Gary Lawson (Law, BU)--who as readers know is always worth quoting--writes with some important observations that warrant the attention of law faculty:
"Your recent post on RAs and co-authorship deserves a thread. The failure of legal academics properly to credit co-workers (who are often relegated to polite mentions in star footnotes) is one of the great undiscussed scandals in this business – and considering the number of undiscussed scandals in this business, that is saying quite a bit. In every other discipline of which I am aware, students who work with professors receive appropriate co-authorship credit, even if they do not get mentioned as the principal researcher. But when you combine uncredited RAs with uncredited law review editors –- who, I gather, often do much of the grunt work for authors by filling in research – the situation in law schools cries out for inquiry.
"It is particularly important to raise consciousness on this issue because so many people in this business frown on appointments candidates whose articles are co-authored. In any rational discipline, co-authorship would be seen as a strong positive indicator of intellectual openness, collegiality, willingness to share ideas, and a host of other virtues that ought to be valued in academia. But how many times have you heard scholarship of candidates denigrated because it is – gasp – co-authored? I’ve heard it so many times that I want to puke, and I have gotten to the point that I am genuinely nasty every time that I hear it (it doesn’t stop people from saying it, by the way, but it gives me a lot of opportunities to vent my penchant for nastiness). I’d be curious to see if other people’s experiences on this score match mine.
"Having railed a bit, however, one ought to give due credit on this score to my old stomping grounds (and your favorite whipping boy): Northwestern. The senior research program at Northwestern, which allows third-year students to spend a good portion of their credits writing intensively with a faculty member, encourages a strong ethic of noting students as co-authors. I’ve co-authored with four different Northwestern students, and I plan to carry that over to BU; I have two student co-authors already committed to a forthcoming project. Steve Calabresi [at Northwestern] has also been exemplary, in my view, in giving co-authorship credit to students who everyone else in this business would have glossed over in star footnotes. It has no doubt hurt his career (by giving people who don’t like him on political grounds a neutral-sounding reason to diss him), but it has been the right thing to do.
"If I get riled up enough, perhaps I will write something and send it to the Journal of Legal Education. Information –anecdotal or otherwise -- from your viewers might help on this score."
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