Immediately after its appearance, we at the University of Amsterdam's Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies enthusiastically adopted Allen Repko's "Interdisciplinary Research: Process and Theory" (Repko, 2008) as it was the first textbook that offered systematic explanation of and guidance through the complexities of an…

In this article, we seek to apply Julie Thompson Klein's supple understanding of typology as both category-making and category-defying to one aspect of her own body of work: her participation in a range of organizations with permeable boundaries. Specifically, we review her contributions to theories of boundary work in interdisciplinary studies…

When introduced around 1925, interdisciplinarity, grounded in the notion of the unity of knowledge, was meant to reconnect the fragmented and specialized disciplines of academia. However, interdisciplinary research became more and more challenging as the plurality and heterogeneity of disciplinary perspectives and insights increased. Insisting on…

Complexity is among the main drivers that justify and guide the genesis and establishment of multi-, inter- and transdisciplinary approaches to the production and application of knowledge. Complexity can be read in the relatively canonical taxonomy of these concepts that structure epistemological reflections on the dynamics of knowledge production…

Prompted by William Newell's 2013 call for the Association of Interdisciplinary Studies (AIS) to consider whether to rethink its mission in light of other organizations' interests, this article begins by reflecting on similarities and differences among five of the founding organizations of a recently formed Global Alliance for Inter- and…

Ten Australians and one New Zealander provide reflections on the influence of Julie Thompson Klein's work on and in inter- and trans- disciplinarity. Even taking into account that this article is based on a small number of contributions from only one corner of the world, the reflections demonstrate the influence of a diverse array of Klein's…

In this article, I consider Klein's scholarship as a foundation to examine the realities of interdisciplinary practice in higher education institutions, including questions of who engages in interdisciplinary work, how interdisciplinary work is supported, and how interdisciplinary work is organized. In discussing each of these issues, I underscore…

This article extends Julie Thompson Klein's ideas on boundary work and typologies of interdisciplinarity from the context of academia to the context of international news media. It draws a metaphorical connection between news frames and the perspectives of academic disciplines, perceiving both as providing selective, limited views on the world.…

With recent increased interest in and efforts to reform and revitalize general education curricula to make an educational experience more vital and germane, many institutions have become interested in incorporating interdisciplinary learning opportunities, or even in creating fully interdisciplinary programs. In order to address the growing need…

Julie Thompson Klein's contributions to interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research have enriched the way collaboration is discussed and handled by introducing concepts of boundary work and boundary crossing from the field of Science and Technology Studies. In recent years, she has been integrating those concepts into crossdisciplinarity, an…

While the scholarship of interdisciplinarity has grown prolifically in the last thirty years, the discourse primarily frames interdisciplinarity as an instrumental research construct. In this article, I will argue that this framework should be expanded to consider how interdisciplinary engagement can support education for democracy. The article…

This article features a conversation on the occasion of a May 2018 "Festschrift" in "Issues in Interdisciplinary Studies" to honor the work of William Newell, between Newell and P. Sven Arvidson. William Newell is Emeritus Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Miami University, where he taught interdisciplinary courses full…

Weaving together stories from history, as well as his own experience, Mr. Williams speaks about how critical public works and policy questions cannot be solved by people trained in one discipline in isolation--arguing that the hyper-specialization of the 20th century swung the pendulum too far. He closes with a reminder of how integrative studies…

The scholarship of interdisciplinarity provides a potentially powerful response to anti-intellectual and anti-democratic impulses. It recognizes that proof and disproof are generally impossible, and that scientists can be biased in their evaluation of the evidence. Yet it proposes a set of strategies for transcending scholarly disputes in order to…