all roads go through the humanities

Whether they cite the articles that influence their thinking or not, scientists consult the humanities and social sciences.

A recent study by Johan Bollen and his colleagues at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico used anonymized server log data from 35,000 journals over a two year period. Included in their published findings is a “knowledge map,” a spatial-visual representation of the academic disciplines represented by the articles that the scientists consulted while researching online. The centrality of the humanities, represented in yellow, is a curious finding given that humanities departments across the country are feeling pressure to defend their utility, while the sciences are not feeling similar pressure.


image, PLoS ONE

Posted on March 11, 2009 
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One Response to “all roads go through the humanities”

  1. Phillip Barron « LIQUIDO ESPAÇO on March 17th, 2009 12:30 pm

    [...] Março 17, 2009 all roads go through the humanities [...]

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