Research with other disciplines and other countries Professor Geri Smyth School of Education University of Strathclyde

Queries and a Case Study Why? How? Problematising the concept Conceptualising the problems Case Study – Refugee Integration project

Why? Funder imperatives Sharing of knowledge base and research skills Creative approach to specific issue Development of existing collaboration (not research based) Do these reasons conflict; produce different outcomes? Are there other reasons?

How? Internally funded project –Bridging the Gap Externally funded project –NordForsk –FP7 Unfunded collaboration –Teachers in TV project Joint supervision of research students –Formal / informal And other models?

Problematising the concept If we are convinced of the need to work with other disciplines, what is our discipline? –What is your academic identity? –Is a project multidisciplinary if there is a collaboration between a sociologist and an educational sociologist? / between a Department of Linguistics and Linguists in a Department of Education? What does Education bring to the collaboration? –Are there specific fields of expertise? –Why do other disciplines want to work with Education? Which country are you representing in an international collaboration? Europe; UK; Scotland --- What are the languages of the collaboration? –Formally and informally Where do you position yourself in the collaboration? –UK centric; UK peripheral; Eurocentric

Conceptualising the Problems What is most important: the outcome; the process; the future engagement? How is mutual understanding gained? How are differing perspectives acknowledged as offering added value? How are conflicting imperatives addressed?

Conceptualising the Problems in 2013 UK Who owns the research? Where do you publish? Joint authorship Future Impact Is the UK one country? Which collaborations count?

Refugee Integration: a case study Funded by Institute for Advanced Studies Now Insight Institute Multidisciplinary –Education; Law; Business; Sociology; Human Geography; Modern Languages; Creative Arts Multinational –Scotland, England, Sweden, Slovenia, Croatia, Australia, Canada Multi-sectored –University, EU, UK, Scottish and local government, 3rd sector agencies

Refugee Integration: a case study Not an empirical research project Seminar based –Hosted by different partners Range of outcomes –Performance –Annotated bibliography –Special Issue Journal of Refugee Studies –Continuing collaborations

Best Practice What are the key issues in effective multi-disciplinary/multi- national/multi-agency research?