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Post by unreal on Oct 24, 2011 8:50:40 GMT -5
Look, I know we all have our own rankings and whatnot, but the idea that journals like JHSB or Demography are in the same tier as SF or SP is utterly naive and hilarious. The latter two are generalist journals that research-oriented sociologists are expected to pay attention to. The former are specialist journals read by a small fraction of researchers. It really isn't that difficult to rank journals in a way that doesn't reflect your own research areas...
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Post by notBS on Oct 24, 2011 9:08:34 GMT -5
Obviously that wasn't meant as a rigid rubric...
But, I would guess that the readership of Demography (even within sociology) far surpasses the readership of Soc Problems (and maybe even Social Forces). And, while you're right that JHSB is a speciality journal with a fairly narrow focus, the quality of the work published there, the citation counts of the papers, and the acceptance rate of submissions all place it in the near top-tier. There are probably other journals that fit in this category that I'm not (yet) aware of (Gender and Society?).
Oh, and I would not call myself a demographer nor do I do any research related to health. But apparently I am naive.
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Post by info on Oct 24, 2011 9:14:19 GMT -5
Handout at meeting for picking finalists for a TT position @ R1 had:
Name Area of speciality University affiliation status, ABD, postdoc, year of grad if not ABD # of pubs and where Funding received or funding apps under review, awards received.
That's it. Nothing else.
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Post by drbearjew on Oct 24, 2011 9:17:43 GMT -5
You know, this advice sounds really fishy. How could it be the case that someone who had a sole-authored ASR on their gender studies work would be viewed less favorably than someone who had put a similar type of paper into a subfield journal? Now if you're comparing coauthored top journal vs. single authored subfield journal, yes, I can see that decision going the other way, but if you're seeing candidates with two sole authored papers? Is your school a place where you pick "second tier stars" because you're worried that people who can get articles in top journals will soon leave? I'm not dishing advice. Just stating what happens at institutions, and what types of conversations take place behind closed doors. A "sub-field" journal is really not an accurate descriptor for what a specialty journal is. It is a journal where scholars of similar research interests publish and share their work. These scholars often come from a variety of disciplines outside of sociology, and the types of work published speak to the interdisciplinary nature of these journals. If you do Sociology of the Body, for instance, then you know your theoretical and methodological enterprise owes a great deal of debt to developments in cultural studies, cognitive neurosciences, and even cultural geography. You send work on the body to journals like Body and Society, Critical Inquiry, and Theory Culture and Society because the reviewers at these journals are much more familiar with the developments in this area than those at a generalist sociological journal. Not all, but quite a few search committees do want to look at applicants who can extend the conversation of their work beyond the generalist dialogue that takes place in ASR/AJS/SF/TSQ etc.
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Post by anumber on Oct 24, 2011 9:36:22 GMT -5
0: The % likelihood that everyone who posts on here and claims to have 4 ASR/AJSs actually does.
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Post by drbearjew on Oct 24, 2011 9:44:55 GMT -5
0: The % likelihood that everyone who posts on here and claims to have 4 ASR/AJSs actually does. Agreed
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rrr
Full Member
Posts: 113
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Post by rrr on Oct 24, 2011 9:48:29 GMT -5
I take this point, however I would hazard that your advice depends on if this is an interdisciplinary department search (e.g. criminology, health policy, maybe even combined soc/anthro, etc.) or a mainline sociology department. Your advice makes perfect sense in an interdisciplinary department, but not in a mainline department, if you see what I am saying.
In short, we're both right.
