The Move Towards Counter-Disciplinary Thought

What I found most interesting in this reading was the process of specialization and concentration of discipline that Bernstein shows is part of the history of American philosophy. When talking about the time before the "Anglo-American/ Continental split" Bernstein reminds us, "We should remember the fluidity of academic disciplines at that time" (384). Yet, as time went on, there was a move towards an isolation of academic disciplines. As Bernstein show, in philosophy the discipline itself became divided and the different schools of thought also became isolated. This isolation creates conversations that are so self-enclosed, that it becomes difficult for anything new or fresh to be discovered. Bernstein believed that people were beginning to move away from this isolation, however. He claims, "Indeed, there is another emerging phenomenon that exhibits a new intellectual mood of fluidity and breaking down of boundaries. Throughout the country in our universities and colleges there has been an explosion of study and discussion groups that cluster about new constellations of texts and themes that cut across disciplines" (396). I believe that a return to some fluidity between disciplines would be a very good thing. I am hoping to go to Graduate school next year, and hope to have the chance to do interdisciplinary work because I believe that so much can get lost when you only look at something from an isolated perspective.