Diana Kwon
Reading task for workshop 2
Kwon, D. (2022) ‘The Rise of Citational Justice’. Nature, 603
This article looked at inequity in citations, how academics from minority backgrounds are often overlooked, either not cited or not credited: ‘citational erasure’. This fails to acknowledge a person’s contribution to research but also has a huge potential impact on a scholar’s career, as can lead to failure to get grants, hiring and promotions.
Research in this area shows us that there are ‘persistent biases in citation patterns – women and people of colour, for instance garner citations at lower rates than men’ (Kwon, 2022, p.569).
Recent work to acknowledge inequities in citational practices and take action to reduce them, has led to ‘citational justice’. This includes using code to help estimate the balance of gender and race and guidance tools for authors.
Interesting points were about the idea that: ‘citational justice isn’t only about justice’ (Cassidy Sugimoto), ‘it’s about doing robust, rigorous science, where you are truly exploring all the potential areas of research’. Therefore it makes sense that you need to cite authors from diverse racial and gender identities.
The research also found that ‘authors tend to cite people they know, such as co-workers, colleagues or those with whom they have had professional interactions’ (Kwon, 2022,, p.569). In our class today, Kwarme suggested this could relate to promoting your own network, to increase each other’s profiles and perhaps gain funding advantages. I also wondered about how I use visual references in teaching practice, usually in informal one-to-one feedback sessions, where I might suggest a student looks at a particular piece of work. Often these come from work or practitioners I know, student work I have seen, or from hearing about the work of a colleague. This isn’t consciously done to promote my own network, rather because it’s in my sphere of everyday experience. This is something to be mindful of.
Other interesting aspect of the article talked about was how ‘heuristics’ are used when finding sources to cite, ‘language a paper is written in, the researcher’s institution and journal reputation’. ‘Such practices can inadvertently silence certain voices – because individuals from some populations are more likely to write in a particular language and less likley to work at prestigious institutions or publish in high-impact journals’ (Kwon, 2022, p.569). This also relates to the idea that indigenous voices have no platform to share knowledge and become silenced and knowledge lost.
Another key point which seems to chime with my understanding of decolonisation is: ‘Just changing the proportion of authors from minoritised groups in reference lists is not enough, she adds. “If you’re only inserting Black women onto a bibliography, but you’re not actually those ideas to influence the way that you think about and see the world, then what you’re engaging with is superficial diversity work, and not true, fundamental change.” (Dani Basset, in Kwon, 2022, p.571)’
References
Kwon, D. (2022) ‘The Rise of Citational Justice’. Nature, 603