Academia should forget artists and embrace artisans

The more I read first drafts of working papers, the more I pick up on scholars’ diverse skills: some authors are really good at coming up with an interesting question; some can really execute a rigorous research design; some have a flare for composing elegant prose; and some are really good at organizing a manuscript. But few – very few!! – are good at all those things combined. In yet another piece in my saga to save academia from itself, I say scrap the expectation that a single scholar must struggle to be a creative, methodologist, writer and editor. An alternative system is possible.

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