Do we over-rate single-author assignment – compared with, say, medicine and the natural sciences? Perhaps. But perhaps, as with older technologies, augmentations and collaborations already safely incorporated within single-author assignment (e.g. safely incorporated into the preface and acknowledgements!), so too, algorithms? In my own field, I don’t think I’ve ever seen either BibleWorks or Accordance make it even as far as the preface and acknowledgements. For the time being, at least, the single author seems safe.
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Good point about variances between the disciplines, Matthew. I thought you might like some graphs to go with your wikipedia link – they show single authored papers as a (declining) percentage of all papers over time; the percentage of single-authored papers within various fields (social science being highest); and a comparison of these disciplinary percentages 1981 : 2012 (all in decline).
[Data in the graphs from Thomson Reuters Web of Science]
I thought about this more from an angle of me as a student, and how algorithms which know my preferences (based on my browsing history and tweets I like, for example) may lead me towards particular resources – thereby gaining (material) agency within my research process. For instance, I noticed early in IDEL that everything was leading to Dave Cormier for a while, and then David White, and two weeks ago in week 7 of our mscedc, many of the blogs/papers/etc. I read ‘in the wild’ referred to Haraway’s Cyborg Manifesto. Interesting that this was not in our cyberculture block.. Of course ‘I’ chose to read the blogs – but how much did the algorithms ‘help’ me to find them?
Renée
Apologies: the hyperlink doesn’t show very clearly – “some graphs” leads to the graphs I was referring to.
Renée
Renee, thanks for this – and for the alert to the very-well-hidden hyperlink. I wouldn’t have found it without your second comment!
The graphs risk masking something acknowledged in the accompanying text, namely that ” the annual number of single-author, non-review papers themselves, as tracked since 1981, has remained largely consistent in the course of the three decades”. The declining percentage share reflect the increase in multi-author pieces, not so much the decline in the single-authored pieces per se. Clearly a complex picture is in view.
Also, I’m curious that there is no category for ‘humanities’: presumably it’s incorporated within ‘social sciences’. I’d imagine, within that category, there are lots of sub-sectors, each with their own practices, circulations and markets. Different assemblages, reacting to and with digital cultures in differing ways. Great to have some data-led insight on it, and inviting of more. Many thanks!