more humanistic than the social sciences as a whole (this is espe-
cially true of the SSRC and the WWNFF competitions), the anthro-
pologists I interviewed are more likely representative of their disci-
pline than are the political scientists and economists. This bias is
unavoidable since I was unable to gain access to the more scientific
social science panels, such as those of the National Science Founda-
tion, where panel members from economics and political science
probably are closer to their disciplines’ “mean.”^11 An important bal-
ancing factor here is that my description of each field, in addition to
being informed by what their members say about it, reflects the per-
ceptions of members of other disciplines, incorporates my own ex-
perience and exposure to these fields, and draws on broader analyses
made by scholars who have studied academic life. I also benefited
from discussion with and feedback from a range of experts from var-
ious fields.
Perceptions of disciplinary differences in panel deliberations. Repre-
sentations concerning disciplinary differences are significant because
they provide one of the frameworks through which members of
multidisciplinary panels make sense of their roles and responsibili-
ties. An anthropologist sketches the basic evaluative procedure this
way:
Before the meeting, you as a reader find something in a proposal
that speaks to you or doesn’t speak to you. And then you hope-
fully are able to convey some of that to the rest of the group...
What you wind up doing is advocating or explaining to other
people why something is a good project. And when other people
are listening, as they were this time, then it’s not so hard to come
to an agreement.Since by definition most of the participating scholars on an inter-
disciplinary panel come from different academic fields, members
56 / On Disciplinary Cultures