New Research Funding Strategies for the Humanities and Social Sciences in the 21 st century: Examples from Canada Chad Gaffield OC FRSC Distinguished University Professor chadgaffield University Research Chair in Digital Scholarship November 16, 2017 www.chadgaffield.com gaffield@uottawa.ca
Technology: Change/History:Transfer of Knowledge
Research is telling us that we are living in a paradigm-shifting era…. Deep changes in research and in larger society
Winter 2006: “accountability” and “value -for- (public) money” review of the federal research granting agencies announced in the 2006 Canadian federal budget Accountable to whom? Value for whom?
SSHRC NSERC CIHR Canada’s Research Granting Councils
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES ON CAMPUS: •– 50,440: Full time graduate students; •– 20,420: Full time professors. • SSHRC: •– $323M in funding — 8,994 projects — 30 disciplines; •– 13,000 applications received for grants, scholarships and fellowships; •– 4,320 new projects funded; •– 565 peer-review committee members.
September 2006: appt as President and CEO Autumn 2006: Jim Mitchell, A review of NSERC and SSHRC .
Technology-driven age? ”Outsiders” telling “us” to change?
So what’s going on? 1) Deep conceptual changes underway in research and larger society; 2) These conceptual changes are being enabled, accelerated and then influenced positively and negatively in iterative ways by digital technologies; 3) For these reasons, we are must update research policies and practices including those related to funding.
Complaints in public discussion: SSH research is not related to the major issues today (especially H) graduates are not getting good jobs – not materially valued by society (especially H)
Timeless critiques? Research activities really changing?
What does research tell us about ourselves as researchers?
Peer-review … .. (external critique: funding bad proposals!) Researcher perspective: Increasing number of applications! Turning down good proposals …
Researcher perspective: Too hard to apply (too many different research funding programs … too complex … valeu of grantmanship is too high
“On a scale ranging from extremely interdisciplinary to exclusively disciplinary, how would you characterize your research?” PERCENT % 45 41,2 Social Sciences 39,8 38,9 40 36,9 Humanities 35 31,6 31,1 History 30 24,3 25 22,7 20 15,5 15 10 6,3 5,9 5,7 5 0 Exclusively Quite disciplinary Quite Extremely disciplinary interdisciplinary Interdisciplinary Source: 2008 web survey, SSH faculty, Science-Metrix
Research is telling us that we are living in a paradigm-shifting era…. Deep changes in research (and in larger society)
COMPLEXITY DIVERSITY CREATIVITY
Three deep conceptual changes: COMPLEXITY = from the conviction that complexity is only apparent (simplicity if we just look closely) to recognition of complexity as a common phenomenon (non-linearity, small-large, emergence, etc)
Thanks to Simon Hodson @simonhodson99
Three deep conceptual changes: COMPLEXITY = from the conviction that complexity is only apparent (simplicity if we just look closely) to recognition of complexity as a common phenomenon (non-linearity, small-large, emergence, etc) DIVERSITY = from diversity as a problem to be eliminated to diversity as the foundation of strength and resilience
Three deep conceptual changes: COMPLEXITY = from the conviction that complexity is only apparent (simplicity if we just look closely) to recognition of complexity as a common phenomenon (non-linearity, small-large, emergence, etc) DIVERSITY = from diversity as a problem to be eliminated to diversity as the foundation of strength and resilience CREATIVITY = from a tiny group of creators (pre-ordained elite) for a majority of appliers to trying to tap the entire pool of talent
WE STUDY HUMANS!!!!!! What are the humanities and social sciences? We study human thought and behaviour In the past and present
We must tell our story based on the evidence!
• Tomorrow’s headlines! • Next generation’s headlines!
Post-graduate income: by field of study
Patented in 1867 by William Lincoln
The increasing influence of the humanities across research fields and beyond: Interpretation, meaning, significance of evidence (« facts ») Evidence does not speak for itself! The data do not tell us …
The increasing influence of the humanities on campus: Studying“unstructured”evidence… studying deep complexity …
« What are the intersections between biomedicine and humanities scholarship? » For more information, please visit the Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities (MITH) 40
Implications for research policy practice: • Complexity: pathways to support integrated research (multi-inter-trans-cross-sectoral) as well as specialized (“disciplinary”)research • Diversity: pathways to support research using different concepts, research approaches, ways of working (no cookiecutter!No“ideal”! • Creativity:redefinewhois“expert”… be open to all possible « research creators »
Redefining relevance … .
SSHRC NSERC CIHR Canada’s Granting Councils
NSERC SSHRC CIHR CFI 21st century approach
“Agatha Christie likely suffered from Alzheimer’s” “Research by U of T professors Ian Lancashire and Graeme Hirst has garnered top spot in the N.Y. Times’ 9th Annual Year in Ideas.”
New answers to old questions: FUND RESEARCH INFRASTRUCTURE IN THE SSH??? SSHRC FUNDS PROJECTS WITH SCIENTISTS??? NSERC? CIHR?
Persistent Challenges 1) Uneven resources across campus … e.g. % of researchers with any external funding! 2) 19th-20th century thinking-assumptions apparent in research funding application forms, adjudication, impact evalution, etc. 3) 19th-20th century thinking-assumptions apparent in institutional structures (including budget models), rankings, etc.
Learning to participate within AND across (20th century) boundaries: a) cross-campus; b) cross-sector; c) global engagement.
"This is an extraordinary time for understanding of the human condition" Pierre Lévy, philosopher, CRC in Collective Intelligence, uOttawa http://www.scoop.it/t/digital-humanities-for-beginners
Over to you! Many thanks.
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