About CISSCT

Many of the most significant developments in contemporary research in virtually all disciplines involve issues that cross not only disciplinary lines but also the chasm that has traditionally separated studies in the humanities from research in the social, and even more, the natural sciences. Since its foundation in 1990, the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies in Science and Cultural Theory (CISSCT) has fostered intellectual exchange between natural and social scientists in a broad range of fields and humanities scholars in fields such as philosophy, art, history, linguistics, and literature.

The Center sponsors colloquia, lecture series, and conferences, and facilitates the teaching of interdisciplinary courses by Duke faculty. The Center has also inaugurated a book series Science and Cultural Theory, co-edited by Barbara Herrnstein Smith and E. Roy Weintraub, for Duke University Press, and co-sponsored the In Vivo: The Cultural Mediations of Biomedical Science, edited by Robert Mitchell and Phillip Thurtle, for the University of Washington Press. The Center for Interdisciplinary Studies in Science and Cultural Theory is affiliated with the Program in Literature and the Department of English.