Critical reflections of postgraduate researchers on a collaborative interdisciplinary research project

Bibliographic Data

ID22230489
AuthorsBen Purvi (0000-0001-8883-5472, University of Sheffield, corresponding author), Hannah Keding (Fraunhofer Information Center for Planning and Building), Adam Gary Lewis (0000-0003-4737-2525), Ashley Lewis, Phil Northall (0000-0002-0228-9886, Sheffield Hallam University)
Year2023
Volume10
Issue1
Pages10-10
Publication date2023-01-06
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHumanities and Social Sciences Communications (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2662-9992 • E-ISSN: 2662-9992
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1057/s41599-022-01494-w
PMID36628103
OpenAlexW4313577306
LanguageEN
Citations received7
References cited94

By employing a retrospective collaborative autoethnographic approach, this work aims to better understand how an interdisciplinary context shaped the authors’ experiences of British academia during their Ph.D research. The authors bring together their individual observations and experiences to collectively interrogate and critically reflect on their position as postgraduate researchers (PGRs) on a collaborative interdisciplinary research project. These reflections are taken as a lens through which to interrogate the contemporary British university. Pre-existing tensions within the academy are characterised as ‘asymmetries’ along dimensions of risk, disciplinary hierarchy, and knowledge. It is argued that the authors’ experience of uncertainty and precarity as junior academics stems principally from pre-existing structures within British academia, rather than the interdisciplinary environment in which they were immersed. By emphasising the role of the successfully trained doctoral candidate as an outcome itself, it is argued that indicators of success can be reframed, shifting the power asymmetry to place greater value on PGRs within the neoliberal academy. Highlighting the ambiguity of their convergent and divergent personal experiences, the authors suggest there is a need for a greater focus on the contested role of the PGR within the contemporary university system

Ambiguity · Discipline · Engineering ethics · Geography · Hierarchy · Pedagogy · Political science · Precarity · Social science · Sociology · Doctoral Education Challenges and Solutions · Engineering · Gender Studies · Innovative Education and Learning Practices · Interdisciplinary Research and Collaboration

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Open DOIOpen Access