Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
90 Dj~
Spring 1995
Some of these problems and tensions arise from the actual practice of
liberal arts and interdisciplinary education. CIRLA and Dianoia did not appear
fully formed on the bald prairie of Alberta. Both arose from the educational and
intellectual convictions of people at Augustana University College. Augustana
prides itself on teaching excellence in liberal arts and innovation in
interdisciplinarity. As recently as five years ago it seemed that no one was
talking about the value and the tensions of the liberal arts, at least in Canada.
lAKE SENSE TO ME!" In response to this lack, Dianoia was launched and CIRLA was formed to work
UERDISCIPLINARITY through the issues.
IBERAL ARTS All this looks good, but as always, practice is less glamorous than ideals.
My own intuition of what liberal arts means involves (in both faculty and
Bruce Janz
students) the active questioning of ideas and the willingness to not be lulled into
Philosophyllnterdisciplinary Studies
a sense of complacency by a well-told story.
Augustana University College
Alas, this ideal is depressingly far from reality, as I found out in a recent
attempt to teach a third-year intellectual history course in an interdisciplinary
Research in the Liberal Arts (CIRLA) has fashion. My colleague (an economist) and I decided that we wanted to both give
c about the nature and application of the a coherent narrative of the last three or four hundred years of thought and social
:iplinary teaching and research, in post practice, and at the same time destabilize that narrative. We did this, in part,
uound the world. CIRLA attempts to by telling the stories of the history of philosophy (my discipline) and economics.
.ys: through the publication of Dianoia Each of us would then raise questions for, and prod the sensitive spots in, the
lei' the Social Sciences and Humanities narrative the other had presented. We used contemporary'l!lusic and art to
CIRLA receives, but henceforth will be highlight the fact that the tensions between the grand explanatory· st~ries we
DIJoquia and conferences, and through the academics tell are felt at a popular level. We tried to show the "cracks· in our
e:search forums and tools such as the own stories, the things that members of our own discipline ignored or
:JRLA gopher, and other initiatives. marginalized in order to have a story that makes sense. In short, we tried to
argue that while we need to make sense of things (and disciplinary explanations
are a good way of doing this), there are shortcomings to all good stories, and
:NT IS OUT OF THE WAY••• the process of understanding has to take into account the cracks as well as the
continuities.
dant that the readers of Dianoia realize
Sounds great in theory. Student evaluations, however, were less than
mmitment to research and dialogue, and
enthusiastic- "But it doesn't make sense to me" was a frequently echoed refrain.
other. Having said that, though, readers
There was great resistance during the term to the process of destabilizing
with CIRLA or Dianoia is hardly an
disciplinary narratives. Now, this could have been because we taught poorly.
far from an evangelistic crusade designed
However, for me at least, students seem generally satisfied in my other courses,
rue faith of liberal arts education. While
often with very similar material. My economist colleague reports the same
iberal arts (or we would not have agreed
thing. The explanation must lie somewhere else.
editorial tasks, instead of writing within
e:stions and tensions, even frustrations, at What happened? I think we have illustrated here the tension in the "new
.y be why liberal arts education remains look" liberal arts. Students are required at Augustana to take an integrative
Iblems have not been worked out. studies course. These are team-taught courses that attempt to establish a
conversation between two or more different ways of knowing (usually
represented by disciplines). The students tend to resent having to take these
iDd like the cure-all for the limitations of Bonner, Kieran. 1994. Interdisciplinary dialogue and the tension between
recognized that there are problems and thinking and the university order: An exercise in radical interpretive
ritself. How, for example, can we avoid inquiry. In Dianoia 3(2)/4(1) Spring: 1-24.
iplines for the benefit of one discipline?
:aIizing vision (or would we even want Janz, Bruce. 1994. Review of Interdisciplinarity: History, Theory, and Practice,
mdmaids of one new "meta-discipline?" by Julie Thompson Klein. In Dianoia 3(2)/4(1) Spring:138-140.
nz., 1994). Is it possible to come to a
,f particular disciplines in cooperative Kenny, Anthony and Jan Pinborg. 1982. Medieval Philosophical Literature. In
the field necessarily become competitive The Cambridge History ofLater Medieval Philosophy. Edited by Norman
IOrlantly, does interdisciplinarity actually Kretzmann, Anthony Kenny and Jan Pinhorg, 11-42. Cambridge:
king dilettantes and amateurs of us all? Cambridge University Press.
Listorical liberal arts is needed to focus
at basis for dialogue (similar issues are Klein, Julie Thompson. 1990. Interdisciplinarity: History. Theory, and Practice.
Detroit: Michigan: Wayne State Press.