Volume 23, Number 1, March, 2001

Reciprocity, Creativity, or License in Interdisciplinary Studies? "Interdisciplinarity, the Psychology of Art and Creativity," special Issue of Creativity Research Journal. Guest editor, Martin S. Lindauer. Vol 11, No.1, 1998. Reviewed by David J. Sill, Professor of Theater Design and Associate Provost, Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville. Both the strength and weakness of the "Special Issue: Interdisciplinarity, The Psychology of Art and Creativity" of the Creativity Research Journal illustrate just how difficult interdisciplinarity is to do. While interdisciplinary work involves as rigorous a discipline of the mind as any disciplinary work, it lacks the disciplinary infrastructure that supports single-disciplinary scholarship. ... The more successful articles in the special isue succeed by creating clearly defined sttructure that are rigorous, thoughtful, and carefully constructed, and in doing so lose some of the liberation, freedom and openness. The less successful articles revel in the spirit of freedom without creating a new discipline of thought, indulging in what might be characterized as out-of-disciplinary experiences.

Beyond Boundaries in International Studies. Beyond Boundaries? Disciplines, Paradigms, and Theoretical Integration in International Studies. Rudra Sil and Eileen Doherty, eds. State University of New York Press, 2000. Reviewed by Raymond C. Miller, Professor of International Relations and Social Science, San Francisco State University. I first met Rudy Sil and Eileen Doherty, editors of this intriguing volume, at the 1999 annual conference of the International Studies Association in Toronto. They were two of four panel members in a session entitled, "Bridges Over Troubled Waters: Cross-Disciplinary Concepts and Problem-Driven Approaches." ... And they were all rebels. ... Sil and Doherty have a straightforward case to make to their fellow specialists in international studies. Get out of your narrow academic boxes, whether disciplines or schools of thought; be open to multiple points of view and sources of relevant theory, methods and information. The pursuit of knowledge will benefit from this open flexibility. Avoid "epistemological absolutism" ... The editors support their case with five case studies and four philosophical essays. Two of the case studies focus on the concept "collective identity." Another looks at negotiation between countries, while the fourth looks at richer, more contextual analyses of interdependence. The fifth case study analyzes behavior within the discipline of political science itself.

In Memoriam - Forrest Armstrong, Past AIS President. Forrest was known as an astute and reflective practitioner, who knew how to implement interdisciplinary studies and encourage and develop faculty participation and cooperation. He made us hopeful in the early eighties when we most needed it and helped us bond together in the best interdisciplinary way. We are grateful to him and for him. (Tribute by Bill Newell)

Faculty Opening

Accreditation Standards Feedback Wanted

Volume 23, Number 2, May, 2001

Reinventing Ourselves. Reinventing Ourselves: Interdisciplinary Education, Collaborative Learning, and Experimentation in Higher Education. Barbara Leigh Smith and John McCann, eds. Bolton, MA: Anker Publishing Company, 2001. ISBN 1-882982-35-5. Reviewed by Frank F. Koscielski, Interdisciplinary Studies Program, Wayne State University. The editors, Barbara Leigh Smith and John McCann of Evergreen State College deserve credit for the organization and editing of this excellent collection. The 26 essays came out of the 1997 Evergreen Conference on Interdisciplinary Education, but the book goes far beyond the usual collection of conference proceedings. ... The main theme of Reinventing Ourselves is undergraduate college education and the struggle to do the right thiing - to develop real and useful epistemologies and teaching and learning strategies; to educate students holistically and genuinely and to provide a sturdy and usable college liberal education using interdisciplinary education, collaborative learning and experimentation.

Econ-Art: Divorcing Art from Science in Modern Economics. by Rick Szostak. London: Pluto Press, 1999. ISBN 07453-1447-3. Reviewed by Larry L. Kiser, Associate Vice Provost for Faculty Development, Eastern Washington University. Already, knowledge seems carved into too many disciplines or areas of specialization. Why would anyone who understands the problem deliberately want to create more? ... Readers might be excused then, for worrying about the implicatons of Rick Szostak's Econ-Art, which threaten to increase disciplinary divisions in academe. ... With Econ-Art, Szostak joins those many writers who have been criticizing the discipline of economics. Szostak criticizes economists for having lost touch with reality. He accuses them of constructing dazzling but non-informative mathematical formulations of economic activity and of fantasizing about a world that will never be. He criticizes economics professors for distracting bright, young, highly motivated students from trying to address serious real world problems. devoting their energies, instead, to trying to comprehend highly polished economic models about this and that. As a result, according to Szostak and other critics, the discipline is populated by increasing numbersof economists who believe they are not supposed to use their knowledge and skills to solve real life problems. Meanwhile, the world waits.

