@BSCPG1 Publishing dilemma musing 1/10...last week I had a paper accepted by the Journal of Aesthetic Education (JAE) and was delighted. Partly because it’s my favourite philosophy journal and partly because I wasn’t sure if the paper would ever be published.
2/10 But we work in a regime where all publications are ‘outputs’, where the value of those outputs is qualified and quantified and where the quantification determines our career and promotion prospects. So, now that the initial excitement of acceptance has worn off...
3/10 I wrote the paper as part of a pilot study for my next project, but realised it wouldn't have a place in that project shortly after it was finished. This is not necessarily a problem, but it does mean that that I’m not likely to pursue those ideas in the future.
4/10 As a ‘standalone’, one of the easiest measures by which to judge this output in REF is the impact factor of the JAE. Although it has a good international reputation, its IF is 0.20 and h-index 16, i.e. very low. Meaning the paper is unlikely to be submitted to REF2028.
5/10 According to the metrics, the output is worthless. Not just worthless, but harmful to my career because the months I spent researching and writing it could have been spent on another output. We work in an incredibly competitive field where we can't afford to 'waste' time.
6/10 Were I a postgrad or postdoc, researching this output could have ended my career because it will put me at a disadvantage against other candidates for permanent jobs. But I'm lucky (and it is luck) enough to have one of those already so does it matter?
7/10 Yes, because it's still time 'wasted' according to REF and that time will probably put me at a disadvantage in promotion competition or if I try to climb the career ladder by moving institutions.
8/10 I'm not suggesting that 'navel-gazing' should be encouraged, but that hegemonic quantification has made publishing even harder because it should be restricted to journals with 'sufficient' IFs when we don't have a reliable measure of what 'sufficient' will be in 7 years.
9/10 We need to: select an interesting subject, discover something original to say about it, survive peer-review (which has problems of its own), and then foresee future impact factors. If we don't do all of this, we are probably disadvantaging ourselves.
10/10 It's really important that PGs and ECRs understand the extra hurdle quantification introduces because they have the most to lose. Personally, I'm still delighted to be back in the JAE and to have an article titled 'The Complex Art of Murder' in press! #academia #phdlife
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
