Mapping interdisciplinary knowledge structures through bibliometric triangulation: a case study of cinema–architecture scholarship (1975–2025)

Purpose This study develops a triangulated bibliometric workflow to examine how interdisciplinary knowledge structures form and stabilize. Using cinema–architecture scholarship as a hybrid case, it investigates the relationships among research fronts, conceptual vocabularies and intellectual traditions. Design/methodology/approach A Scopus dataset of 641 documents (1975–2025) was analyzed through bibliographic coupling, co-word and co-citation techniques to map production, discourse, and recognition layers. Clustering and visualization were conducted in VOSviewer, with supplementary analysis in NetworkX. Cross-method triangulation was complemented by overlay visualization and cluster-level temporal profiling to assess alignment across epistemic layers. Findings The domain exhibits a layered and only partially aligned knowledge structure characterized by temporal differentiation. Active research fronts concentrate post-2010, vocabularies show selective post-2015 renewal and co-citation clusters remain anchored in late-twentieth-century theory. Consolidation occurs in limited zones of convergence stabilizing aesthetic, historiographic and narrative concerns, while adjacent clusters act as epistemic bridges linking design, media, perception, and cultural theory. From an information-science perspective, the domain operates as a recombinatory configuration shaped by temporally stratified reuse of recorded knowledge rather than linear accumulation. Research limitations/implications Findings reflect Scopus coverage and threshold choices that may underrepresent non-English or emergent work. Future research should incorporate multi-database integration and longitudinal sensitivity testing. The study identifies patterns of consolidation, acceleration and blind spots in interdisciplinary knowledge organisation. Originality/value The study contributes to information science by operationalizing triangulated mapping as a transferable framework for analyzing interdisciplinary fields. Empirically, it offers the first systematic knowledge map of cinema–architecture scholarship, illustrating how partial alignment, temporal asymmetry and recombinatory stabilization structure hybrid domains.