1. Interdisciplinarity Derek Matravers

2. AHRC Priorities 1. Research 1.1. To support the best ideas and projects emerging from researchers. 1.2. To enable larger projects, including facilitating collaboration and interdisciplinarity. 1.3. To bring scholars together to address new research questions and agendas in themes and strategic initiatives. 1.4. To develop both the assessment and formative role of peer reviewers to ensure that funding is directed toward research of the highest quality and greatest ambition.

3. CHASE ‘vision’ It is also fundamental to the CHASE ethos that serious disciplinary research is interdisciplinary. Because the established disciplines are hybrid and evolving, interdisciplinarity is neither a new nor an unchanging enterprise. Across the arts and humanities, we study periods, cultures and communities in which modern disciplinary boundaries simply did not and do not exist; equally, emergent or less-established fields of study require new forms of attention, practice and communication.

4. Definitions Multi-disciplinary work: A problem is tackled by a number of different disciplines, each retaining its own character. Inter-disciplinary work: Integration of knowledge, method (and so on) of a number of different disciplines.

5. Practice The structure of university departments. The REF units of assessment. The way money flows around universities.

6. Theory There is some way that things are (for example, with respect to art). Various disciplines are studying the way things are (for example, art theory and philosophical aesthetics). These disciplines are truth-tracking. These disciplines should converge on the way that things are.

7. Theory There is some way that things are (for example, with respect to atomic power). Various disciplines are studying the way things are (for example, physics and engineering). These disciplines are truth-tracking. These disciplines should converge on the way that things are.

8. Something to ponder Should we expect different humanities disciplines to converge? – Is there some way that things are? – Are (all) humanities disciplines truth-tracking?