[Ethnocomm] e-seminar: a response from Tamar Katriel

Thu Feb 18 16:41:09 UTC 2016

My apologies to Tamar, if my suggestion that we consider what comes next
sounded like a way to end content discussion - that wasn't what I intended.

In the spirit of continuing the conversation over the next few days, let me
just add one comment about interdisciplinarity, since that's a topic I've
published on (2012) and thought about more than some others that have been
brought up here. In my reading, overlapping terms are used to mean
sometimes quite different things. Let me try to sort this out, as it may be
helpful to our future discussions.

*Interdisciplinary* is the most common term for integrating information,
data, techniques, tools, perspectives, concepts, and/or theories from two
or more disciplines. If disciplinary work provides depth,
interdisciplinarity provides breadth to research. But there is a second use
of this term: the study of content previously ignored by existing
disciplinary researchers as standing outside the boundaries they understand
as appropriate for their disciplines. This is the way in which EC was
interdisciplinary when Hymes first introduced the idea in 1962, since he
intended to combine the method of anthropology (ethnography) with the
content of linguistics (speech, or more broadly and as he said slightly
later, communication). So in the best sense, interdisciplinary researchers
spend time on topics that might otherwise be overlooked. I have seen the
term "interdiscipline" used for this as well, though rarely. And sometimes
an interdiscipline becomes a new discipline, as with ecology, or
gerontology.

*Multidisciplinary*, while sometimes used as a synonym for
interdisciplinary, at other times describes the combination of researchers
from different disciplines cooperating in a single project in such a way
that their work is complementary, yet NOT unified into a single whole (as
it would be in an interdisciplinary endeavor). This is a weak form of
interdisciplinarity, but probably the most common, when scholars from
different disciplines are brought into a shared project for a brief time,
then return to their home disciplines.

*Transdisciplinary* is sometimes used as a synonym for interdisciplinary in
the US, but in Europe the term implies something much larger, including
both a focus on real-world problems (applied research), AND integration of
points of view from a wider public or community (community research of a
specific sort, involving community members in the project from the start).
While rarely used in the US in this sense, it seems likely to have value
and merit greater use.

*Crossdisciplinary* and *pluridisciplinary* are also sometimes used as
synonyms for either interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary, but they are
rare enough that we can probably ignore them.

Wendy

Reference:

Leeds-Hurwitz, W. (2012). These fictions we call disciplines. *Electronic
Journal of Communication/La Revue Electronique de Communication, 22*(3-4).
http://www.cios.org/www/ejc/
<http://www.cios.org/www/ejc/sandbox/022341_EJC>

On Wed, Feb 17, 2016 at 10:40 PM, Tamar Katriel <tamark at edu.haifa.ac.il>
wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> The e-seminar format David had in mind based on the Ling. Ethnography one,
> which is similar to a very successful one I'm familiar with of a Media
> Anthropology network, gives a few days for a discussion of the author of
> the piece discussed response to be further responded to. This is so as to
> give an opportunity to disperse the last word among list members. I
> personally like this format and suggest that we give a few more days, until
> the originally designated 22/2, to substantive comments. Of course, I have
> a vested interest this time, as I spent several hours formulating my
> response.
>
> Then, since it is our first try, it would indeed be very good, as Wendy
> suggests, to debrief about the process and see if we want to modify the
> format and address the other issues as well. I have my thoughts but will
> keep them for later.
>
> And while I'm at it, here's a link to a NY Review of Books article that
> came out a couple of weeks  ago and touches on some of the points relating
> to the digital environment that came up in our discussion, in case you
> haven't seen it. It was re-circulated to subscribers today, which I think
> means it has been widely read
>
>
> http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/02/25/we-are-hopelessly-hooked/?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NYR%20Scalia%20and%20the%20constitution%20the%20chess%20master%20and%20the%20computer&utm_content=NYR%20Scalia%20and%20the%20constitution%20the%20chess%20master%20and%20the%20computer+CID_2f5f707cfcfac768f69ce5f00a044059&utm_source=Newsletter&utm_term=We%20Are%20Hopelessly%20Hooked
>
> All best,
> Tamar
>
>
>
> On Wed, Feb 17, 2016 at 7:04 PM, Wendy Leeds-Hurwitz <
> wendy.leeds.hurwitz at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> First, of course, I want to add my thanks to David for organizing this
>> e-seminar, to Tamar for the initial and final statements framing the
>> conversation, and to everyone who participated.
>>
>> Second, rather than picking up any of the threads mentioned to this
>> point, I want to ask the group to spend a little time thinking about what
>> comes next. As we are still at the beginning of figuring out how online
>> "conversations" of this sort can be retrieved, cited, etc., this should be
>> a good moment to ask about process, not in EC, but at a meta level, for
>> this conversation about EC. How does this conversation become more broadly
>> accessible, or was the goal to reach only those who have participated to
>> this point, whether through comments or reading the comments of others? I
>> guess what I am asking is what existing models others are aware of for
>> turning this discussion into a more "stable" form. Of course, anyone can
>> follow the thread on the listserve in future - but do people really do that
>> very often? I've seen all the comments on a topic turned into a PDF that
>> can be downloaded all at once, for example, which has the advantages of
>> preserving the conversational style, while making access a bit easier. In
>> fact, David sent me one such transcript as a model, when he invited me to
>> participate (a Ling-Ethnog e-seminar from 2015). So that's one possibility.
>> Of course, there's always the possibility of planning a conference panel on
>> a related topic, or preparing a publication (a journal special issue or a
>> book, I guess, since an article with all these authors might be a bit
>> difficult). That has the advantage of stability, but would take a lot of
>> time and effort, and loses the spontaneity of an online conversation. What
>> other ideas do others have, whether or not they have been tested previously?
>>
>> Wendy
>>
>> On Wed, Feb 17, 2016 at 8:45 AM, David Boromisza-Habashi <
>> david.boromisza at colorado.edu> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi All,
>>>
>>>
>>> Tamar had graciously agreed to write a "response to responses" - please
>>> find it attached.
>>>
>>>
>>> We still have a few days until the official end of this e-seminar
>>> (2/22). I would like to encourage all of you to respond to Tamar and to
>>> everyone else who joined this conversation over the past couple of weeks.
>>>
>>>
>>> Cheers, David
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> David Boromisza-Habashi, Ph.D.
>>> Assistant Professor, Department of Communication, University of Colorado
>>> Boulder
>>> http://colorado.academia.edu/DavidBoromiszaHabashi
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Ethnocomm mailing list
>>> Ethnocomm at listserv.linguistlist.org
>>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/mailman/listinfo/ethnocomm
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Wendy Leeds-Hurwitz, Ph.D.
>>
>> Director
>> Center for Intercultural Dialogue
>> http://centerforinterculturaldialogue.org
>>
>> Professor Emerita
>> Communication Department
>> University of Wisconsin-Parkside
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Ethnocomm mailing list
>> Ethnocomm at listserv.linguistlist.org
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/mailman/listinfo/ethnocomm
>>
>>
>

-- 
Wendy Leeds-Hurwitz, Ph.D.

Director
Center for Intercultural Dialogue
http://centerforinterculturaldialogue.org

Professor Emerita
Communication Department
University of Wisconsin-Parkside
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