Editorial text of the New Newsletter

“We are not students of some subject matter but students of problems. And problems may cut right across the borders of any subject matter or discipline” (Karl Popper, Conjectures and Refutations, 1962)

The scientific project of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies – CEIS20 of Universidade de Coimbra at the University of Coimbra is built on the frontier of the contemporary understanding of interdisciplinary knowledge, with a particular focus on the humanities, arts and social sciences. The study of complex social, human and natural fields requires approaches to complex problems and systems that adopt strategies of networked knowledge (albeit often incomplete and with disciplinary friction) that go beyond the disciplinary framework associated with the classical reductionist logic of isolating phenomena. The work carried out by our researchers, our research groups and projects and the multiple scientific dynamics that we promote and are a part of, advance plural knowledge, integrating or articulating information, concepts, methodologies and theories from different disciplinary backgrounds and research practices.. This work of integrating knowledge is often cyclical, dynamic and sometimes difficult and unpredictable in its articulation of methodologies and premises, but it is also strongly motivated both by the exploration of fundamental problems at the interfaces of disciplines and by the need to understand and intervene in the resolution of social problems.

The Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies is going through a very challenging time and is now entering the final phase of the current funding cycle, when everyone’s commitment becomes even more urgent. Throughout this cycle, we have tried to think and manage the Centre’s scientific project in a consistent and ambitious way, stimulating the scientific agenda with questions that are multidisciplinary in scope and part of contemporary debates and knowledge networks; we promote the reception, development and integration of the many scientific momentums, projects and activities proposed by the researchers and research groups; we support the administrative and communication aspect of our activities and the efficiency of scientific management with remarkable results; and we prepare a strategy for the scientific area in which the production, dissemination and transfer of knowledge allow us to generate expectations of the evaluation process that are proportionate to the contributions that, individually and collectively, build and are part of the Centre’s goals and objectives.

In the coming year, I would like to highlight three areas of structural work for the scientific life of CEIS20. First, preparing for the FCT evaluation of our R&D unit (in 2023 and 2024), which implies knowledge and the design of a strategy to address the evaluation parameters and processes, both retrospectively and prospectively. We see this as a collective function where the leadership of the Coordination Office will seek to aggregate the expertise of our community and institutional context.

We then aim to consolidate the Centre’s interdisciplinary mission through annual forums with a differentiated scientific impact and transversal relevance to our interests, groups and projects. I would like to highlight two aggregating events organised by CEIS20, in addition to others of great impact, but whose interdisciplinarity is more circumscribed, promoted by the research groups: (1) the Congress Thinking the 20th Century – Perspectives from the 21st Century, to be held between 1 and 3 February, which reshapes the foundational impetus of CEIS20 (“of the 20th century”) and “seeks to be part of contemporary debates on the history, memory and heritage of the 20th century, contributing to the diversification and complexity of its narratives and representations”. At the same time, this congress is coordinated and aligned with a new scientific reorientation of the journal Estudos do Século XX. (2) The Interdisciplining Knowledge: Humanities, Science and Culture Symposium, to be held between 17 and 19 May, aims to examine and question the contemporary construction of interdisciplinary knowledge, considering how this configuration of research raises questions about heterogeneity, evaluation and performative modes of knowledge.

Finally, I would like to highlight the reorganisation of the many scientific initiatives that take place within CEIS20 (lectures, seminars, workshops, training, symposia, etc.) into three types: (1) Axes of Interdisciplinary Knowledge aims to bring together all the scientific activities of a broad multidisciplinary or interdisciplinary nature promoted by the Centre, and which are inherently integrated into the scientific mission of the Doctoral Programme in Contemporary Studies; (2) Disciplinary Affinities consists of events that represent the development of perspectives with close disciplinary depth, typically promoted by the Centre’s research groups; and finally, (3) Projectório – Research in Perspective, which brings together several initiatives promoted by the Centre’s Science Management on the formal, evaluative and strategic nature of scientific and artistic practice.

Best wishes for a happy 2023!

José Oliveira Martins,
Scientific Coordinator, Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies