Faculty of Social and Human Sciences

Faculty of Social and Human Sciences (FCSH/NOVA)
Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas
Type Public
Established 1977
Dean Francisco Caramelo [1]
Administrative staff
 99 [2]
Students 5154 [2]
Undergraduates 2693 [2]
Postgraduates 1583 [2]
878 [2]
Location Lisbon, Portugal
Campus Av. de Berna, center Lisbon
Colours Green and Blue         
Nickname FCSH/NOVA
Website http://www.fcsh.unl.pt

The Portuguese Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas (Faculty of Social and Human Sciences - FCSH) is an organic unit of the Universidade NOVA de Lisboa (NOVA) and a legal person under public law, endowed with scientific, pedagogical, administrative and financial autonomy, whose public service mission is to qualify citizens at the highest level. According to its statutes, “the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences of NOVA University of Lisbon is an institution dedicated to education, scientific research and cultural creation".[3] The Faculty's own identity stems from the coexistence of social sciences with humanities, allowing an unusual interdisciplinarity in the Portuguese higher education panorama.

Since May 2011, the FCSH/NOVA is present on several digital platforms, namely Facebook, Twitter , LinkedIn and an official blog.

General description

The FCSH main building is inspired by the image of an open book

FCSH/NOVA was established in January 1977 by Decree-Law No. 464/77, following the development of the area of Human and Social Sciences that existed at NOVA at the time, led by a group of faculty members and researchers, namely J. S. da Silva Dias, Leonor Buescu, João Morais Barbosa, Artur Nobre de Gusmão, Fernando Gil, Augusto Mesquitela Lima, A.H. de Oliveira Marques, José Augusto França, Vitorino Magalhães Godinho, José Mattoso, Raquel Soeiro de Brito, Teolinda Gersão, Leonor Machado de Sousa, Yvete Kace Centeno and Teresa Rita Lopes. The Faculty began its activity on 2 January 1978.

The FCSH is located at Av. Berna, in the centre of Lisbon, next to the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, and enjoys excellent access to public transport. Based on a barracks that belonged to the military, the Faculty’s facilities are divided into B1 and B2 buildings (classrooms and departments), Tower A (classrooms and head office of the Languages Institute of the Universidade NOVA de Lisboa - ILNOVA]), Tower B (departments, and the Mário Sottomayor Cardia Library), boards of management, administrative services, cafeteria, Students Association and, since 2009, the ID building (Research and PhD degrees). This building, known as the former DRM (Military District Recruitment), has recently undergone a major change in order to be adapted to the new objectives it has been assigned. The core of the administrative support for PhD degrees, the research units associated with FCSH/NOVA and classrooms for the PhD programmes located in the ID building.

In addition to teaching areas (classrooms, lecture halls and auditoriums), the FCSH/NOVA also has various spaces for socialization, a printing centre and a large courtyard. To solve logistical issues created by recent growth, new facilities are scheduled for the FCSH/NOVA in the plans of the Campolide Campus, where other Faculties of the Universidade NOVA de Lisboa (NOVA) are already installed, such as the Faculdade de Economia (FE), the Faculdade de Direito (FD) and the Instituto Superior de Estatística e Gestão de Informação (ISEGI). The Rectory of NOVA and the University residence Alfredo de Sousa are also located in the Campolide Campus.

Faculty Structure

The Faculty Structure, according to the RJIES,[4] has the following bodies:

Composition and election of the Faculty Council

The Faculty Council is a representative University body composed of 13 members: eight faculty members or researchers (Ana Paiva Morais, António José Duque da Silva Marques, João Sàágua, Margarida Acciaiuoli, Maria Helena Trindade Lopes, Maria Regina Salvador, Nuno Severiano Teixeira, Salwa Castelo-Branco), one student (Ana Assunção), and four external personalities ((Francisco Pinto Balsemão, Nazim Ahmad, António Vieira Monteiro e Francisco Seixas da Costa).[5] Faculty members or researchers are elected for four years (with one possible renewal), whereas external individuals, chosen by the elected counsellors in their first meeting, are nominated by the Rector.[6]

