I’d like to share with you my experience of trying to engage academic sociologists on my interdisciplinary work.
Interdisciplinary research is highly valued outside academia. Within academia, much of the the interdisciplinary work lies in its theorisation – what is interdisciplinary research, how should it be done, how might it theoretically change the world. Yet the hands-on interdisciplinary work of researchers from different disciplines working on the same end product together is largely being done by applied researchers beyond the academy.
It’s been my experience, and that of some of my applied colleagues, that our interdisciplinary work is not similarly valued by our academic peers. How can this change?
At one academic conference, after I presented a social model I’d worked on with a mathematician, one sociologist asked, “Why would you do this?” Meaning, why do you bother with this work?
This is where theory and practice need to match up. Interdisciplinary work is incredibly time consuming. You not only have to learn to work together with people who aren’t trained to think like you, but you also have to do a lot of ground work to achieve mutual understanding of basic concepts before you can even begin the work.
For example, I’ve spent weeks and months as part of interdisciplinary teams working with through questions such as: What is a typology? What is ontology? How do we visually represent sociology concepts?
Then you have to work out ways to “translate” sociology into maths, or computer coding, a model, software, or some other practical outcome.
The university system is due for change, as there’s currently little incentive to engage with applied interdisciplinary research, where the end outcome is not a research paper.
What are your experiences in working within an interdisciplinary environment? Is this work well regarded by your academic peers? How might we improve the esteem of this research within the current academic model? Leave your comments below!
This post was first published on our Sociology at Work LinkedIn group, as an expanded response to a post on OrgTheory.
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Maybe I’m wrong but I think one of the reasons people are not keen on interdisciplinary work especially currently is that doesn’t have the ‘WOW!’ factor. When we look at Durkheim, Plato, Aristotle, Marx etc. they conceptualised, hypothesized and could explain why society was the way it was and could almost predict the future of society that touched the then different classes and parts of society which could be argued still exist today. The political and economical state also differed much between now and then. Some might argue that they and academics before and after did all the critical analysis we use to argue and investigate things today and formulate explanations within either one or the other framework of past academics.
For example, if we look at the academic society, from a functional perspective keeping the disciplines distinct and not merging or crossing boundaries that was set previously, or not too far if they did, is because of the different principles to make theories valid, that was created to be distinct from other disciplines and to be able to exist as a discipline. It could also been seen as easy a way of understanding and categorising different contexts of knowledge and research. Interdisciplinary work could seen as deviating from the set principles and could arguably cause unrest among some because of implications that it could cause for their specific field.
So is it a means to an end or means itself?
I however agree that looking at things from different perspectives can bear fruitful results if the contexts are the correct ones and if it addresses an important and widespread need or if there’s understanding to be gained that could revolutionise how we go about life, making it somehow.
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Hi Marlon,
Thanks for your comments! Interdisciplinary research has its own robust scholarship – but academics in mainstream disciplines, like sociology, find it difficult to understand as interdisciplinary research in an applied context requires knowledge of working outside academia. The theorists you cited as examples have their merits, but are outdated and exclusionary. They did not “predict the future.” They explained elements of society from the point of view of White men from privileged backgrounds. They largely ignored women in general, and did not adequately deal with other issues affecting minority groups. Feminist scholars pointed this out long ago, from Dorothy Smith to bells hooks and beyond. Contemporary theoretical perspectives have addressed issues of gender, race, sexuality, disability and intersectionality to better understand the limits of functionalism, marxism and early philosophy.
Back to interdisciplinary research – this practice requires engagement with other disciplines. Learning to work with researchers who don’t think like us, who use different theoretical and methodological tools, and collaborating with them to solve new problems. It is about providing novel answers to complex problems through the creation of technologies, models, socio-ecological programs and other services.
The reality is that very few jobs exist tailor-made for sociologists. We are competing for jobs alongside other social scientists from disciplines that are better recognised, or that more easily adapt to interdisciplinary environments. Knowing how to work in an interdisciplinary context is a very useful skill for sociology graduates. This is not readily taught in sociology courses, which is a disadvantage to our graduates.
You’ll find examples of applied sociologists who work in multidisciplinary as well as interdisciplinary jobs on our website. Check out our “Resources” section to see how sociology can be blended with other fields to solve “real world” problems!
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Interdisciplinary theory in academia might seem like a fad, perhaps,
because academics don’t really see the end product. It’s also incredibly
time consuming. You not only have to learn to work together with people
who aren’t trained to think like you, you also have to do a lot of
ground work to achieve mutual understanding of even the most basic
concepts before you can even begin the work.
This paragraph makes a really superb point and i love how you layed out the positives.
http://www.lawlergroup.com/
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Thanks very much for your comment. Sounds like you have first-hand experience of interdisciplinary research. Great to know this post connected with you!
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