Brian 's finally getting back to blogging, after being dragged to the other side of the planet and back. He knocks one out of the park with this one.
So I too use Wikipedia as a nexus for discussing all manner of digital effects. Sure, you have to acknowledge some shortcomings, but I'll stack the benefits against the liabilities any day. And when, as is almost inevitable, someone asks "what do you think of students citing Wikipedia in an academic essay?" I simply shout back "what do you think of someone citing Britannica? Huh? HUH?" and glare at them a bit. That usually shuts them up, and shutting people up is the hallmark of authoritative instruction.
No kidding. People seem to forget that just because something's online doesn't make it authoritative, trusted, nor appropriate for citation. Just the same as offline publications. You likely wouldn't cite People Magazine in an academic paper (unless, maybe, the paper was on the history of pop culture or something…)
Nor should you cite Wikipedia (or Brittanica, or Readers' Digest) as a primary source.
ps. welcome back, Brian! And with a healthy dose of “blamb’s ways to enrich your vocabulary” – using “synecdoche” casually in a post. I had to look that sucker up.
Brian 's finally getting back to blogging, after being dragged to the other side of the planet and back. He knocks one out of the park with this one.
So I too use Wikipedia as a nexus for discussing all manner of digital effects. Sure, you have to acknowledge some shortcomings, but I'll stack the benefits against the liabilities any day. And when, as is almost inevitable, someone asks "what do you think of students citing Wikipedia in an academic essay?" I simply shout back "what do you think of someone citing Britannica? Huh? HUH?" and glare at them a bit. That usually shuts them up, and shutting people up is the hallmark of authoritative instruction.
No kidding. People seem to forget that just because something's online doesn't make it authoritative, trusted, nor appropriate for citation. Just the same as offline publications. You likely wouldn't cite People Magazine in an academic paper (unless, maybe, the paper was on the history of pop culture or something…)
Nor should you cite Wikipedia (or Brittanica, or Readers' Digest) as a primary source.
ps. welcome back, Brian! And with a healthy dose of “blamb’s ways to enrich your vocabulary” – using “synecdoche” casually in a post. I had to look that sucker up.
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It’s ridiculous that people think you shouldn’t be allowed to cite encyclopedias or wikipedia in papers. The information in them is peer-reviewed and edited thoroughly. There are no more mistakes in them than in scholarly journals. Of course, they are not good primary sources but people need to get their heads out of their asses, do the research, and they will learn that wiki and encyclopedias are reliable sources. Fools
Sarah, the reason why encyclopedia (including wikipedia) shouldn’t be cited in papers is because you should only be citing original research. Many of the subtleties in the original research publications and seminal papers will be lost when distilled into an encyclopedia entry. Use the encyclopedia to find the original sources, sure, but then read those original sources and cite them rather than the encyclopedia. It avoids a game of “telegraph”, which is a bit dangerous in academic citations…