Engineering, Social Sciences, and the Humanities

This book presents a critical examination of conversations between engineering, social sciences, and the humanities asking whether their conversations have come of age. These conversations are important because ultimately their outcome have real world consequences in engineering education and practice, and for the social and material world we inhabit. Taken together the 21 chapters provide scholarly-argued responses to the following questions.Why are these conversations important for engineering, for social sciences, and for the humanities?Are there key places in practice, in the curriculum, and in institutions where these conversations can develop best?What are the barriers to successful conversations?What proposals can be made for deepening these conversations for the future?How would we know that the conversations have come of age, and who gets to decide?The book appeals to scholarly audiences that come together through their work in engineering education and practice. The chapters of the book probes and access the meetings and conversations, and they explore new avenues for strengthening dialogues that transcend narrow disciplinary confines and divisions."For several decades already, there has been a growing enthusiasm for integrating social sciences and humanities disciplines (SSH) into engineering education and practice. However, it is yet unclear whether the efforts towards integration are coherent and whether this is making a difference at all in how engineers see themselves and their field. This book offers a snapshot in time describing how the efforts to bring SSH insights into engineering look like and how successful these efforts are. The volume offers a rich collection of descriptive resources and theoretical tools that will be useful for researchers of engineering practices, and for those aiming to reshape the engineering lifeworld through new policies. The book depicts the current state of the art of the most visible SSH contributions to shaping engineering practices, as well as a map of research gaps and policy problems that still need to be explored."                                          (Dr. Ir. Lavinia Marin, TU Delft, degrees in Electrical Engineering and Philosophy)