Upcoming Open Houses on Learning Communities. Learning community leaders at colleges and universities in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic States are launching a learning community network with ten day-long Open Houses in the spring and fall of 2001. The open houses are part of the national Learning Communities Project of the Washington Center for Improving the Quality of Undergraduate Education.

Call for Papers

• Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences is an interdisciplinary international journal that serves as a forum for exploring the intersections among phenomenology, empirical science, and analytic philosophy of mind. The journal welcomes contributions.Conference Announcements

Conference Announcements

• "Global Interactions and Interdisciplinary Perspectives Conference," Oct. 12-13, 2001. Ramapo College of New Jersey, Mahwah, New Jersey.
• "Playing the Wild Card: Un/Disciplined Thoughts on Wild(er)ness," May 9-12, Banff Centre of Conferences, Banff, Alberta, Canada. Hosted by the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Liberal Arts (CIRLA).
• 23rd Annual AIS Conference, October 4-7, 2001, Virginia Tech Conference Center of Roanoke. Theme: "Globalizaing Interdisciplinary Pedagogy and Research."

Faculty Openings

Volume 23 Number 3, October, 2001

Publishing Interdisciplinary Scholarship. By Joan Fiscella, Bibliographer for Professional Studies and Associate Professor, University of Illinois at Chicago. This is the first in a series of short articles designed to provide the AIS membership with a description of journals, other than Issues in Integrative Studies, that encourage interdisciplinary work. ... In this issue of the newsletter, I will discuss three journals: American Studies, Environmental Ethics, and Inquiry. [Other articles in this series appear in the March and May 2002 editions of the AIS Newsletter.]

Interdisciplinary Studies Advising in International Education. The Advising Quarterly, 55, (Winter 2001) Special Issue on Interdisciplinary Study. Reviewed by Judy Whipps, Coordinator of Liberal Studies, Grand Valley State University. The entire Winter 2001 issue of Advising Quarterly for Professionals in International Education is focused on interdisciplinary study and draws on significant resources from the AIS literature. Basically, this issue addresses two areas: understanding the scope and practice of interdisciplinary studies in the U.S. and problems faced by international students when studying interdisciplinary studies. The articles that address the theory and practice of interdisciplinarity provide an excellent summary, and are clear enough to be very helpful to those who have not had extensive training in this area. The cautionary remarks about international students studying interdisciplinary studies open up a different perspective on interdisciplinarity.

Interdisciplinarity in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. Pat Hutchings, Editor, Opening Lines: Approaches to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. Menlo Park, CA: The Carnegie Foundation for he Advancement of Teaching, 2000. Reviewed by Michael Bowler, Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies, Saint Mary's University of Minnesota. There are traces of crucial interdisciplinary research on teaching and learning throughout Opening Lines, but a disappointing dearth of rich interdisciplinary data. Still, some of the research questions raised and initial vision proposed are central to the understanding of interdisciplinary teaching and learning, as well as interdisciplinarity as an approach to further understanding of teaching and learning. I want to touch upon three crucial ideas related to integratied studies found in Opening Lines: an ethnographic research approach to understanding interdisciplinary learning, the interdisciplinary integration of research on teaching and learning, and institutional interdisciplinary support for this research.

September 11, 2001: Researchers Wanted, Grants Available. The National Science Foundation wishes to identify researchers who are currently or interested in conducting research in areas that can possibly shed light on the tragic events of September 11, 2001, and options for the future (e.g., social movements, religious groups, international relations, groupidentity, Islamic/Arabic groups in the U.S.)

Fellowship Opportunity. Washington University announces the second year of a new Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship Program designed to encourage interdisciplinary scholarship and teaching across the humanities and social sciences.

Travel-study Program: The Coastal Studies Semester. A brand-new program, The Coastal Studies Semester, has been developed by Hood College, a private not-for-profit women's institution in Frederick, Maryland. ... The Hood Coastal Studies Semester is a travel-based, experiential learning program open to students from a wide variety of institutions.

