Miles Jackson wrote:
>
>>But you're not really "working for nothing" when you publish an academic
>>book; you're building your credentials, improving your likelihood of
>>receiving grants and fellowships, fulfilling tenure or posttenure
>>requirements. Granted, you get little or no direct money for publishing
>>books, but that's not the point. Academe is a quaint "gift-giving"
>>culture, where your prestige and access to resources are determined by
>>your generous donation of academic goodies to your community. It has
>>always fascinated me how this profoundly non-capitalist culture thrives
>>in our capitalist society.
>>
All the things you mention are not automatically granted when you
publish a book. Publishing just allows you to enter the race.
As for the "community." I really, really wish that people would stop using this word as a synonym for "profession" or "special interest group." The whole point of "community" is that it is a group of heterogeneous people hold something in common -- possibly something as evanescent as the desire to come together to offer mutual support. It has been hijacked to mean "any group of people that serves my self interest." Ugh.
Joanna
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