Addendum to a previous post: A Happy Ending
So, in my next-to-last post, I related the rather mind-boggling incident of a young-ish academic who, submitting a review to me, had plagiarized my own review on that same book. Well, I'm happy to report that this situation will apparently have a happy ending. After a few sternly worded e-mails, it looks like the reviewer in question will work diligently to produce a new, better review. I won't know for sure until it's actually submitted, but I'm hopeful.
As I mentioned in my earlier post, this was a teachable moment-- that's always my gut reaction in these kinds of cases, whether I'm dealing with undergraduate freshmen or more advanced academics. Sure, it astounded me that a doctoral student could believe I wouldn't notice the plagiarism. But everyone has to learn sometime, and one's first foray into professional academic discourse can be intimating. And while I'm more than willing to use my meager institutional authority strategically to employ guilt, shame, and chagrin as motivations, you shouldn't ever forget that academia is essentially a cooperative enterprise. Peer review, for example, might oftentimes feel brutal, but both the reviewer and the author ultimately want the same thing: a strong, published article.
What I find despicable, though, are those allegedly "old-school" academics who believe that academic life is fundamentally agonistic. I had one of those on my dissertation committee -- the only Tolkienist in the department, but I refused to invite him on my committee until a last-minute dropout forced my hand. In a way, it was nice that he hopped on board so late in the process -- and, initially, I felt the appropriate gratitude. Still, his commentary on my dissertation was so nasty, loathing anything beyond this guy's narrow and obsolete views on literary criticism, that my feeling of gratitude quickly dried up. What if, instead of a mid-30s white male confident in my own abilities and skills, I had been a more insecure or fragile graduate school? I've had friends leave grad school entirely because of such people, and there's actually a heavily gendered component to such abuse.***
Anyway, as I said, looks like this particular reviewer will pull through. I'm glad of that.
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***At Ohio State, there were two sections of Intro to Critical theory that all incoming graduate students had to take. I had the good fortune to take my class with Dr. David Herman, one of the nicest people I've ever encountered , but the other section was led by a professor who clearly relished bullying students. On the first day of class, I later learned, he put examples of grad student writing on the board and then -- in front of everyone -- proceeded to mock the sentences he considered incompetent.
As I mentioned in my earlier post, this was a teachable moment-- that's always my gut reaction in these kinds of cases, whether I'm dealing with undergraduate freshmen or more advanced academics. Sure, it astounded me that a doctoral student could believe I wouldn't notice the plagiarism. But everyone has to learn sometime, and one's first foray into professional academic discourse can be intimating. And while I'm more than willing to use my meager institutional authority strategically to employ guilt, shame, and chagrin as motivations, you shouldn't ever forget that academia is essentially a cooperative enterprise. Peer review, for example, might oftentimes feel brutal, but both the reviewer and the author ultimately want the same thing: a strong, published article.
What I find despicable, though, are those allegedly "old-school" academics who believe that academic life is fundamentally agonistic. I had one of those on my dissertation committee -- the only Tolkienist in the department, but I refused to invite him on my committee until a last-minute dropout forced my hand. In a way, it was nice that he hopped on board so late in the process -- and, initially, I felt the appropriate gratitude. Still, his commentary on my dissertation was so nasty, loathing anything beyond this guy's narrow and obsolete views on literary criticism, that my feeling of gratitude quickly dried up. What if, instead of a mid-30s white male confident in my own abilities and skills, I had been a more insecure or fragile graduate school? I've had friends leave grad school entirely because of such people, and there's actually a heavily gendered component to such abuse.***
Anyway, as I said, looks like this particular reviewer will pull through. I'm glad of that.
----------------------
***At Ohio State, there were two sections of Intro to Critical theory that all incoming graduate students had to take. I had the good fortune to take my class with Dr. David Herman, one of the nicest people I've ever encountered , but the other section was led by a professor who clearly relished bullying students. On the first day of class, I later learned, he put examples of grad student writing on the board and then -- in front of everyone -- proceeded to mock the sentences he considered incompetent.
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