Research

See my Publications

See also a summary of my ongoing The Classifying (Mapping) Scholarship Project

See also the classification system I am developing: Basic Concepts Classification (Web version 2013)

See also an outline of my World History project: Making Sense of WH

Research interests

       

 Research in Progress:

“Classification and Interdisciplinarity” This multifaceted project is part of an even larger research program focused on showing how interdisciplinary research is best performed, and in particular how it can be aided by the various classifications I have developed in previous work.  I continue to develop my arguments that scholarly documents can and should be classified with respect to universal and exhaustive classifications of phenomena (and the relationships among these), theories, and methods. I am now applying this classification also to artifacts, works of art, archival documents, and the Semantic Web. Last but not least I continue to develop the Basic Concepts Classification.

I also continue to do research on interdisciplinary best practices. One project here involves further developing the About Interdisciplinarity and Interdisciplinary General Education websites. 

I have submitted a book chapter on interdisciplinary graduate education (but the book is in limbo).

I have drafted a paper, "Toward a General Theory of Knowledge Organization."

I have recently submitted a co-authored paper on classifying musical genres.  

I have drafted a book tentatively titled Integrating Human Science.


Awards for Research:

        Boulding Award, Association for Interdisciplinary Studies, October 2018. For contributions to scholarship of interdisciplinarity.

        McCalla Professorship, University of Alberta, 2001-2.  This competitive award provided full release from teaching during the   academic year in order that I could devote my time to research. 


Best Paper Award, International Society for Knowledge Organization conference, Wuhan, China, March 2024.


My Making Sense of World History was named “Outstanding book in humanities and social science” for 2020 by Taylor and Francis.  It also won the Open Access Award for Media and Arts. https://www.routledge.com/go/2020-book-and-digital-product-awards