It's clear that however much we may find it distasteful (to underplay it
rather) there is still a clear need (particularly for less senior staff)
to play the publishing game in 'stellar' journals. That said there are
many opportunities to also publish elsewhere, improve the standing of
open access journals, confront the basic and blatant self-exploitation
that much traditional academic publishing entails, and try and do things
differently. In simple terms this requires a will to do so, a fair
degree of cunning, and a fair dollop of strategy (to create the time and
space to do so). Darrell's message in many of these respects was
heartening. I wonder how, if the Times Higher is to be believed, a
shift to analysis of citations as a basis for the 'next RAE' rather than
other metric measures might impact on the need for greater open sourced
access?
Beyond that of course, there's also the argument that we should stop
writing and get out and do something more interesting instead...
-----Original Message-----
From: A forum for critical and radical geographers
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of D'Arcus, Bruce Dr.
Sent: 12 November 2007 23:55
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Paying for academic journals
Darrell Fuhriman wrote:
...
> I'm not sure what the blocks are behind this - one thing that I
suspect
> is that unfamiliarity with technology may play a role. But that was an
> excuse when it was only technology-comfortable physics, mathematics,
and
> computer science journals making the transition, but honestly the
time
> for that excuse has expired.
True.
> Maybe it's the fear of (lack of) tenure,
> but at the end of the day, I think that's a pretty sorry excuse, given
> the way the rest of academia is clearly moving.
Here's where we part company a bit.
Fear of being denied promotion and tenure is hardly a "pretty sorry
excuse." That disciplinary mechanism is responsible for a whole lot of
dysfunctions in academia. WRT to publications, it's quite common that
Dean's and such look at journal impact ratings. It's a rather large leap
of faith to publish in the absence of those "objective" measures of
"high quality publishing outlets" and you can't leave it to individual
junior faculty to negotiate this.
Any move to open publishing has to address this issue head on, rather
than dismiss it. It's a BIG issue.
Just as a simple example, I have the technical expertise to have
published my book without the help of Routledge. To have done so, I
think, would have been career suicide.
...
Bruce
--
This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous
content by the NorMAN MailScanner Service and is believed
to be clean.
The NorMAN MailScanner Service is operated by Information
Systems and Services, Newcastle University.
|