Peer Review
Peer review is a central concept for most academic publishing; other scholars in a field must find a work sufficiently high in quality for it to merit publication. The process also guards against plagiarism.
Failures in peer review are sometimes scandalous. The Bogdanov Affair in theoretical physics is one example. The Sokal Affair is another, though this controversy also involved many other issues.
Rena Steinzor wrote:
Perhaps the most widely recognized failing of peer review is its inability to ensure the identification of high-quality work. The list of important scientific papers that were initially rejected by peer-reviewed journals goes back at least as far as the editor of Philosophical Transaction's 1796 rejection of Edward Jenner's report of the first vaccination against smallpox.Read more about this topic: Academic Publishing
Famous quotes containing the words peer and/or review:
“The Peer now spreads the glitt’ring Forfex wide,
T’inclose the Lock; now joins it, to divide.”
—Alexander Pope (1688–1744)
“You don’t want a general houseworker, do you? Or a traveling companion, quiet, refined, speaks fluent French entirely in the present tense? Or an assistant billiard-maker? Or a private librarian? Or a lady car-washer? Because if you do, I should appreciate your giving me a trial at the job. Any minute now, I am going to become one of the Great Unemployed. I am about to leave literature flat on its face. I don’t want to review books any more. It cuts in too much on my reading.”
—Dorothy Parker (1893–1967)