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[looby]

I didn't want to hijack the most recent thread, but was hugely interested by SeniorScholar's sense, articulated there, that UK Ph.Ds had become un-hirable at her institution because they have "published too much junk, even by the time they defend; and I think it's related to the number of low quality book chapters and conference proceedings and special issues of journals -- all of which seem (from the timing) to be a consequence of the REF (or whatever it's called at present) washing down to the grad student level."

My question is, what counts as good publication in the U.K.? I'm greatly interested in this issue partly because I did my own Ph.D. in England many years ago (at a time when publication standards were never actually articulated), but mainly because I would like to know how my own grad students (elite private R1 in the US) could make themselves contenders for UK jobs. I'm in the Humanities, if that makes a difference.

With thanks!

[the_walrus]

In my field in the UK, what counts as good/bad is the same as what counts as good/bad anywhere.  The gold standard (social science field) is peer reviewed articles in prestigious journals.  I must admit that I have certainly noticed that people in the UK, I do believe forced by the REF, publish lots of crap books (bad publisher/bad content) and papers in edited volumes.  Everybody knows these are junk, and this includes the REF panels, who, best I can tell, do not judge such things favorably. 

[qrypt]

Junk vs. good is in the eye of the beholder.  The_walrus is right about book chapters.  But peer review of articles is no guarantee.  An awful lot of what comes out in British sociology journals is junk -- in this beholder's eye.  Interview twelve and a half people, write an article with a methods section that bashes positivism and an empirical section that features half a dozen extended quotes -- presto, you've got yourself an article in Sociological Review. 

The thing is, for many people this is what counts as good work here.  My perspective on the quality of such work is very much a minority perspective.  (That perspective, by the way, does not rest on dismissal of qualitative work; it is of course possible to do good qualitative work.) 

Looby, what this means is that your question is very field-specific and culture-dependent.  You might get good information only if you identify your field more specifically (and then only from people in that field).  Even then, it's probably a matter of getting to know the British version of your field in greater depth than you'll get here. 

[the_walrus]

Yes, probably you are right that it is field specific. 

As for peer-reviewed journal publication, I didn't mean in just any journal, but rather internationally recognized ones---the kinds that that the ESF journal judging exercise judged as A (not being any where near sociology, I don't know whether Sociological Review falls into that category or not). 

That said, I certainly agree that publication in such a journal is no guarantee that the work is any good.  There is certainly plenty of work that appears in the flagship journal of my discipline that I really think is no good at all.  But if the question is what counts as good publication here, then the answer for my field anyway is no different from what it is in the US.

[sandgrounder]

I'd agree that what is good in the US is usually good in the UK for my social science field, except that there's some variation in the journal rankings simply because one particular sub-field in the US is so dominant atm (and of minimal interest to anyone outside the US), that it monopolises the 'top' US journals and even top-ranking US scholars in other sub-fields have to publish elsewhere.
The two publications issues / problems from US-based job candidates that we do see though are:
1) early career scholars whose entire output is based on their supervisor's work - they show no sign of any independent research agenda. This seems to be happening more and more - not sure why but an American colleague suggested that more and more PhDs awarded in the US in my field are quant analyses of existing datasets often (partially or wholly) collected by their supervisors, and that the trend away from independent data collection is perhaps leaving the students in a less favourable place to start a independent research career post-PhD, and so they are more reliant on their supervisors. This isn't just a UK gripe but one I've heard from colleagues elsewhere in the world too.
2) Mid-career applicants not understanding that if you do not have your 4 REF articles then you have no chance. We see a lot of applications from Europeans / UK applicants based in the US with tenure and wanting to come home, but their cv shows they did just enough for tenure and have published very little since but assume that the earlier good publications will carry them through.

[runwithscissors]

In response to some of the comments. Book chapters and conference proceedings aren't REF-able, unless you absolutely have nothing else to submit. None of the Russell Group will hire lecturers (let alone Senior or above) without 4 solid peer reviewed articles.

As for books, I just finished a monograph which is coming out with Routledge - there was no pressure for me to publish with a university press here in the UK, they are (according to my immediate superiors) all considered much the same. A book counts for 2 articles, essentially.

I think the divide between the US obsession with University presses, and the UK indifference to university presses is reflective of a lack of available publshing outlets to UK scholars. The smaller US UPs don't make it to conferences outside of the States so don't aquire that many manuscripts, a lot therefore end up only really publishing US-based scholarship. The bigger UPs are also rarely considered preferable to Oxford and Cambridge (from the perspective of UK universities), so if you can't crack the big two you aren't left with a lot of options... other than Routledge, Ashgate, Springer etc...

What does everyone else think?

[bwwm1]

A book counts for 2 articles, essentially.

Wow. A book is so much more work than two articles. Why would anyone produce books if this is the case?

I think the divide between the US obsession with University presses, and the UK indifference to university presses is reflective of a lack of available publshing outlets to UK scholars. The smaller US UPs don't make it to conferences outside of the States so don't aquire that many manuscripts, a lot therefore end up only really publishing US-based scholarship. The bigger UPs are also rarely considered preferable to Oxford and Cambridge (from the perspective of UK universities), so if you can't crack the big two you aren't left with a lot of options... other than Routledge, Ashgate, Springer etc...

What does everyone else think?

So it's indifferent in the UK whether you publish with Yale or Ashgate? Some of the big US presses have operations, including promotions, in the UK. They often have much lower prices than non UP. In addition, in my sub-fields of history Oxbridge do not have a specific presence at the conferences (many held outside the US) while the American UPs which specialize in these fields do. European scholars regularly publish with them.

