Lecture Series Winter 2026-27

Joint Lecture Series by the ZiF and ISoS at Bielefeld University

Winter 2026/27

This lecture series brings together theoretical reflections and practical experiences on interdisciplinarity in scientific research. The field of science studies has long examined the conditions, forms, and implications of interdisciplinary work. Historians, sociologists, and philosophers of science address questions such as what distinguishes interdisciplinary from multidisciplinary research, how knowledge is integrated across disciplinary boundaries, how interdisciplinary fields emerge and stabilize, how researchers navigate conflicting methods, standards, and epistemic cultures incollaborative settings, and whether interdisciplinarity is an epistemic necessity or primarily a policy-driven ideal.

The series connects these theoretical debates with insights from research, funding, and institutional practice. It highlights interdisciplinary projects inwhich scholars develop innovative approaches to collaboration and design measures to foster interdisciplinary competencies. The lecture series also offers perspectives on how funding organizations design and implement formats that promote and sustain interdisciplinary research, as well as on how research institutes host, structure, and actively support such collaboration.

Since its founding in the 1970s, Bielefeld University has embraced interdisciplinarity as a defining institutional principle. The Center for Interdisciplinary Research (ZiF), a Center for Advanced Study which embodies this commitment, and the Institute for Studies of Science (ISoS), dedicated to the interdisciplinary reflection on science, have jointly organized this lecture series to explore interdisciplinarity in both theory and practice.