 at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. The program allows students to take control of their educational path by designing their own major, incorporating various areas of study at Miami University to form an interdisciplinary focus. The Western College Program is distinguished by its living-learning community that fosters intellectual, personal, and professional growth through a support system of students, faculty, and staff. Students have the benefit of the individual attention a small college can offer with the resources and opportunities from a larger university.
Universities worldwide recognize that, in order to address the problems facing humanity today, they must increase their commitment to interdisciplinarity. For example, a grass-roots effort by faculty and students at
Stanford University resulted in a new program called
Bio-X, which explores the intersections among biology, computer science, medicine, and engineering. The program is housed in the
Clark Center, which opened in 2003. Situated along the pathways between the university and the medical center, the Clark Center is designed to both express and facilitate the concept of interdisciplinarity. Each lab is equipped with at least two scientists from each of the participating disciplines, but they are by no means fixed: for example, walls can be moved (or eliminated), and all equipment is on wheels. The entire building is designed to facilitate interdisciplinary communication and to accommodate new, rapid, and unexpected growth as it occurs.
A similar program has recently been instituted at
Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri. Undergraduate students must apply for acceptance into the program, and in the process design their own major using available courses in disciplinary programs. The major requires students take only two courses: an introductory course to interdisciplinary studies (focusing on the theory of interdisciplinarity) and a senior capstone (focusing on synthesis/praxis), while the rest of the student's coursework is overseen by a faculty mentor. The first class of IDSM majors at the school were: Rhetoric and Power, Philosophy in Literature, and Gender in Politics, though recently Biochemistry, Medieval Studies, and East Asian Studies were proposed.
Increasingly, universities are consciously incorporating elements of interdisciplinarity into their curricula -- within particular courses, especially as part of
general education requirements, or by requiring cognate fields in the
academic major, and through such devices as the
Learning Community, or the "clusters" system at
Washington University in St. Louis.
Interdisciplinarity is a typical trait of
holistic approaches in science. Not all scientists who are committed to interdisciplinarity consider themselves holists, however, as they may not embrace the connations of the term.
See
:Category:Interdisciplinary fields*
American studies*
Anthropological theories of value*
Area studies*
Biomedical engineering*
Biomedical informatics*
Biomedical technology*
Biophysics*
Cognitive science*
Computer graphics*
Cultural studies*
Cybernetics*
Film studies*
Holism in science*
Integrative learning*
Intelligence analysis*
Liberal arts*
Library and information science*
Media studies*
Nanotechnology*
Nativist theorizing*
Political economy*
Science studies*
Science and technology studies*
Soil science*
Systems theory*
Transdisciplinarity*
Women's studies*
The Evergreen State College, Olympia, Washington*
School of Social Ecology at the University of California, Irvine*
Association for Integrative Studies* Awbrey, S. and Awbrey, J. (1999), "Integrative Universities",
Second International Conference of the Journal "Organization", UMASS, Amherst, 17â€"
19 September 1999,
Eprint.
*
Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in the Arts (University of Manchester)*
Hang Seng Centre for Cognitive Studies*
Humanities/Policy*
Interdisciplinarity and tenure* Chubin, D.E. (1976). The conceptualization of scientific specialties.
The Sociological Quarterly 17: 448-476.
* Defila, R., and Antonietta Di Giulio. (1999).
Evaluation criteria for inter and transdisciplinary research: Project report, instrument.
Panorama Special Issue 1.
* Gerhard Medicus
Interdisciplinarity in Human Sciences (Documents No. 9 and 10 in English)* Johnston, R. (2003). [https://www.cia.gov/csi/kent_csi/pdf/v47i1a06p.pdf Integrating methodologists into teams of substantive experts].
Studies in Intelligence 47(1).
* Rhoten, D. (2003).
A multi-method analysis of the social and technical conditions for interdisciplinary collaboration.
* Siskin, L.S. & Little, J.W. (1995). The Subjects in Question. Teachers College Press. about the departmental organization of high schools and efforts to change that.