[mingus]

This might be true in your field, but in general it is nonsense that not be promoted here.  In certain fields (e.g. computing and certain engineering), the speed of progress means that even major work first appears in conference proceedings (refereed), and these are very REF-able.  Take a look at the past RAE submissions in said fields, and you will find papers from conference-proceedings all over the place, including all the RG universities.  Yes, Oxbridge too.

As a guide, basic requirements for an academic: (a) use your head and don't assume that what its true in your field is true elsewhere; (b) check the the facts before making "mighty" announcement.  

In response to some of the comments. Book chapters and conference proceedings aren't REF-able, unless you absolutely have nothing else to submit. None of the Russell Group will hire lecturers (let alone Senior or above) without 4 solid peer reviewed articles.

As for books, I just finished a monograph which is coming out with Routledge - there was no pressure for me to publish with a university press here in the UK, they are (according to my immediate superiors) all considered much the same. A book counts for 2 articles, essentially.

I think the divide between the US obsession with University presses, and the UK indifference to university presses is reflective of a lack of available publshing outlets to UK scholars. The smaller US UPs don't make it to conferences outside of the States so don't aquire that many manuscripts, a lot therefore end up only really publishing US-based scholarship. The bigger UPs are also rarely considered preferable to Oxford and Cambridge (from the perspective of UK universities), so if you can't crack the big two you aren't left with a lot of options... other than Routledge, Ashgate, Springer etc...

What does everyone else think?

[the_walrus]

A book counts for 2 articles, essentially.

Wow. A book is so much more work than two articles. Why would anyone produce books if this is the case?

While I'm sure this varies from field to field, in mine, at least, books, even at the most prestigious presses (OUP and CUP) are reviewed only by a single reviewer.  As a consequence, people can put all kinds of stupid stuff and vagueness into them that they'd never get into even second tier journals (all of which have at least 2, if not 3, and sometimes even 4 reviewers per paper).  They just don't require the level of formal detail required of a good journal article.  So, personally, my feeling is that counting most books as 2 is probably even too generous.  Of course, I guess the downside is that when they're bad, they count doubly. 

[bwwm1]

A book counts for 2 articles, essentially.

Wow. A book is so much more work than two articles. Why would anyone produce books if this is the case?

While I'm sure this varies from field to field, in mine, at least, books, even at the most prestigious presses (OUP and CUP) are reviewed only by a single reviewer.  As a consequence, people can put all kinds of stupid stuff and vagueness into them that they'd never get into even second tier journals (all of which have at least 2, if not 3, and sometimes even 4 reviewers per paper).  They just don't require the level of formal detail required of a good journal article.  So, personally, my feeling is that counting most books as 2 is probably even too generous.  Of course, I guess the downside is that when they're bad, they count doubly. 

In my field books from top presses have three reviewers, are widely cited, and are usually more influential than articles in the term at least.

[hphphp]

What I find somewhat baffling is the strong emphasis in (some?) arts and humanities fields for single authored publications. I presume this is down to historic perception of the work of a scholar in those fields. But this is very counter productive and inhibits good research in those areas. I'm hoping that this attitude will gradually fade.

[runwithscissors]

This might be true in your field, but in general it is nonsense that not be promoted here.  In certain fields (e.g. computing and certain engineering), the speed of progress means that even major work first appears in conference proceedings (refereed), and these are very REF-able.  Take a look at the past RAE submissions in said fields, and you will find papers from conference-proceedings all over the place, including all the RG universities.  Yes, Oxbridge too.

As a guide, basic requirements for an academic: (a) use your head and don't assume that what its true in your field is true elsewhere; (b) check the the facts before making "mighty" announcement. 

I am flattered that you would consider my announcement to be mighty. Of course in electronic engineering IEEE proceedings are fab and in CS there are practically no journals: but in practically every other discipline (you know, 98% of academia) it would be foolhardy to pin your hopes of a 4* submission on proceedings and chapters.

[totoro]

A book counts for 2 articles, essentially.

Wow. A book is so much more work than two articles. Why would anyone produce books if this is the case?

A book counts for 3 articles in Australia and a book chapter or refereed conference proceeding for 1/2.

[totoro]

What I find somewhat baffling is the strong emphasis in (some?) arts and humanities fields for single authored publications. I presume this is down to historic perception of the work of a scholar in those fields. But this is very counter productive and inhibits good research in those areas. I'm hoping that this attitude will gradually fade.

Yes, even in economics about half of all articles have multiple authors. I was told explicitly to make sure I had enough single author articles to be evaluated for tenure as there is a lot of suspicion about relative contributions on multiple author articles. I suspect that in my field having two authors is good as they can criticize each other's work. Papers with a lot of authors tend not to be so good. Single author ones can be good. It depends...

[mingus]

This might be true in your field, but in general it is nonsense that not be promoted here.  In certain fields (e.g. computing and certain engineering), the speed of progress means that even major work first appears in conference proceedings (refereed), and these are very REF-able.  Take a look at the past RAE submissions in said fields, and you will find papers from conference-proceedings all over the place, including all the RG universities.  Yes, Oxbridge too.

As a guide, basic requirements for an academic: (a) use your head and don't assume that what its true in your field is true elsewhere; (b) check the the facts before making "mighty" announcement.  

I am flattered that you would consider my announcement to be mighty. Of course in electronic engineering IEEE proceedings are fab and in CS there are practically no journals: but in practically every other discipline (you know, 98% of academia) it would be foolhardy to pin your hopes of a 4* submission on proceedings and chapters.

Note: "mighty".  Quotation marks.

What is it with you and stupid statements?  Is it  that you are not very bright, or are you just too lazy to do your homework?  As matter of fact there are hundreds of CS journals.  

I assume your 98% comes from the same source as your other "facts".