rinse, repeat . . . panty wad

Music: Apoptygma Berzerk: Harmonizer (2002)

Since we're on the topic of the profession this week, I thought I'd share that my panties are in a wad about a review of a co-authored essay I'm revising for resubmission this week. Before I detail the character of said wad, however, the requisite preliminary wind-up: if you are a professor at a research institution, you are expected to publish books and articles to keep your job. The perils and joys of publishing have been discussed here frequently, so I won't retread the usual grousing and encouraging tips (for beginning scholars, I've got some pages here that walk-through the process with an example). I will say, though, that if you're going to publish, you will have to revise. Never expect to get an article accepted at first pass. If your article is good enough, you will receive a request to "revise and resubmit" the essay from the editor. You should always regard those as a foot in the door. Revise well and things are usually promising.

I've only had three articles accepted at first pass. Ever. Eight years. Three articles. I think it is quite telling that all three articles were not with "Communication Studies" journals. Eight years. Three articles. Not communication. As a recent flap on a professional listserver demonstrates, for many folks in "my field," Communication Studies is synonymous with the National Communication Association. Now, while it is true that's where I tend to associate my professional "home," I like to think of my work as "interdisciplinary," straddling cultural studies and performance studies and English rhetoric/composition, among other fuzzily defined fields (right now I'm trying to get my lern on in media ecology). It always seemed to me the term "communication" was so vacuous and huge I could stick anything I want under the banner. Hell, folks publish navel-gazing in the name of communication, so why can't I write about poop can call it "communication?" (I know what you're thinking, and my response is: exactly!)

In addition to the extreme reviewers one sometimes gets (profiles of types here), I have to say, perhaps, my hugest most biggest pet peeve is the statement, "this has nothing to do with communication." What the eff does that mean? I'm sure y'all get this in your various fields: "this is not political science," or, "this is not anthropology." I can even understand how those statements can be justified. But it just sounds ridiculous for a Communication Studies scholar. What, exactly, isn't communication? Hell, aside from publishing about rhetoric as a way of knowing, my advisor made a name for himself by writing about silence. I remember when at LSU, one of our most talented graduate students wrote a pretty darn interesting paper on a sit-com and submitted it for review at Communication Quarterly. The editor sent the essay back, without any reviews, saying that "this is not communication scholarship." I was so mad I sent him a letter telling him it was his responsibility to publish an editorial statement that specified what is and is not communication research (he never did).

So, I've sufficiently built up this post to paste in the source of my ire. So, like, ummmm . . . me and a cherished mentor wrote an essay on a film. We argue the film expresses certain social anxieties. That's the gist (I don't want to give too much away, as it's still in review). Anyhoo, so one of our reviewers writes this:

First and foremost, I'm not clear on your theoretical moorings or intentions for this project. Certainly, I understand that you are situating it in psychoanalysis, but you employ that as a methodological tool: what do you hope to explore, interrogate, trouble, or contribute to in terms of theory? Along these lines but notable on its own terms as well, this project really has nothing to do with Communication---the only Communication pieces that you cite are the ______ pieces (more on those in a moment) on [the film]. This analysis could just as easily have come out of Film Studies or English or Comparative Literature. While interdisciplinarity of approaches and lenses is more than appropriate---it is often a strength in criticism---you really don't have that here so much as a methodical psychoanalytic critique that isn't anchored to anything substantive outside of that, and given your interest in publishing in a Communication journal, the absence of that particular foundation is especially conspicuous. There are a number of Communication scholars (other than_____) that have taken up the crisis in masculinity, [the film], and psychoanalysis, but you reference none of them here.

Ok, aside from the obvious bullshittery of "there are a number of Communication scholars [who] have taken up the crisis of masculinity, [the film], and psychoanalysis"---this is a patent falsehood---what kind of boundary pissing is this? A reading of the film as expressive of social anxiety is not good enough?

No, it's not for this reviewer. The problem is that s/he equivocates with "Communication" as either a substantive domain or as code for some sort of citation practice. Worse, I think the underlying warrant here is a conflation of those two things: "Communication" consists of whatever communication studies scholars are publishing in communication studies journals. To wit: Communication is what communication studies people publish. It's not clear what journals the author has in mind, but I'm willing to play bingo on the NCA square: our scholarship has nothing to do with communication because we are not citing research published within NCA journals. This is among the most stupid demands of scholarship I can imagine, especially when we're called on the carpet for not citing scholarship that doesn't exist.

So, if I were to amend my reviewer profiles, I would now add the Disciplinarian: no matter what you write, it's not "communication" and therefore deserving of rejection. The reviewer never tells you what communication is, of course, but assumes you understand it from some sort of citational protocol you apparently missed.