Jerry A. Jacobs
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- May 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780226069296
- eISBN:
- 9780226069463
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226069463.001.0001
- Subject:
- Education, Higher Education
Jacobs raises questions about the increasing popularity of concept of interdisciplinarity, which is becoming a powerful force in American higher education. Reformers assert that blurring the ...
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Jacobs raises questions about the increasing popularity of concept of interdisciplinarity, which is becoming a powerful force in American higher education. Reformers assert that blurring the boundaries between traditional disciplines would promote more rapid advances in research, more useful solutions to complex public problems, and more effective teaching and learning. Jacobs maintains that the critiques of established disciplines, such as history, economics and biology, are often over-stated and misplaced. He shows that disciplines are remarkably porous and continually incorporate new methods and ideas from other fields. Drawing on diverse sources of data, Jacobs considers many case studies, including the diffusion of ideas between fields, with a special focus on education research; the creation of interdisciplinary scholarly journals; the rise of new fields from existing ones; American studies programs; cross-listed courses, team teaching and specialized undergraduate degrees. Jacobs broadens the inquiry, looking beyond individual research collaborations to the system of disciplines and the long-term trajectories of research frontiers. Over time, successful interdisciplinary breakthroughs recreate many of the key features of established disciplines. He questions whether efforts to integrate knowledge across domains are likely to succeed, since interdisciplinary research itself is often quite specialized. Finally, these efforts may produce unintended consequences, since an interdisciplinary university would likely promote greater centralization of academic decision making in the offices of deans and presidents. Over the course of the book, Jacobs turns many of the criticisms of disciplines on their heads while making a powerful defense of the enduring value of liberal arts disciplines.Less
Jacobs raises questions about the increasing popularity of concept of interdisciplinarity, which is becoming a powerful force in American higher education. Reformers assert that blurring the boundaries between traditional disciplines would promote more rapid advances in research, more useful solutions to complex public problems, and more effective teaching and learning. Jacobs maintains that the critiques of established disciplines, such as history, economics and biology, are often over-stated and misplaced. He shows that disciplines are remarkably porous and continually incorporate new methods and ideas from other fields. Drawing on diverse sources of data, Jacobs considers many case studies, including the diffusion of ideas between fields, with a special focus on education research; the creation of interdisciplinary scholarly journals; the rise of new fields from existing ones; American studies programs; cross-listed courses, team teaching and specialized undergraduate degrees. Jacobs broadens the inquiry, looking beyond individual research collaborations to the system of disciplines and the long-term trajectories of research frontiers. Over time, successful interdisciplinary breakthroughs recreate many of the key features of established disciplines. He questions whether efforts to integrate knowledge across domains are likely to succeed, since interdisciplinary research itself is often quite specialized. Finally, these efforts may produce unintended consequences, since an interdisciplinary university would likely promote greater centralization of academic decision making in the offices of deans and presidents. Over the course of the book, Jacobs turns many of the criticisms of disciplines on their heads while making a powerful defense of the enduring value of liberal arts disciplines.
Kristin Czarnecki
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780989082679
- eISBN:
- 9781781382196
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9780989082679.003.0023
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This chapter presents a reading of Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway and Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony. These novels depict the trauma suffered by two male veterans of war: Septimus Warren Smith, an English ...
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This chapter presents a reading of Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway and Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony. These novels depict the trauma suffered by two male veterans of war: Septimus Warren Smith, an English veteran of the First World War, and Tayo, a Laguna Pueblo man who fought in the Pacific Islands during World War Two. Both young men return from war psychologically and emotionally shattered. Each has witnessed the brutal death of a man he loved; each suffers from flashbacks and hallucinations; each contends with guilt and self-accusations; and each confronts doctors unable or unwilling to administer proper treatment. Both characters also have disorienting urban experiences and sense a fraught connection with the natural world. Complicating their trauma is their inability to fulfill Western culture's proscribed gender roles. The books share stylistic similarities in their shifts in space, time, and perspective—anti-authoritarian narrative modes that help develop their comparable themes. They also strive to reject the witchery and highlight feminine principles as keys to psychological and cultural health. The novels diverge, however, when Septimus commits suicide and Tayo begins to heal after re-immersing himself in Laguna culture and accepting his biracial identity.Less
This chapter presents a reading of Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway and Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony. These novels depict the trauma suffered by two male veterans of war: Septimus Warren Smith, an English veteran of the First World War, and Tayo, a Laguna Pueblo man who fought in the Pacific Islands during World War Two. Both young men return from war psychologically and emotionally shattered. Each has witnessed the brutal death of a man he loved; each suffers from flashbacks and hallucinations; each contends with guilt and self-accusations; and each confronts doctors unable or unwilling to administer proper treatment. Both characters also have disorienting urban experiences and sense a fraught connection with the natural world. Complicating their trauma is their inability to fulfill Western culture's proscribed gender roles. The books share stylistic similarities in their shifts in space, time, and perspective—anti-authoritarian narrative modes that help develop their comparable themes. They also strive to reject the witchery and highlight feminine principles as keys to psychological and cultural health. The novels diverge, however, when Septimus commits suicide and Tayo begins to heal after re-immersing himself in Laguna culture and accepting his biracial identity.
