How does beta work for academic papers? Klytaimnestra 2002

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Disclaimer: Thanks to Joss and ME, who are as gods, for letting us play in their universe ...

I was trying to explain academic research to a friend who writes short stories and has friends of hers critique them ("beta" them is the term they use) before publication. She wondered how "betaing" worked for academics. Here's my response.

I've skipped the initial part where one avoids writing the paper until 2 a.m. the night before, etc etc.

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Beta for academic papers is,

a) you give the paper at a departmental seminar, as flies buzz in and out of the open mouths of your slumbering colleagues.

b) you give the paper at a conference. See a) for result, except that one question will be asked by the person who is giving the paper after yours and is hoping to model the behaviour he/she wishes to see after his/her own paper. The question will have nothing to do with your paper but will gallantly acknowledge, at least, what author you were discussing. If, for example, you are giving a paper on Sophocles' Ajax, the question will be on the Oedipus Rex. The audience will briefly come alive at this point since everyone has read the Oedipus Rex and has an opinion on it. There will be a lively, short discussion of the Oedipus Rex. Everyone will feel that they have acquitted themselves well and will feel pleased and satisfied. Even you, since the discussion may not have been about your paper, but at least most of the audience was awake.

c) You send the conference paper to a couple of friends for comments. or, you write it up complete with footnotes (which the conference paper didn't have). you send it to a couple of friends for comments. They never, ever, ever get back to you, because it's actually asking a lot of someone to plod through 30 pages of academic prose when they're trying to get their own work done at the same time.

d) you write it up with footnotes and send it off to a journal.

e) wait six months.

f) email the editor to see if it's gotten lost somewhere.

g) wait another 3-4 months. Or 5 or 6. Or up to two years, actually.

h) rejection arrives at last, with 1 or 2 referee's reports.

Referee A was reading a paper that existed only in his own head and has only the most casual association with what you sent in, but is full of negative commentary on your intelligence, attitude, scholarship, knowledge of the field, ability to write a coherent English sentence or get from point A to point B without a map and a set of protractors, which apparently you didn't have when you wrote this piece of egregious fish-wrap. You can fairly assume that referee A is working on a paper that says much what yours did, and doesn't want any competition. You throw out referee A's comments (in fact, in a childish moment it is possible that you rip them into tiny pieces and flush them down the departmental toilet, and then have to look innocent when the plumbers have to be called three days later because there's water all over the floor). It's no use, though, since of course the comments remain seared in your memory for the rest of your life in any case.

Referee B, at last, may actually engage with your paper, and point out 2 or 3 minor weak points in it that would benefit by being fixed up. Yahoo! Someone actually paid attention to your work! You can easily fix up these points. Referee B, even better, recommends that the paper be published.

Oh, but see the editor's letter. "As you can see, you have two negative reports. Clearly your paper sucks and you haven't the brains God gave a goose. You are a disgrace to the world of academe. Resign your position now, in the unlikely event that you've got one, and let a halfway-competent person have the job. We are writing to everyone we know to warn them against hiring anyone with a degree from the institution foolish enough to give you yours."

Okay, that's the subtext. The text is, "As you can see, you have two negative reports. Don't bother to resubmit this dog."

Oops, I've slid into subtext again. Whatever. What you can REALLY see from the editor's letter is that they don't read their correspondence, since you did not have two negative reports. Or referee A is a major name and referee B is not. Or, actually, that the editor didn't like your paper either and has some he/she likes better and would rather publish, which is fair enough, though one wishes they would be honest about it.

i) spend a year or so so scarred by the experience that you don't send the paper out again, or, in fact, anything else. Meanwhile your tenure clock is ticking and the panic levels are rising precipitously.

j) fix the 2 or 3 minor points mentioned by referee B, and resubmit the paper to another journal.

k) wait a year or so for a response. Etc.

I hope this makes the life of the academic clear? In the meantime, of course, there is teaching, which takes up most of one's time, is a lot of fun and saves many people's sanity, or mine, at least.