Making Interdisciplinarity Work Through Translation and Analogical Thinking

Analogies are often employed in a variety of contexts as a means of translating across disciplines or perspectives. Such translation fails when it is thought of merely as transversal exchange, focusing on similarity within the analogy. Until now, in my teaching, I have been directing students to do just this. Recently, I have been considering the philosophical problems of analogical thinking, and I am prepared to revise my approach. Rather than assume the value of similarity, and therefore conclude the integrative process (and claim success) on that basis, analogical thinkers as interdisciplinary translators would do better to engage the difference that inheres within each discipline or perspective as the source of understanding "how newness enters the world."