The Faculty Council has the power to:[7]

The Dean

The Dean, a position currently held by Francisco Caramelo, is elected for four years and may be renewed only once through an electoral process that begins three months before the mandate expires.[8] The Dean may designate up to four Vice-Deans, positions currently held by Maria José Roxo, Susana Trovão and João Soeiro de Carvalho, and associate deans Cristina Ponte e João Figueira de Sousa.[9]

The Dean is responsible for guiding and coordinating the Faculty services, providing them unity, continuity and effectiveness. Thus, he must represent the Faculty within and outside the institution, ensure compliance with the statutes and regulations, chair the Scientific and Pedagogic Councils (which must implement resolutions), appoint executive coordinators of departments, approve academic calendars, propose the creation or elimination of programmes, coordinate Faculty support services, conduct administrative and financial management, take initiatives for the development of the Faculty, ensure compliance with the resolutions taken by the collegiate bodies, and ensure the quality of teaching and research of the Faculty.

Leaders

Presidents of the FCSH Installation Committee

FCSH’s Deans

Departments

The FCSH/NOVA delegates the operation of its educational offer to its 12 Departments, as well as the support for scientific and technological development and dissemination of culture in the fields taught. The development of this mission is secured by the faculty members associated each Department - tenured and visiting - supported by a secretariat. The coordination of each department is taken up by a Coordinator appointed by the Dean from the tenured faculty members.[10]

Today, FCSH’s Departments are:

Research Centres /
FCT Classification[11]
  • Journalism and Media
    Research Centre (CIMJ)/ Very Good
  • Linguistics Research Centre of UNL
    (CLUNL) / Very Good
  • Music Aesthetic and Sociological Studies
    Research Centre (CESEM) / Very Good
  • Institute for History
    of Art (IHA) / Very Good
  • Ethnomusicology Institute – Music and Dance
    Research Centre (INET-MD) / Excellent
  • Center for English, Translation
    and Anglo-Portuguese Studies (CETAPS) / Good
  • Traditional Literature Research Institute
    (IELT) / Very Good
  • Institute of Philosophy (IFILNOVA) / Excellent
  • Overseas History Centre (CHAM) / Excellent
  • Medieval Research Institute (IEM) / Very Good
  • Modern History Institute (IHC) / Very Good
  • Anthropology Network Research
    Centre (CRIA) / Very Good
  • Interactive Technologies
    Research Centre (CITI)
  • Interdisciplinary Centre of Social Sciences
    (CICS.NOVA)
  • Institute for Archaeology
    and Palaeosciences (IAP)
  • Portuguese Institute
    for International Relations (IPRI)

Research Centres

ID building houses the FCSH research centres

FCSH houses a total of 16 Research Centres, whose primary mission is the development of scientific research in different cultural areas of the social sciences and humanities, the education of researchers and the rendering of services to the community. Research is considered one of the most important assets of the Faculty: research units are a benchmark for quality, in and outside Portugal, hosting more than 500 researchers integrated at the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT/MCTES).

The Faculty is the only higher education institution in the Social Sciences and Humanities field with its own facilities dedicated to research centres and to PhD’s (ID building), strengthening the desired association between research and PhD programmes.

Out of the 16 research centers, 13 were evaluated by international panels of FCT/MCTES - four with an "Excellent" grade and eight with a "Very Good" grade - launching the FCSH to a position of great importance in the national University panorama. Taken together, these centres captured 1.4 million [12] in funding in 2009.

Study Cycles

Today, the FCSH is the second largest unit of NOVA, both in student numbers, and in financial budget. It has more than 300 faculty members, almost all of them holding a PhD degree or with recognized prestige in their scientific area. It also has about 100 staff members. During the academic year 2015/16, the Faculty admitted a total of 4725 students, 2587 undergraduate, 1488 masters and 650 students for doctoral programs.[2]

The FCSH teaching programme for the academic year 2016/2017 includes 14 undergraduate degrees, 46 masters programs and 28 PhD’s, the latter two being exclusively developed during a night schedule.

