Interdisciplinarity in Transdisciplinary Projects: Circulating Knowledges, Practices and Effects

Abstract

This article argues that the emphasis on solving substantive “real-world” problems through interdisciplinary research collaboration can neglect the wider value created by such collaborations. Championing the role of a knowledge integration and reflection facilitator, the article contends that more recognition be given to the value of “spillover” effects associated with interdisciplinary modes of working, rather than focusing solely on knowledge outputs and impacts. Drawing on embedded research conducted in relation to a project on local energy futures involving physicists, architects and geographers, the paper illustrates such “spillover” in relation to academic practice in teaching, project management and research methods. Such “spillovers” signal that what travels in interdisciplinary working is much more than formal knowledge and point to potential long-term legacy effects from interdisciplinary working occurring back in the disciplines.

Notes

1 Auto ethnography refers to an ethnographic practice which focuses on the personal reflections and experiences of the researcher.

2 Live projects are projects undertaken by architecture students which involve a particular group or community with an architectural objective or need.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Helen Holmes

Dr Helen Holmes is a Hallsworth Research Fellow in Sociology at the University of Manchester. Her current work explores contemporary thrift through the lens of materiality, temporality and practice. Her most recent publication explores the materiality of the sharing and circular economies, published in Geoforum. She also has several forthcoming articles and book chapters exploring how materiality is entwined with everyday life and personal relationships.

Nicky Gregson

Dr Nicky Gregson is Professor of Human Geography at Durham University. She has published extensively on waste and recycling economies, on second-hand exchange and on household consumption.

Matt Watson

Dr Matt Watson is Senior Lecturer at the University of Sheffield, UK. He is a human geographer with expertise on understanding the systemic relations between everyday practices, technologies, spaces and institutions to advance understandings of social change in relation to sustainability. Empirically, this work has encompassed energy, food, waste and personal mobility.

Alastair Buckley

Dr Alastair Buckley is a Senior Lecturer in Organic Electronics at the University of Sheffield’s Department of Physics and Astronomy, UK. He holds a degree in chemical physics and a PhD in spectroscopic measurements of discharge lighting. Dr Buckley’s research is themed around understanding and applying the intrinsic advantages of functional organic materials to a wide range of optoelectronic devices. He is currently Academic Director of Sheffield Solar.

Prue Chiles

Prue Chiles is an architect and Professor of Architectural Design Research at Newcastle University, UK. Professor Chiles’ research, consultancy and practice projects include both designing and publishing on the design of learning environments, neighbourhood design, regeneration and imagining new futures for the North of England. She has latterly been working in Zanzibar, Africa, and Calabria, Italy, with students on sustainable development projects.

Anna Krzywoszynska

Dr Anna Krzywoszynska is a Leverhulme Early Career Research Fellow at the Department of Geography, University of Sheffield. Her research explores how practices, knowledges and ethics shape human interactions with and understandings of the material world, particularly in the context of food production. She is currently examining the co-production of humans and soils, and the impacts of these on food security and environmental health.

Jose Maywin

Dr Jose A. Mawyin is Adjunct Physics Professor at St. John’s University, New York, USA. He has worked as a renewable energy researcher at the technology, community and policy level. Dr Mawyin has research experience in renewable energy and focuses on the development of decentralised renewable energy generation technologies and how people and communities interact with new technologies.