In this week's topic we're going to talk about integration and understanding what Interdisciplinarity is all about. As Interdisciplinary Studies majors, the notion of integration is strongly emphasized throughout your coursework. In your book, Repko mentions the analogy of a fruit salad as well as a smoothie. Where the fruit salad is an example of multidisciplinarity,and the smoothie represents interdisciplinarity. Combining the use of all three of your disciplines into a unified, quintessential realm, where logic is utilized interchangeably to solve complex problems, continues to remain the most critical component of interdisciplinarity. Based from Repkos, "Interdisciplinary Research," and from your own knowledge, I would like you all to
respond to the following questions in your own words:
What is integration? What are some examples?
How have or haven't you integrated your areas and minor?
Why is integration of areas/minor important in terms of professional, academic, and/or personal
developing?
How can your areas/minor be better integrated?
Remember to respond with complete sentences as well as the use of appropriate grammar.
I think of integration as being a way to combine different things to be used together, or to help benefit each other. We use integration everyday in many different social ways, in schools, and in the work place. Sometimes it is more of a way of thinking, while others times you may actually be acting out something. My areas of focus are health and behavioral and social sciences, and my minor is history. While these areas of study are not directly integrated I believe that having a history back ground can always help a person in any area, because it can give you an understanding of how far we have developed in certain areas and the things that helped shaped who we are now. It can be very useful to understand what things were done in the past that may or may not have worked for your areas. I also believe that it helps give you a more rounded understanding of things, and it can help you understand them better if you know the back ground of them. If you can integrate all of your areas of study and your minor you are strengthening your understanding and your over all knowledge of everything. I could better integrate my areas with my minor by studying the history of my areas as much as possible.
ReplyDeleteIntegration is combining different elements for one purpose. Examples of integration would be athletes they train, practice, condition and eat right all to perform well at their sport. Without practice they can't perfect their game and without eat right they won't have the stamina to last a full game so all these components play vital roles in their careers they can't just have one they need to focus on all the areas. I have integrated my disciplines although they may seem to be irrelevant to one another I used them to my advantage. Learning to integrate our disciplines properly is important for us to learn now because we can perfect what we hope to use them for in the future. Knowing how to integrate our disciplines separates us from liberal studies major who have no idea where they want to take their education. To better integrate our disciplines we need to learn and know what we intend to do in the future so that we focusing on what will be useful to us.
ReplyDeleteIntegration is the use of parts to create a better, more effective whole. For example, when you integrate personal computers into the work place, work and productivity can increase with ease and speed.
ReplyDeleteMy areas and minor are Behavioral/Social Sciences, Arts and Magazine journalism. Without properly integrating my studies I would have nothing more than a cluster of seemingly unrelated studies. By pulling specific courses out of each field I can design the "perfect" major for my career goals. I have specifically chosen anthropology from B/SS, photography from Arts, and integrated them with knowledge from Magazine Journalism to give me the best combination of skills to document different cultures of the world.
Integration is important for academics because it gives me a productive track to reach my goals and for professional development because the skills I integrate will best prepare me for my working environment.
The integration of my studies could be improved by adding cinematography from Arts. However, I do not yet know of any other way to better integrate my areas/minor.
Hi Cristie,
ReplyDeleteMy name is Monirah and I'm one of your mentors for the semster. I love your example of an athlete integrating eating well and practice to be able to perform well during the game. This is a great way to demonstrate how we as interdisciplinary studies students have an advantage over other students when we integrate all of our areas of focus and put that knowledge toward our careers.
Kevin,
ReplyDeleteYou have really have put thought into how you have integrated your minor and areas of study. In such a integrated approach what career options do you think this will open up for you, compared to more of a traditional approach of study?
Heather,
ReplyDeleteIt is always good to know the historical events and background. I will graduate this May with a minor in History, and I can truly say it has broadened my understanding of many different disciplines. My favorite phrase by George Santayana: "Those who do not learn from the past are condemned to repeat it." I'm glad you have found ways to integrate history into your degree and your life - good luck this semester!
Hi Kevin,
ReplyDeleteI like your comment regarding the integration of anthropology and magazine journalism. Now, here you have two seemingly different disciplines. The process of integration is being able to take knowledge from one discipline and apply it to another simultaneously.
I agree with some that, you can't delve that deeply into one field. When I was asking about being a professor, I was told that 15 credits hours in a master program, you can start teaching in that field. Well the IDS Masters program only delves 9 credit hours into each field....
ReplyDeleteHi Kevin
ReplyDeleteI liked your example of the personal computer in the work place. I too agree that integration is very important for your education. I believe that I helps give you a more well rounded education, and overall a better education. But, it sounds like you are doing a good job at integrating you studies .
Hi Cristie
ReplyDeleteI really liked your example of integration. I think that is an excellent way to describe it, and I think that it helps to better understand Interdisciplinary Studies. I also agree with you about how if we know how to integrate our studies it will be to our advantage, and the earlier we do the better it will be for us.
I think of integration as combining different skills, experience, and education to achieve a better more well rounded individual when thinking in terms of people. You can also integrate physical things such as tools in the workplace or in a school to make it more efficient.
ReplyDeleteMy area's of focus are Communication's and Social and Social and Behaivoral Science and my minor is in Enviromental Studies. I choose this because I plan to work with the public and therefore I believe that it will be benificial to me to learn how to communicate with other's and also to have knowlegde on the social and behaivor aspects of people as well. Integrating these together will give me a well rounded education and will prepare me for the job's that lie ahead.
I believe that integration is important because it will insure that we get the most out of our education and therefore be a great canidate for a job.
Integration means combining, in the sense of academic disciplines it means a fusion of those areas of focus. An example of this is the subject of chemistry, in order to succeed in the class you must know how to read the language it is taught in, and second simple mathematic skills would also prove beneficial since thats what chemistry boils down to. Chemistry is a good example, because it combines your ability to read, with your simple arithmetic skills.
ReplyDeleteSince both my concentrations, as well as minor are all science based, it is impossible to not integrate them all.
Cristie:
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you that in order to better the integration of our areas we need to know what our end goal is. We can only for a path to a determined place, if we know where we are going.
Kevin
I believe in another blog, I commented on how well integrated your minor, and areas of focus are in regards to your future goals. I wish you the best!