How Professors Think : Inside the Curious World of Academic Judgment

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Decode the mysterious academic peer review system.

This book is a good fit for any academic who desires to better understand the peer review process. Michele Lamont shines a light on the hidden world of academic judgment, exploring the idiosyncrasies of peer review and what it means for quality. She provides an unmatched insider perspective that is invaluable to any serious and curious student of academia.

How Professors Think : Inside the Curious World of Academic Judgment

Regular price $16.13
Unit price
per
ISBN: 9780674032668
Authors: Michèle Lamont
Date of Publication: 2009-03-31
Format: Hardcover
Related Collections: Philosophy, Sociology, Science
Related Topics: Education, Education
Goodreads rating: 3.63
(rated by 104 readers)

Description

Excellence. Originality. Intelligence. Everyone in academia stresses quality. But what exactly is it, and how do professors identify it? In the academic evaluation system known as “peer review,” highly respected professors pass judgment, usually confidentially, on the work of others. But only those present in the deliberative chambers know exactly what is said. Michèle Lamont observed deliberations for fellowships and research grants, and interviewed panel members at length. In How Professors Think, she reveals what she discovered about this secretive, powerful, peculiar world. Anthropologists, political scientists, literary scholars, economists, historians, and philosophers don’t share the same standards. Economists prefer mathematical models, historians favor different kinds of evidence, and philosophers don’t care much if only other philosophers understand them. But when they come together for peer assessment, academics are expected to explain their criteria, respect each other’s expertise, and guard against admiring only work that resembles their own. They must Is the research original and important? Brave, or glib? Timely, or merely trendy? Pro-diversity or interdisciplinary enough? Judging quality isn’t robotically rational; it’s emotional, cognitive, and social, too. Yet most academics’ self-respect is rooted in their ability to analyze complexity and recognize quality, in order to come to the fairest decisions about that elusive god, “excellence.” In How Professors Think, Lamont aims to illuminate the confidential process of evaluation and to push the gatekeepers to both better understand and perform their role.
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Decode the mysterious academic peer review system.

This book is a good fit for any academic who desires to better understand the peer review process. Michele Lamont shines a light on the hidden world of academic judgment, exploring the idiosyncrasies of peer review and what it means for quality. She provides an unmatched insider perspective that is invaluable to any serious and curious student of academia.