4 ms·

> academia was a bastion of the male WASP elites that didn't have much pretense of serving the broader public Have things really changed? I suspect there are

by adekok 9y ago

> academia was a bastion of the male WASP elites that didn't have much pretense of serving the broader public Have things really changed? I suspect there are fewer males, but any job that demands 20 years of full-time concerted effort is likely to be dominated by men. Similarly, the western world is overwhelmingly caucasian, so again... the best predictor (now as then) is that white male professors will be represented disproportionately. > at least you didn't have the torrent of mediocre papers that you see today. That certainly is true. Stats for the humanities and social sciences are that 80% of the papers have zero citations. i.e. they have no contribution to the greater body of human work. In Physics (my background), most papers have 2-3 citations, and only a small percentage have 1 or fewer. I would say that if a discipline is dominated by uncited papers, then that discipline is probably a waste of time. And the professors who work in it are a net drain on society.

tnecniv 9y ago
As a note, WASP refers to old money families with ties going back to the colonial era, not just middle-class/wealthy white dudes in America. Also, at least in STEM departments, you will see plenty of non-white names. > In Physics (my background), most papers have 2-3 citations, and only a small percentage have 1 or fewer Does that account for self-citations?
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > WASP refers to old money families with ties going back to the colonial era No, it refers to White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, an ethno-religious group that cuts across socio-economic class divides and includes plenty of people that are neither old money nor descended from families that have been in the US since the founding (and excludes some old-money, from-the-founding families.)
  - PeterisP 9y ago
    It does exclude many large subpopulations from the many immigration waves coming after the colonial era. All the irish, italian, polish, jewish people; the vast majority of 19th and early 20th century (very large!) immigrants and their descendants aren't WASPs.

by adekok 9y ago

tnecniv 9y ago

As a note, WASP refers to old money families with ties going back to the colonial era, not just middle-class/wealthy white dudes in America. Also, at least in STEM departments, you will see plenty of non-white names. > In Physics (my background), most papers have 2-3 citations, and only a small percentage have 1 or fewer Does that account for self-citations?

dragonwriter 9y ago
> WASP refers to old money families with ties going back to the colonial era No, it refers to White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, an ethno-religious group that cuts across socio-economic class divides and includes plenty of people that are neither old money nor descended from families that have been in the US since the founding (and excludes some old-money, from-the-founding families.)
- PeterisP 9y ago
  It does exclude many large subpopulations from the many immigration waves coming after the colonial era. All the irish, italian, polish, jewish people; the vast majority of 19th and early 20th century (very large!) immigrants and their descendants aren't WASPs.