Baker Academic

Monday, February 10, 2014

When should a young scholar start trying to publish?--Chris Keith

The title of this post is a question that Anthony and I, along with lots and lots and lots of other people, get asked occasionally.  I'd be interested in how others answer it, but my answer is pretty firm.  In general, you shouldn't be aiming for publication until after you've finished writing your PhD dissertation.  The PhD is the single most important piece of writing for 99.9% of young scholars, and all efforts should be put into it.  There will be the occasional exception where someone is able to publish something prior, but those should remain exceptions.  I understand all too well the desire to have some publications on your CV straight out of the gate in order to compete in a historically insane job market.  But, to the best of one's abilities, he or she should resist that pressure and try to focus on the PhD.  Has anyone else given or received helpful advice on this topic?

UPDATE:  In light of some discussion on Facebook, I probably need to clarify my point.  It's not that publishing before the PhD is necessarily bad; it's that trying to publish at the expense of the PhD is.  If someone can publish articles en route, and it doesn't result in them neglecting their doctoral work, that's great and will only help them on the job market.  But those publications should spring from work related to the doctorate.  I think that neglecting one's doctoral work in order to pursue writing unrelated journal articles, etc., is a bad idea.  There's no doubt some regionalism at work here as well, as I did my PhD, and now currently teach, in the British system.  In the US system, seminar papers can often easily lead to publishable articles prior even to commencing doctoral work.

10 comments:

  1. I suppose the real question is what one is actually aiming to publish. I've written a few reviews (including one on Jesus Among Friends and Enemies, although that feels like a long time ago now) as well as a short theological article for a small academic (not peer-reviewed) journal, and it has been a meaningful experience to acquaint me with the publication process. I haven't attempted to publish anything major, which I agree would probably be too much of an undertaking before finishing my PhD, but to a reasonable extent a publication credit is a publication credit, right?

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    1. Joshua, yes I think something like a book review is a great thing to do prior to finishing the PhD or perhaps even undertaking it. My real point is simply that people shouldn't be trying to publish articles and neglecting their dissertations.

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  2. John Barclay from Durham counselled me and others NOT to publish articles before finishing our PhD's ....

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  3. When they have something interesting to say.

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  4. I think that your answer is spot on, Peter. A *good* article is always worth publishing... It will be up to the author to seek out good advice on whether their article is interesting, well-argued, etc... Of course, the trouble is that many arguments that we think are good when we are 25 seem different later in our careers.

    -anthony

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  5. From the publisher's point of view, it is almost impossible to publish an academic book unless you have a teaching position.

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  6. Deciding what is good and worth publishing is the catch though. One has to seek good *and honest* advice, ideally, from several people who are willing to say what can be tough to hear: “Your manuscript is both good and original, but the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good” (Samuel Johnson).

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  7. Peter said it elegantly.
    Also consider writing your graduate course essays well enough and on issues significant enough that you can submit them for publication.

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  8. Check this one out: http://evangelicaltextualcriticism.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/malik-on-corrections-in-sinaiticus.html

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    1. Thanks, Peter, and congratulations to Peter Malik!

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