The Virtues and Limits of Inter/Trans/Cross-Disciplinarity

Advanced Course in Theories of Knowledge: Scholars in the humanities generate knowledge for society in a variety of ways and engaging with several disciplines when doing so can sometimes yield particularly novel, path-breaking research. This advanced course in theories of knowledge critically examines the virtues and limits of working across disciplines.

Time and place: June 3, 2024 9:15 AM – 4:00 PM, Seminar room 3, Sophus Bugges hus

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This course is a part of HF's PhD week.

Course Description

Working across disciplines is both challenging and rewarding. Challenging because engaging with another discipline takes scholars out of their disciplinary comfort zone and into unfamiliar conceptual and methodological territory, a move which is often both risky, difficult, and time-consuming. Rewarding because cross-fertilisation of thought and practices can yield entirely new paths and perspectives for research, leading scholars to engage with questions and answers that a monodisciplinary approach would not have enabled.

Drawing on the experience of several interdisciplinary researchers, this course offers in-depth discussion of the virtues and limits of working across disciplines. The themes covered include:

What is a scholarly discipline?
How can working across disciplines yield new understandings of the value of different types of knowledge?
What gaps exist between the qualitative- and quantitative sciences, and how might these be bridged through interdisciplinary collaboration?
What collaborative skills are beneficial when working across disciplines?
Is interdisciplinarity always a good thing?

This is a 1 ECTS course.

Course Preparations

Course participants will read about 100 pages of required reading and select at least 200 pages of their own choice from the lists of suggested reading. Before the course, participants will write a brief (1 page) response-paper where they critically engage with a proposition in one or several of these texts: this paper should be uploaded to the digital course site by 27 May. After the workshop, they will also write a 2-page essay relating themes from the workshop to their own field or research project. This essay should be uploaded to the digital course site by 20 June for approval by the Course Convenor.

In class

Your reflections will be the starting points for our discussions—in groups and plenary. Expect an interactive and problem-driven day filled with intellectual engagement with core issues in the theories of humanities. The morning session will begin with a short introduction followed by four presentations by scholars experienced in working across disciplines. The presentations will be followed by in-plenum discussion of key take-away points. The afternoon will be devoted to guided in-group discussion among PhD candidates, sharing and discussing a variety of perspectives and experience with inter/multi/trans/cross-disciplinarity. Attending doctoral candidates will be expected to relate their group work to the assigned reading and reflect on the theme of the course in relation to their own research interests.

Language

The course language is English, including reading responses and essays. We will switch to Norwegian in class if everyone is able to follow what is being said

Registration

Registration opens 20 February. Candidates admitted to the PhD programme at HF are given priority if signing up before 1 March.

Course convenors

Contact person: Malene Bøyum, malene.boyum@imv.uio.no

IMV, responsible department

IAKH, contributing department

Presenters

Anne Danielsen (IMV/RITMO)

Alexander Refsum Jensenius (IMV/RITMO)

Nanette Nielsen (IMV/RITMO)

Kristin Ranestad (IAKH)

Course curriculum

Help us build the course curriculum: if you have suggestions for this list, please e-mail nanette.nielsen@imv.uio.no -- we’re happy to include additional titles

Required reading:

Callard, F., Fitzgerald, D. & Woods, A. Interdisciplinary collaboration in action: tracking the signal, tracing the noise. Palgrave Commun 1, 15019 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1057/palcomms.2015.19

Cioni, Martina, et al. ‘Chapter 2 - The Two Revolutions in Economic History.’ The Handbook of Historical Economics, edited by Alberto Bisin and Giovanni Federico, Academic Press, 2021, pp. 17–40, (Link to text in Oria)

Danielsen, A., Paulsrud, T. S., & Hansen, N. Chr. (2023). “MusicLab Copenhagen”: The Gains and Challenges of Radically Interdisciplinary Concert Research. Music & Science, 6. https://doi.org/10.1177/20592043231194747

Klein, Julie Thompson, and Robert Frodeman, 'Interdisciplining Humanities: A Historical Overview', in Robert Frodeman (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Interdisciplinarity, 2nd edn, Oxford Handbooks (2017; online edn, Oxford Academic, 6 Mar. 2017) https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198733522.013.13

McAuley, Tomás, Nanette Nielsen, and Jerrold Levinson, 'Introduction', in Tomás McAuley and others (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Western Music and Philosophy (2020; online edn, Oxford Academic, 15 Dec. 2020), https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199367313.013.61

Pedersen, D. Integrating social sciences and humanities in interdisciplinary research. Palgrave Commun 2, 16036 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1057/palcomms.2016.36