Conference Announcements

• An Interdisciplinry Conference on Narrative Perspectives, Approaches and Issues Across the Humanities and Social Sciences, May 16-19, 2002, St. Thomas University, Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada.
• 17th Annual Interdisciplinary Nineteenth Century Studies Conference on Nineteenth-Century Knowledges, April 11-14, 2002, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia.

Director Openings

Volume 23, Number 4, December, 2001

Dissertations on Interdisciplinary Studies, 1996-2000. Compiled by William H. Newell, School of Interdisciplinary Studies, Miami University. The following dissertations were identified by searching Dissertation Abstracts on-line by title. ... They can be ordered on-line at www.lib.uml.com/dissertations ... (PDF file downloaded from web).

Edwards, Alan Francis, Jr.: Interdisciplinary studies programs: Developing a grounded theory through a framework of institutionalism. The College of William & Mary, 2000, 194 pp.

Ribble, Margaret S.: Finding Fibonacci: An interdisciplinary liberal arts course based on mathematical patterns. The University of Tennessee, 1999, 222 pp.

Elliott, Brett Madison: The influence of an interdisciplinary course on critical thinking skills. University of North Texas, 1999, 90 pp.

Shin, Hejin: Research interactivity of cognitive science: A bibliometric analysis of interdisciplinarity. The University of Texas at Austin, 1999, 170 pp.

Yigzaw, Samuel: Exploring multicultural issues through an interdisciplinary curriculum. University of Minnesota, 1999, 211 pp.

Georgiadis, Konstantin: Interdisciplinarity and economic education: Foundations and design of a model program of integrative studies exploring the contemporary world economy. The Union Institute, 1998, 400 pp.

Bennett, Evelyn Nora (MA): The rhetoric of interdisciplinarity: Manifestos and complaints in literary studies, Carleton University, 1998, 139 pp.

Kain, Constance Jacobs: American humanities studies. A multicultural, interdisciplinary approach in the English classroom: Learning levels 11-14. The University of Nebraska - Lincoln, 1997, 383 pp.

Mellin, Alison Elizabeth: Interdisciplinary collaboration among higher education early intervention faculty members. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1997, 105 pp.

Pincus, Gail Smith: The impact of a community college interdisciplinary faculty teaching and learning community on faculty professional development. Oregon State University, 1997, 185 pp.

Rice, Joseph Charles: The development of performance studies: The impact of interdisciplinarity and interculturalism. The University of Texas at Austin, 1997, 263 pp.

Yampolschi, Roseane (DMus): Standing and conflating: A dialogic model for interdisciplinarity in composition. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1997, 114 pp.

Arseneault, Carl Joseph: Thomas Kuhn and the evolution of composition studies: Issues in Interdisciplinarity, The University of Tennessee, 1996, 461 pp.

Lattuca, Lisa Rose: Envisioning interdisciplinarity: Processes, contexts, outcomes (interdisciplinary scholarship, teaching, research). The University of Michigan, 1996, 323 pp.

McMann, Richard Guy: The relationship of eight organizational problems and selected demographic variables on the vitality and viability of undergraduate interdisciplinary studies programs. Ohio University, 1996, 184 pp.

Palmer, Carole L.: Practices and conditions of boundary crossing research work: A study of scientists at an interdisciplinary institute. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1996, 450 pp.

Qin, Jian: Levels and types of collaboration in interdisciplinary research in the sciences. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1996, 146 pp.

Watkins, Jane A.: The decline and fall of the interdisciplinary humanities program at Oklahoma State University, Oklahoma State University, 1996, 333 pp.

Integrating Criminologies. Greg Barak, Integrating Criminologies. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1998. 330 pages. Reviewed by Douglas Davenport, Truman State University. If interdisciplinary studies are ideally suited for topics too broad or complex for one perspective (Klein and Newell, 1996), then an interdisciplinary examination of crime and criminality is clearly appropriate. Indeed, vast arrays of disciplinary scholars have considered the problem. ... Gregg Barak's Integrating Criminologies seeks to provide fresh insight into the topic by explicitly wrestling with the wide array of competing explanations.

Position Wanted

Request for Proposals

• New Directions in the Earth Sciences and the Humanities: Interdisciplinary Team Projects. The New Directions Initiative (NDI) will award up to six grants to support collaborative partnerships between scholars in the Earth/environmental sciences and the humanities.

Job Openings