The study cycle cover the traditionalSocial Sciences and Humanities fields, but also several thematic and interdisciplinary courses. In addition to a Summer School, the FCSH/NOVA also offers specialization degrees, free courses and, since 1997, a programme on Portuguese Language and Culture. This program is structured according to the six proficiency levels of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. It can be intensive (30 hours - 5 times per week), a semester (64 hours two times per week) or taught individually.

Annually, more than 400 students participate in the Mobility Programmes, of which the Erasmus Programme is the best known example. This is one of the examples of the FCSH/NOVA’s internationalization strategy.

The Pedro Hispano Programme

The Pedro Hispano Programme – Doctoral Studies in Social Sciences and Humanities was created in May 2012 to foster excellence, interdisciplinarity and internationalization of all the FCSH/NOVA's doctoral programmes, through a set of joint initiatives:

Mário Sottomayor Cardia Library (BMSC)

Mário Sottomayor Cardia Library

Housed in the main building of the FCSH, it has had the title since 2008, following a private donation of about 70,000 volumes by the family of Professor Mário Sottomayor Cardia, who disappeared in 2006.

Its mission is to provide services and bibliographical, documentary and information resources needed for teaching, research and education in the fields of Social Sciences and Humanities.

The library holds a collection of more than 92,000 monographs, 3,000 periodical titles and over 3000 non-book material units, the BMSC asserts itself as a reference in its fields, by providing teachers, researchers, students and FCSH/NOVA employees as well as any interested reader with monographs, periodicals, academic papers, local access to major national and international digital repositories, and online availability of content resulting from research projects developed by the Research Units based at the FCSH/NOVA.

The BMSC is also a deposit for private donations given by inheritors of former teachers of FCSH: The Leonor Buescu Library (BLB) - 3000 volumes of broad scope, with greater relevance to the area of Linguistics and English Literature; the Luis Krus Library (BLK) - 2200 volumes on Portuguese and European Medieval History, Anthropology and Sociology; the António G. Mattoso Library (BM) - 8500 books of broader scope, with particular importance to the field of History, and the Mário Sottomayor Cardia Library (BMSC) – 70000 volumes, still not fully treated, that deal with issues of a general nature, with a particular emphasis on Philosophy and Political Science.

The BMSC also includes the bibliographic collection of the American Ladies Club (ALC) - 1000 volumes dedicated to Literature, as well as some personal libraries, as in the case of the Dragomir Knapic Library (BK) - 250 works on Geography; the Rodrigues Michaels Library (BRM) - 1400 works dedicated to the History of Literature and the António Rita Ferreira Library (BRF) - 850 books related to Anthropology, African Colonization, Ethno history of Africa and the John Catarino Library (BJC), containing 700 works on Archaeology.

The BMSC has integrated the properties of the departmental libraries of Anthropology, Art History and Musicology thus increasing its collection by an additional 10,000 books and acquiring the bibliographic collection of musicologist Macario Santiago Kastner.

The BMSC provides information distribution services; reference and research; reading at the library; home loan and interlibrary loan.

Undergraduate Programmes

Auditorium 1 at FCSH/NOVA, inside Tower B

Master’s Programmes

PhD Programmes

Postgraduate studies

References

  1. ↑
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 FCSH - Facts and numbers
  3. ↑ Diário da República Portuguesa, series II, No. 128, 4/6/1990
  4. ↑ Article 8, II Chapter of the Despacho Reitoral No. 3849/2009
  5. ↑ Conselho de Faculdade
  6. ↑ Article 9 and 10 of the FCSH Statutes
  7. ↑ Article 10 of the FCSH Statutes
  8. ↑ Article 13 of FCSH Statutes
  9. ↑ Órgãos de Gestão
  10. ↑ Articles 24 and 25 of the Statutes of FCSH
  11. ↑ http://alfa.fct.mctes.pt/apoios/unidades/avaliacoes/2007/resultados
  12. ↑ Speech by Professor João Sàágua, Dean of FCSH at the 32nd anniversary of the Faculty, April 28, 2010

External links

Coordinates: 38°51′03″N 9°10′05″W / 38.85083°N 9.16806°W / 38.85083; -9.16806

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