Interdisciplinarity in action: the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, 1964–2002

Abstract

The Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS) at the University of Birmingham in England, launched in 1964, highlights contested issues of knowledge production in relation to the disciplines in modern universities. It constitutes a fascinating example of the social formation of configurations of knowledge that can be subjected to historical analysis such as those conducted for example by Richard Selleck, Geoff Sherington and other recent historians of education. It enacted an explicit ideal of interdisciplinarity in its approach to research, teaching and social practices, unlike for example educational studies which in the same period generally held to a weaker model of multidisciplinarity. Archival documents and interviews with some of those who were participants or witnesses of its development shed light on CCCS's approach to interdisciplinarity in action. This generated significant works such as Unpopular education: schooling and social democracy in England since 1944 and a collegial style of teaching and research, but also led to isolation, political vulnerability and its eventual closure in 2002.

Keywords:

• history
• educational studies
• cultural studies
• higher education
• interdisciplinarity
• disciplines

Acknowledgements

I am most grateful to the Society for Educational Studies for its generous support for the research project ‘The social organisation of educational studies: past, present and future’, on which this paper is based; also to my colleagues in this project, Gemma Moss, James Thomas and Steven Cowan; and to Peter Cunningham and Richard Johnson for their additional comments.

Notes on contributor

Gary McCulloch is the Brian Simon Professor of the History of Education at the Institute of Education, University of London. He is a former president of the UK History of Education Society and a past editor of the journal History of education. His recent publications include The struggle for the history of education (2011) and Secondary education and the raising of the school leaving age: coming of age? (with Tom Woodin and Steven Cowan, 2013) and he is editor of the British journal of educational studies. He is currently working on a book on the history and politics of educational studies as an interdisciplinary field.