Accounting historians engaging with scholars inside and outside accounting: Issues, opportunities and obstacles

Abstract

Originating in a panel presentation at the eighth Accounting History International Conference, this study offers a reflection on the issues, opportunities and obstacles which may arise when accounting historians engage with other accounting scholars and scholars outside of accounting. Supporting the view that accounting scholars need and should make an effort to engage with other scholars inside and outside accounting, various aspects are considered as enhancing the interdisciplinarity of accounting history research. Then issues such as researchers and the community, research problems, theories, methods and data are addressed. The opportunities arising from interdisciplinary interactions with a wide range of scholars are then developed. Finally, the potential obstacles are addressed. This obstacles can be overcome by the development of robust communication and the invention of a new genre of discourse and research focus and by working with those outside our discipline and embracing the challenge of the new and the different.

Accounting and entertainment: An introduction

“…Yet the boundaries are often where accounting is at its most interesting (Miller, 1998). This is a stance readily supported by accounting historians who recognise the importance of pushing the boundaries of our discipline (Fowler and Keeper, 2016) and of furthering its interdisciplinary agenda (Baskerville et al, 2017). Indeed, accounting history is inherently interdisciplinary (Carnegie and Napier, 2012) and therefore easily operates across a broad domain of intellectual curiosity.…”

Balzac: An Artist and an Entrepreneur

“…As widely known, interdisciplinarity has enhanced the growth of accounting history research; this is particularly accentuated by the growing call for studying accounting as a social practice. Within accounting history research, new research topics, research approaches, and the use of different theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches drawn from other disciplines, have increased the potentialities and dimensions of the investigations undertaken (Baskerville, 2017).…”

Accounting and governance in diverse settings – an introduction

“…We do agree that this dimension provides research opportunities that are rarely covered by traditional accounting research, which is sometimes functionalist in nature (Lai and Samkin, 2017: 268). Instead, by drawing on theoretical underpinnings of other disciplines, accounting historians can contribute to offer new findings or new interpretations to modern phenomena grounded on experiences of the past (Baskerville et al, 2017). Research in accounting and governance in the past may enlarge the already prolific stream of studies informed on the ‘accounting and power’ framework (Foucault, 1991), but may expand further.…”