Academic discipline
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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An academic discipline, or field of study, is a branch of knowledge that is taught and researched at the college or university level. Disciplines are defined (in part) and recognized by the academic journals in which research is published, and the learned societies and academic departments or faculties to which their practitioners belong.
However, there exists no formal criteria for when educational programs and scholarly journals form an academic discipline. A huge difference exists between well established disciplines that exist in almost all universities all over the world having a long history, and well established set of journals and conferences, on the other hand, suggestions for new fields supported only by few universities and publications. Fields of study usually have several sub-disciplines or branches and the distinguishing lines between these are often both arbitrary and ambiguous.
Overview
The University of Paris in 1231 consisted of four faculties: Theology, Medicine, Canon Law and Arts. Most academic disciplines have their roots in the mid-to-late-19th century secularization of universities, when the traditional curricula were supplemented with non-classical languages and literatures, social sciences such as political science, economics, sociology and public administration, and natural science and technology disciplines such as physics, chemistry, biology, and engineering.
In the early 20th century, new disciplines such as education and psychology were added. In the 1970s and 1980s, there was an explosion of new disciplines focusing on specific themes, such as media studies, women's studies, and black studies. Many disciplines designed as preparation for careers and professions, such as nursing, hospitality management, and corrections, also emerged in the universities. Finally, interdisciplinary scientific fields such as biochemistry and geophysics gained prominence as their contribution to knowledge became widely recognized.
There is no consensus on how some academic disciplines should be classified, e.g., whether anthropology and linguistics are social sciences disciplines or humanities disciplines. More generally, the proper criteria for organizing knowledge into disciplines are also open to debate.
An asterisk (*) denotes a field whose academic status has been debated among this article's editors.
Humanities
History
- African history
- American history
- Ancient history
- History of Asia
- History of Europe
- Chinese history
- Cultural history
- Diplomatic history
- Economic history
- Ethnohistory
- Greek History (outline)
- History of science and technology
- Iranian History
- Indian History
- Indonesian History
- Intellectual history
- Military history
- Modern history
- World history
Linguistics
- Languages
- Applied Linguistics
- Computational linguistics / Natural language processing
- Discourse analysis
- Etymology
- Historical linguistics
- History of linguistics
- Interlinguistics
- Morphology
- Philology
- Phonetics
- Phonology
- Pragmatics
- Semantics
- Semiotics
- Sociolinguistics
- Syntax
- Composition studies
- Rhetoric
Literature
- World literatures
- Arabic literature
- Argentine literature
- Bengali literature
- Bulgarian literature
- Bosnian literature
- Classics
- Comparative literature
- Chinese literature
- English literature
- French literature
- Gaelic literature
- German literature and Austrian literature
- Hebrew literature
- Hindi literature
- Italian literature
- Japanese literature
- Kannada literature
- Korean literature
- Latin American literature
- Nigerian literature
- Oriya literature
- Pashto literature
- Persian literature
- Polish literature
- Philippine literature
- Portuguese and Brazilian literature
- Russian literature
- Serbian literature
- Spanish literature
- Yiddish literature
- Tamil literature
- Welsh Literature
- Literary theory
- Creative writing
- Creative nonfiction
- Fiction writing
- Non-fiction writing
- Literary journalism
- Poetry composition
- Screenwriting
- Playwrighting
Performing arts
- Arts administration
- Music (outline)
- Dance (outline)
- Theatre (outline)
- Film (outline)
- Oral literature
Philosophy
- Meta-philosophy
- Metaphysics
- Epistemology (outline)
- Ethics (outline)
- Aesthetics (outline)/Philosophy of Art
- Social philosophy and political philosophy
- Philosophical traditions and schools
- History of philosophy
- Logic (outline)
- Applied philosophy
Religion
- Abrahamic religions
- Indian religions
- East Asian religions
- Other religions
- Comparative religion
- Mythology and Folklore
- Irreligion
Visual arts
- Art history
- Calligraphy
- Connoisseurship
- Creative arts
- Drawing (outline)
- Fine arts