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Post by numbahs on Oct 24, 2011 10:08:20 GMT -5
As an aside, and to get this back to numbers, it is important to realize that the reputation of a publication is not the same as its current visibility or quality. Even if a top publication started publishing crap year after year, it would be a while before their status would suffer. Case in point, here's the impact factor rankings for journals in sociology:
AM SOCIOL REV ANNU REV SOCIOL AM J SOCIOL GENDER SOC INT POLIT SOCIOL SOCIOL METHOD RES SOCIOL RURALIS ANN TOURISM RES HUM ECOL LANG SOC BRIT J SOCIOL SOCIOL HEALTH ILL J MARRIAGE FAM SOC NETWORKS ECON SOC J CONSUM CULT SOC PROBL SOCIOL THEOR SOC SCI RES LAW SOC REV POPUL DEV REV SOCIOLOGY INT J COMP SOCIOL THEOR SOC POETICS J SCI STUD RELIG SOCIOL EDUC SOC FORCES POLIT SOC ETHNIC RACIAL STUD QUAL RES SOCIOL FORUM SOC NATUR RESOUR WORK EMPLOY SOC BODY SOC RATION SOC YOUTH SOC AGR HUM VALUES INT J INTERCULT REL SOC JUSTICE RES
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Post by idealist on Oct 24, 2011 10:28:21 GMT -5
Handout at meeting for picking finalists for a TT position @ R1 had: Name Area of speciality University affiliation status, ABD, postdoc, year of grad if not ABD # of pubs and where Funding received or funding apps under review, awards received. That's it. Nothing else. Not even the titles of publications? Call me an idealist, but I want the content of my ideas to be valued. This process encourages a "least publishable unit" mentality over creative thinking and risk-taking.
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anon
New Member
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Post by anon on Oct 24, 2011 10:42:19 GMT -5
welcome to academia
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Post by Been Around on Oct 24, 2011 10:47:04 GMT -5
I'm sure they talked about the content of the candidates ideas at the meeting. If they didn't then you probably wouldn't want a job there!
I use the "would I want to teach this in my graduate seminar on x (x being that person's main subfield)" question. If the answer is no, then I wouldn't hire them, nor interview them, in my R1 department. Generally, only ASR/AJS articles and books from the top 5 presses (How is it that no one has mentioned books here people?) make that cut.
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Post by Boring on Oct 24, 2011 10:50:59 GMT -5
Am I the only one who thinks that ARS and, especially, AJS, are the most boring journals EVER? Have you ever tried to read one issue? It's really a pain.
I simply don't see the point of the current fixation with holding them as the Gold Standard for intellectual production.
Besides being boring, they are not that generalist at all, only a very specific range of topics and discussions are included (and this has to do with intellectual relevance as well as with networks).
The (interesting) conversations are very often taking place elsewhere.
But anyway, that's how SCs make the cut, hence reproducing and legitimating certain topics, styles of thought (and also ways of writing).
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Post by rogerdodger on Oct 24, 2011 10:58:42 GMT -5
This thread has gotten silly.
On journal impact factor rankings: the kind of inter-sub-disciplinary comparisons as above are not productive, both for technical and substantive reasons.
Technically: it is not valid to compare impact factors across subdisciplines in the field, because citation patterns vary across sub-disciplines. Thus a journal may have an artificially high impact factor because it's from a subfield with many more citations-per-article than in other subdisciplines.
Substantively: "top" journals are defined by reputation and the hierarchy is remarkably stable. AJS/ASR because they're prestige generalist journals, followed by Social Forces, Gender & Society, and Social Problems. At least that's the hierarchy at my high-R1.
More generally, the entire question of "how many is enough" is flawed. I agree with some above posters: whether you get a fly-out (to say nothing of hired) is a function of the "fit" (read: local politics) with a department and the reputation of your program, work, and intellectual network. To ask whether raw publications can overcome those more salient (by profoundly obscure) factors is to submit to a myth of agency in a process that's almost completely (at the point of application and evaluation) un-agentic for the candidates themselves.
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Post by What about books on Oct 24, 2011 11:47:15 GMT -5
I just want to reiterate what is being said above. Why aren't we talking at all about books? How are contracts with top university presses weighed with top journal publications? As another poster said, some kinds of work will just never get included in the conversation at AJS, ASR and the like; in these cases a book may be more achievable.
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Post by Been Around on Oct 24, 2011 11:59:38 GMT -5
Some types of research definitely fit book publishing better than others (Qualitative, particularly ethnographic and historical). And, sometimes, a (sole-authored) book contract at one of the most prestigious presses (Chicago, CA, Princeton, Harvard, Cambridge) is enough to get an interview.
However, most of the top 20 R1s are in agreement now that a book, even an award-winning incredible book published by one of those presses, is not enough to get tenure (or would be a more difficult case to make). Thus, they ALSO want to see evidence that you'll be a sucessful article writer as well. I think this is partly why ASR/AJS articles get SO MUCH play on the market, and seem to get more interest than even a book contract, which in these times is not that easy to get!
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