Cross-College Research Collaboration

The College of Arts & Humanities is running a pilot project to stimulate collaborative research. Our aim is to encourage a creativity that reaches beyond the College of Arts & Humanities.

We are developing an integrated approach to research collaboration. The arts and humanities, social sciences, physical sciences, engineering, medical, veterinary, and life sciences are all involved.

Please contact John Reuben Davies (john.r.davies@glasgow.ac.uk), Associate Director of Arts Lab. John is available to help you with any research activity that moves beyond the College of Arts & Humanities.

Approaches to research collaboration

Image of John DaviesThe Cross-College Research Collaboration pilot project began in June 2021. We are stimulating and supporting collaborative research to encourage a creativity that reaches beyond the College of Arts & Humanities.

Our approach focuses on integrated forms of collaboration but embraces other types too – technical collaboration (one discipline commissioning work from another), and co-operative collaboration (more than one discipline working side by side on different questions).

Integrated collaboration sees more than one discipline applying their own methods to the same problem. The intellectual working space is open. We share our research tools. Everyone thinks together and asks questions they would not otherwise have thought of.

The arts and humanities, social sciences, physical sciences, engineering, medical, veterinary, and life sciences are currently all involved in our activities.

 

Support For Researchers

We support researchers in at least three ways:

  • Research connections: Designing and hosting events and exploratory conversations to seek common ground between researchers in different disciplines.
  • Curated conversations: Setting up and guiding discussions in the direction of collaborative research pathways towards future projects.
  • Facilitated conversations and other activities: Developing teams and research questions. These more established pathways focus on specific projects.

Once a stable group of participants emerges, we encourage, enable, and support the process of preparing for a specific project or a range of funding opportunities.

 

Contact

Please contact John Reuben Davies (john.r.davies@glasgow.ac.uk), Associate Director of Arts Lab. John is available to help you with any research activity that moves beyond the College of Arts & Humanities.

Research Connections

Our Research Connections events begin the process of bringing different disciplines together. They are the first step for exploratory conversations to seek common ground or new areas for exploration.

 Modern Languages & Cultures – Psychology & Neuroscience

A series of conversations between researchers in the School of Modern Languages & Cultures and the School of Psychology & Neuroscience (College of MVLS) began in 2021 and has led to new projects on the connection between the gut and the mind, surrealism and perception, and connections between identity, culture, technology, and the natural environment.

 Arts – Physics & Astronomy

The first in-person ‘Research Connections’ event took place in May 2022 in the ARC, when researchers from the College of Arts & Humanities interacted with colleagues from the School of Physics & Astronomy. Further events will take place this year, building on successful recent collaborations in the fields of gravitational waves and spatial perception for deaf blind people.

Knowledge and Creativity

A Joint Initiative between the College of Arts & Humanities and the College of Medical, Veterinary and Life Sciences.

At its best, research is a creative process, whether in the Arts or the Sciences. We are running an extra-curricular forum for students from disciplines within our two colleges to explore the fundamental nature of research.

A cohort of Arts and MVLS students are starting to think about, and discuss, the nature of creativity in research, the fundamental nature of knowledge, and other issues that will inform their understanding of the dynamic and creative processes that underpin successful research careers.