ABSTRACT

With increasing knowledge specialization, disciplines continuously communicate and contest the boundaries of knowledge. Within the dynamic space of collaboration and communication between fields that has ensued, it is not clear whether these new boundaries are aligned to knowledge similarities, or to prestige overlaps. In this article, I explore the significant case example of college double major combinations to show: (1) how the configuration and availability of double major programs are linked to the epistemological and social aspects of the disciplines; and (2) the ways in which disciplinary communication is shaped by students’ choices. Using a large administrative data set of undergraduate students, I show that students’ choices of double majors maintain knowledge boundaries, as proposed by the epistemological essentialism approach. However, when students deviate from this dominant pattern, their choices align with the prestige of the field; this leads to a unique structure of combinations, but also creates hierarchies based on knowledge combinations.

摘要

随着知识专业化程度的提高，学科不断地交流和争夺知识的界限。在随之而来的领域之间协作和交流的动态空间中，尚不清楚这些新边界是否与知识相似性或声望重叠一致。在本文中，我探讨了大学双专业组合的重要案例，以展示：（1）双专业课程的配置和可用性如何与学科的认识论和社会方面联系起来；(2) 学生选择塑造学科交流的方式。使用本科生的大型行政数据集，我表明学生对双专业的选择保持了知识边界，正如认识论本质主义方法所提出的那样。然而，当学生偏离这种主导模式时，他们的选择与该领域的声望保持一致；这导致了独特的组合结构，但也创建了基于知识组合的层次结构。