Scientific Journal: Authorship and the Politics of Knowledge in the Nineteenth Century

The scientific journal has played a crucial role in the advancement of knowledge, but its dominance was a hard-won compromise born of political exigencies, shifting epistemic values, intellectual property debates, and the demands of commerce. A better understanding of the journals past will be crucial to imagining future forms for the expression and organization of knowledge.

\n Format: Paperback / softback
\n Length: 368 pages
\n Publication date: 22 September 2020
\n Publisher: The University of Chicago Press
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The scientific journal has been a celebrated medium for advancing knowledge since the printing press, playing a central role in the identity of academic scientists and the public legitimacy of scientific knowledge. However, this dominance was not always the case. At the dawn of the nineteenth century, academies and societies dominated elite study of the natural world, and journals were a relatively marginal feature. Journals were often viewed with suspicion and even hostility.

The Scientific Journal by Alex Csiszar takes readers on a journey through nineteenth-century London and Paris, where savants struggled to reshape scientific life in the light of rapidly changing political mores and the growing importance of the press in public life. Csiszar argues that the scientific journal did not emerge as a natural solution to the problem of communicating scientific discoveries, but rather as a hard-won compromise born of political exigencies, shifting epistemic values, intellectual property debates, and the demands of commerce.

The dominance of the scientific journal was a complex and multifaceted process that involved a range of actors and institutions. It was shaped by the political context of the time, with governments seeking to control and regulate scientific knowledge for national security and economic purposes. Epistemic values also played a significant role, with the rise of rationalism and empiricism leading to a focus on empirical evidence and scientific method. Intellectual property debates also shaped the journal, with publishers and scientists arguing over who owned the rights to scientific discoveries and how they should be disseminated.

The demands of commerce also played a role in the development of the scientific journal. As scientific knowledge became more valuable and sought after, publishers sought to monetize it by selling subscriptions and advertising. This led to the development of a commercial publishing industry that was focused on profit rather than the dissemination of knowledge.

Despite these challenges, the scientific journal has played a crucial role in advancing knowledge and shaping the modern scientific enterprise. It has provided a platform for open communication, peer review, and the dissemination of scientific discoveries. It has also played a role in shaping the identity of academic scientists and the public perception of scientific knowledge.

However, the scientific journal is not without its problems. Today, scholarly publishing is facing a range of challenges, including the rise of open access publishing, the rise of predatory journals, and the impact of digital technologies on information dissemination. These challenges highlight the need for a better understanding of the journals past to imagine future forms for the expression and organization of knowledge.

In conclusion, the scientific journal has been a celebrated medium for advancing knowledge since the printing press, playing a central role in the identity of academic scientists and the public legitimacy of scientific knowledge. However, its dominance was not always the case, and its development was shaped by a range of political, epistemic, intellectual property, and commercial factors. A better understanding of the journals past will be crucial to imagining future forms for the expression and organization of knowledge.

\n Weight: 514g\n
Dimension: 152 x 228 x 27 (mm)\n
ISBN-13: 9780226752501\n \n