Under Construction @ Keele 2016 Volume 1 Issue 1 | Page 8

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Introduction

The articles that follow are the culmination of seven months of meetings,
discussions, pitches, design, editing, redesign, and peer review, between staff and
students from multiple disciplines: English, Music, History, Politics, Sociology, Film,
and Philosophy. All of whom have dedicated their time (to say nothing of their
patience) to the endeavour of creating Keele University’s first interdisciplinary
academic journal for postgraduate students.
The act of saying “I would like to create a post-graduate academic journal,” is
very easy. Once that has been said, it’s then even easier to say “I want it to
incorporate both the humanities and the social sciences.” And then, seeing as you’ve
come that far, it’s only logical to finish with “I want it to be a formal undertaking with
editors, meetings and peer review.” How effortlessly the words form in the mouth.
The reality on the other hand is not quite so simple: copyright issues, deadlines,
format, and a host of issues we had not even considered suddenly raise their
Daedalean heads. How will you fund this? Is it feasible? Will it appeal to the student
body?
With the reasons against a project such as this beginning to mount, the only
thing to counteract them is the reason for it. We believe that a need exists among
postgraduate students to explore their own work; to discuss their ideas and receive
feedback in a manner not confined to their own disciplines. It was John Henry
Newman in 1852, who said that all branches of knowledge are connected together:
An assemblage of learned men, zealous for their own sciences, and rivals
of each other, are brought, by familiar intercourse and for the sake of
intellectual peace, to adjust together the claims and relations of their
respective subjects of investigation. They learn to respect, to consult, to
aid each other. Thus is created a pure and clear atmosphere of thought,
which the student also breathes, though in his own case he only pursues
a few sciences out of the multitude. He profits by an intellectual tradition,
which is independent of particular teachers, which guides him in his
choice of subjects, and duly interprets for him those which he chooses. He
apprehends the great outlines of knowledge, the principles on which it