The thing about interdisciplinarity is that, for as much as we try to be interdisciplinary, we still end up going back to our own disciplines, by default. It’s comfortable, it’s what we know; going into something different can put us in a vulnerable position, as we don’t know about that other discipline. We don’t want to look stupid – we’re academics; looking stupid is like bleeding in shark infested waters.

I’m posting this post during the day, as opposed to at the end of it, because of this point on interdisciplinarity. Many of the attendees are from the disciplines of Biology, Chemistry and Physics; as the Geographic Information Scientist (the bastard child of Geography and Information Studies), I have a completely different knowledge sphere, with little overlap with the others. I could tell you about where to source materials, or analyse the spatial distribution of your market, but I have no idea how to “increase the enzymatic activity of cutinase in washing power”. First, I have a vague notion of an enzyme (haven’t done anything in Bio since 8th grade [when I was 13 years old]); secondly, “cutinase” has the same meaning as “fliminy-floo” to me. That said, though, I’m not going to, proverbially, bleed in the shark infested waters. The point was to think about how to design a curriculum to teach this thing, which the rest of the group seemed to understand.

For the greater good, I just quietly listened and tried to take away what I could, but I think the picture included with this post largely sums up my feelings. However, one of the other participants absolutely flattered me in saying that my work on challenges/suggested solutions in Interdisciplinary Research was something that we NEED to talk about, as she (and myself included) believed that the focus of the workshop was on establishing INTERDISCIPLINARY teaching methods. I guess the thing to take away from this is that we have to come away from what’s comfortable, and truly try to be more interdisciplinary; don’t assume the people that you’re working with have any understanding of your discipline, and then, if you can successfully teach them what they want to learn about your discipline (or what you think they need to know about it) and there is uptake, make note of what you did, because you’re doing something right.