[Air-l] What is a discipline.

Matthew Allen M.Allen at exchange.curtin.edu.au
Tue Nov 5 17:06:28 PST 2002


 Hi all

INteresting posts on disciplines...revealing, I suspect, that one of the
defining features of a discipline is the way in which proponents of that
discipline understand and apply the term 'discipline' (sorry if this sounds
like a problem from a set-theory textbook).

My contribution is, however, to ask if there is value in shifting the debate
away from the noun, discipline, to the verb 'to discipline' (obviously
following Foucault here)? I think that disciplines are defined, mostly, by
the processes and actions which maintain and perpetuate them, rather than by
the boundaries or terrain which they enclose.  I would assert that the
difficulty for transdisciplinary scholars, such as found in areas of study
such as Internet Studies, is not in traversing the ground, nor crossing the
borders, of the many disciplines which they might encounter; rather, the
difficulty is one of connection with and deep understanding of processes.

Matt




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