- Painting (outline)
- Filmmaking
- Photography (outline)
- Mixed Media
- Printmaking
- Studio art
- Sculpture (outline)
- Art conservation
Social sciences
Anthropology
Archaeology
- Classical archaeology
- Egyptology
- Experimental archaeology
- Maritime archaeology
- Near Eastern archaeology
- Paleoanthropology
- Prehistoric archaeology
Area studies
- African studies
- American studies
- Asian studies
- Indology (Indian studies)
- Iranian studies
- Japanology (Japanese studies)
- Korean studies
- Sinology (outline) (Chinese studies)
- Southeast Asian studies
- European studies
- Australian studies
- Middle East studies
Cultural and ethnic studies
Economics
- Agricultural economics
- Behavioral economics
- Bioeconomics
- Complexity economics
- Computational economics
- Consumer economics
- Development economics
- Ecological economics
- Econometrics
- Economic geography
- Economic history
- Economic sociology
- Economic systems
- Energy economics
- Entrepreneurial economics
- Environmental economics
- Evolutionary economics
- Experimental economics
- Feminist economics
- Financial economics
- Financial econometrics
- Game theory
- Green economics
- Growth economics
- Human development theory
- Industrial organization
- Information economics
- Institutional economics
- International economics
- Islamic economics
- Labor economics
- Law and economics
- Macroeconomics
- Managerial economics
- Mathematical economics
- Microeconomics
- Monetary economics
- Neuroeconomics
- Political economy
- Public finance
- Public economics
- Real estate economics
- Resource economics
- Social choice theory
- Socialist economics
- Socioeconomics
- Transport economics
- Welfare economics
Gender and sexuality studies
- Feminine psychology
- Gender studies/Gender theory
- Heterosexism
- Human sexual behavior
- Human sexuality (outline)
- Masculine psychology
Geography
- Cartography (outline)
- Human geography
Political science
- American politics
- Canadian politics
- Civics
- Comparative politics
- Geopolitics (Political geography)
- International relations
- International organizations
- Nationalism studies
- Peace and conflict studies
- Policy studies
- Political behavior
- Political culture
- Political economy
- Political history
- Political philosophy
- Psephology
- Public administration
- Public policy
- Social choice theory
Psychology
- Abnormal psychology
- Applied psychology
- Biological psychology
- Clinical psychology
- Cognitive psychology
- Community psychology
- Comparative psychology
- Conservation Psychology
- Consumer psychology
- Counseling psychology
- Cultural psychology
- Differential psychology
- Developmental psychology
- Educational psychology
- Environmental psychology
- Evolutionary psychology
- Experimental psychology
- Forensic psychology
- Health psychology
- Legal psychology
- Media psychology
- Medical psychology
- Military psychology
- Neuropsychology
- Occupational health psychology
- Organizational psychology
- Parapsychology (outline)
- Personality psychology
- Political psychology
- Positive psychology
- Psychometrics
- Psychology of religion
- Psychophysics
- Quantitative psychology
- School psychology
- Social psychology
- Sport psychology
Sociology
- Applied sociology
- Collective behavior
- Community informatics
- Comparative sociology
- Conflict theory
- Cultural studies
- Criminology/Criminal justice (outline)
- Critical management studies
- Demography/Population
- Environmental sociology
- Feminist sociology
- Futures studies (outline)
- Human ecology
- Interactionism
- Medical sociology
- Military sociology
- Organizational studies
- Science studies/Science and technology studies
- Sexology
- Social capital
- Social control
- Social economy
- Social philosophy
- Social psychology
- Social policy
- Social research
- Sociology of culture
- Sociology of deviance
- Sociology of education
- Sociology of gender
- Sociology of the family
- Sociology of knowledge
- Sociology of law
- Sociology of religion
- Sociology of sport
- Sociology of work
- Social theory
- Social stratification
- Sociological theory
- Sociobiology
- Sociocybernetics
- Sociolinguistics
- Urban studies or Urban sociology/Rural sociology
- Visual sociology
Natural sciences
Space sciences
- Planetary science (alternatively, a part of earth science)
Earth sciences
- Edaphology
- Environmental science
- Environmental chemistry
- Gemology
- Geodesy
- Geography (outline)
- Geology (outline)
- Geochemistry
- Geomorphology
- Geophysics (outline)
- Glaciology
- Hydrogeology
- Hydrology (outline)
- Meteorology (outline)
- Mineralogy
- Oceanography (outline)
- Pedology
- Paleontology
- Planetary science (alternatively, a part of space science)
- Sedimentology
- Soil science
- Speleology
- Tectonics
- Volcanology
Life sciences
- See also Branches of life sciences