IDS201 Elements Disciplines Pt1

So this PowerPoint video will
cover the key elements that

make up academic disciplines.

As I mentioned in
the module content,

I'm going to introduce
the elements,

define them, and
then briefly explain

why, as interdisciplinary
study students,

it's useful and important
for you to know them.

The main reason why
I want to detail

the elements of disciplines
is because the main objective

of this module and
really, for this course

is the premise that
interdisciplinary studies

is rooted in and depends
on the disciplines.

I know I've said
that repeatedly,

but again, that's
the overall point

of this particular module.

So what I want you to do is
imagine that each discipline

has its own culture.

And so what we want
to do is to try

to better understand the
pieces and elements that

make up that culture.

And of course, this
will also help you

with this week's assignment,
the Areas of Study paper,

which also asks
you to get to know

your disciplines by identifying
many of the key elements we're

going to discuss here today.

So one of the first key
elements is phenomena,

and phenomenon refers
to the enduring aspects

of human existence that
are of interest to scholars

and are candidates for scholarly
description and explanation.

In other words, a
phenomena is something

that exists in the world that
is worthy of thought, that

is worthy of scholars
taking their time

and intellectual labor to
study and examine or explore.

Now, the important thing
is that every discipline

has its own ideas about
what is worthy of thought

and what is a suitable
topic for practitioners

in that discipline to study.

So let me give a few
concrete examples here.

So in the natural
sciences, the phenomena

for the discipline of
chemistry, for instance,

is the periodic table
of chemical elements

that are the building
blocks of matter--

their composition,
properties, and reactions.

Another example, let's
take the social sciences.

So the phenomena for
psychology and psychologists

is the nature of human
behavior, as well as

the internal, or the
brain and the mind,

and the external, the
environment or society,

the internal and
external factors that

affect this human behavior.

So one last example would
be in the humanities.

The discipline of history is
concerned with the people,

events, and movements
of human civilization,

both past and present.

And again, this is what they
deem worthy to think about,

and it's worthy of
intellectual thought and thus,

their phenomena.

So part of getting to
know your areas of study

is identifying
the phenomena that

may be related to your research
question or potential topic.

And I also want to be very
clear here that phenomena often

overlap between disciplines.

So you can see that
in some cases maybe

a historian would be
interested in the way

the brain and the mind affects
human behavior over time

or that historians are also
interested in human behavior

that is shaped by both
individual characteristics,

but also, structural
societal factors.

Next, we have assumptions,
and assumptions

are something that's
taken for granted,

a supposition, a
principle that underlies

the discipline as a whole
and its overall perspective

on the world and on reality.

And assumptions are often
accepted as true or sure

to happen, oftentimes,
even without proof,

and they are upon which the
disciplines theories, concepts,

methods, and even
curriculum are based.

So for example, sociology
has very different beliefs

and assumptions than say,
the discipline of economics.

So while assumptions can and do
vary widely within sociology,

sociologists tend to assume
that a phenomena like poverty,

for instance, is a result
of societal and structural

factors.

On the other hand,
economics are more

inclined to assume that
poverty is the result of market

failures or even as a result
of individual responsibility

or mismanagement of income.

Thus, every discipline
or area of study

is rooted in its own
assumptions and worldviews,

and if you can identify
the assumptions

of your areas of
study, you'll be

better prepared to
identify conflicts

and tensions between them.

Next, we have epistemology,
which is a big, fancy word

that I'm sure many of
you may be familiar with.

And this is a
branch of philosophy

that studies how one knows
what is true, but also,

how one validates truth,
or in other words,

how do we know what we know, and
how do we know that it's true?

And each discipline
has agreements

about how researchers
in that discipline

should select their data,
evaluate their experiments,

and judge their
theories, and of course,

about how to go about
creating knowledge.

And generally speaking,
most disciplinary scholars

tend to fall into one of these
two epistemological camps.

The first is modernism,
which, at its core,

is the belief in objective,
empirically-based, rationally

analyzed truth that
is, in fact, knowable.

And one school of thought that's
very popular within modernism

is positivism, this
idea that there exists

a true reality that
can be discovered

through careful research
and observations,

that there's one
reality in the world,

and we can find it if we
just do enough objective data

collection and that
an objective analysis,

an analysis without any biases
at all, is actually possible.

Now, on the other
polar opposite end

are interpretivists,
sometimes also referred to

as postmodernists.

An interpretivist
believe that the world

is socially constructed, that
so-called reality doesn't

exist independently of our
interpretation of them.

So there can be
multiple realities,

depending on your perspective
and experiences in the world,

and most importantly,
that objective analysis

without any bias is impossible,
that we all have biases.

It's just a matter of making
that clear in our research

what our biases are.

So the point of getting a sense
of your areas of studies, what

we might call epistemological
tendencies, which, by the way,

is hardly, if ever explicit.

So scholars aren't going to
say, this is my epistemology.

But we want to get
a sense of them,

especially their
limitations and advantages,

in order to be able to
select the most appropriate

for the problem at hand.