The Journal for Research Cultures is a peer-reviewed platform for the communication and presentation of strategies of experimental, transdisciplinary and artistic research practices across epistemic cultures. The journal is published annually.
Approaches to how research is executed depend on epistemologies, which vary considerably, both – within and between humanities and sciences. They are the connecting element of the collective and shape perception by incorporating certain shared assumptions of a prevailing research culture. How knowledge is acquired is further vastly influenced by the structure of the system that it is generated in, which is configured and adapted due to the various contexts. Hence these context require analysis if one wants to uncover more about the process itself, or how Ludwik Fleck phrased it: “(…) epistemology without historical and comparative investigations is no more than an empty play on words or an epistemology of imagination.” (Fleck 1979)
These comparative investigations – within and between certain disciplines – is what we dedicate our journal to. To allow such an approach, to bridge this divide of homo- and heterogeneous thought styles without sacrificing the original quality of each of them, authors are asked to not speak about their subject but rather about their strategy within their research. This way we aim to “map out discursive territory where it is possible that scientists and artists can mutually look at their hands, paying less attention to what they say but much more on what they do when they practice their craft.” as Hans Jörn-Rheinberger so elaborately phrased it in a paper published in this first issue of the Journal for Research Cultures.