Having an interdisciplinary background and research agenda is much valued in the social sciences. There are well-known journals that are geared
to an interdisciplinary approach, faculty job announcements that state preferences for candidates with interdisciplinary backgrounds, and books and articles considered “classics” that achieved this status through the author’s interdisciplinary work. Before discussing the ins and outs of writ-ing an interdisciplinary dissertation, we define what is meant by interdis-ciplinary. In a general sense, doing interdisciplinary work means that the author who is studying in a particular field—let’s say social work—is also using the insights, theories, literature, and research strategies that are used in other fields that are not often associated with social work. A doctoral candidate in social work at an Ivy League university described what she meant when she talked about her interdisciplinary dissertation, which was a study of public housing architecture:
I study social work—that’s the school I am in. But when I first started studying housing, which is my subfield, I found that some of the most interesting work on housing was being done not by social workers but by cultural geographers, people in communica-tions, and others who were examining the broader cultural and geopolitical constructions of what housing tells us about policy, not so much how policy affects housing, which is the traditional way of scholarship in schools of social work such as mine.
When choosing to do an interdisciplinary dissertation, the first step is to be able to articulate why an interdisciplinary dissertation is necessary. Why is it important that your topic be examined by using the knowledge, litera-ture, and methods of a field that is not your own? Interdisciplinary work can pose a challenge to dissertation committee members who do not know, and sometimes do not appreciate, the work in other fields that you may find necessary to incorporate. You should explain why it is important that you are studying, for example, popular magazines when your field is education:
You can think of it as the “significance” part of your dissertation. In this case, when you are stating the significance of your dissertation, which is a main-stay of a proposal or introductory chapter in a dissertation, not only will you state the importance of your topic but you will also state the importance of studying the topic in the way you intend. Here you should very clearly state the significance of the interdisciplinary work as if you were writing for the most discipline-based individuals in your department. Following are some pointers you could keep in the back of your mind as you develop your pro-posal and work through the first draft of your dissertation.
• Your interdisciplinary work should demonstrate the value of inter-disciplinary analyses. You want to be able to highlight why your
dissertation is distinctive and significant because of its interdisci-plinary nature. You need to be able to answer the question: Why is your interdisciplinary method important to the overall dissertation?
• You need to be willing to gain much knowledge outside your field.
This should include taking doctoral-level classes in fields that are not your own. Your literature review will need to encompass more than your field and will often be longer and more far-ranging than the traditional literature review.
• Your dissertation committee should represent the different fields you are involved in. You must be able to find professors outside your field who are willing to be a part of a dissertation committee outside their schools, sometimes with other professors they do not know.
• You should be prepared to submit to journals outside your field and to attend conferences that are not ordinarily attended by those in your field. In order to have more than a superficial knowledge of the various fields you are incorporating into your dissertation, you should immerse yourself in the other fields as if you were truly a part of them, not just borrowing from them.
There are also some cautionary notes involved in the doing of an in-terdisciplinary dissertation. They include the following:
• Though you may understand the importance of interdisciplinary work, not all people do. This can affect your dissertation and ca-reer in several ways. For example, in fields that are traditional, it may be difficult to find a university position if your work does not
“fit inside the box.”
• Related to the first point, it is possible that an Institutional Review Board may have difficulty approving your research. In some cases, they may not be accustomed to the research method and may not know how to respond. Others may feel threatened by it because the interdisciplinary method does not conform to traditional research strategies, although this perspective is rare these days.
• Regarding dissertation committees, power plays can arise when professors are from different departments and sometimes different schools within a university. For example, there is a hierarchy of fields that can cause tensions when students of education or social work involve professors from outside fields, especially when those fields are more respected or considered more scholarly than edu-cation or social work.
• Pragmatic concerns can arise related to schedules and distances between individuals in different schools and sometimes different
universities in different parts of the country. When doing inter-disciplinary work, one does not often have the luxury of having a close-knit group of professors within a single field (and univer-sity department) who know each other and are probably used to working with each other.
Of course, these cautionary notes do not apply in all circumstances.
Although it might be difficult to find a university position when your work is not traditional, you might have a better chance of landing a job when universities are seeking interdisciplinary faculty members. Each dissertation writer will have to determine how pertinent these potential problems are.
But there are several steps that can be followed not only to avoid some of the pitfalls of interdisciplinary work but also to capitalize on its benefits.
Step 1. Be able to articulate in a proposal and in everyday corridor and classroom discussions why your interdisciplinary work is impor-tant to your field in particular and the social sciences in general.
Step 2. Nurture good relationships with professors outside your field who are known for their interdisciplinary work. This can be done by taking classes with the professors or arranging for indepen-dent studies with them (which can be done with professors in other universities).
Step 3. Through classes, independent studies, conferences, and your literature review, attempt to become proficient in the ideas, major figures, theories, topics, and research methods of each of the fields you are incorporating into your work. Keep your knowl-edge current.
Step 4. Find other research, including dissertations that are similar to your own. Use these as models, but also develop your disserta-tion so that it furthers the knowledge and analyses presented in this other research.
Step 5. Develop a working group of individuals who are doing simi-lar interdisciplinary work. This can include individuals in your own school and department as well as individuals across the coun-try. Locally, this may take the form of a reading group; a support-ive group of like-minded people at a distance can be maintained through e-mail and other forms of electronic communication, con-ferences, joint projects, and other venues.
Step 6. Prepare yourself for a lifetime of creative and discipline-stretching research of the sort many scholars find the most inter-esting and revealing. Also prepare yourself for possible pitfalls such as those discussed earlier.
In many ways, doing an interdisciplinary dissertation is similar to doing a dissertation that conforms to the expectations of a single discipline.
However, there are issues that can arise when doing an interdisciplinary dissertation that should be considered. This section tried to cover some of the concerns, but the extent to which these will affect you depends on your predicament, field, department, and career choices.
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