Outlets for alpha taxonomy

[Denis Brothers]

Of course this could be rectified if every reference mentioned in those
synonymy lists were included in the literature-cited section of the
paper, but I suspect that editors would balk at the increased length.
Denis

Professor Denis J. Brothers
School of Botany and Zoology
(and Centre for Environment & Development)
University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg
Private Bag X01              Telephone: (+27) (0)33-260 5106
Scottsville                        Fax: (+27) (0)33-260 5105
3209 SOUTH AFRICA     e-mail: brothers at nu.ac.za

>>> Jim Croft <jrc at ANBG.GOV.AU> 01/21/02 01:55AM >>>
> > I find this somewhat incongruent with the large amount of attention
being
> > given to laments about how little we know of the contents of
biological
> > world.
>
>The three word explanation for this is almost certainly "Citation
Impact
>Factor" - most species descriptions do not accrue a high number of
>citations, and therefore dilute a journal's citation impact factor.

No literature is more self-citing or more self-referential than that
of
biological taxonomy.  Just look at any nomenclature/synonymy block in
a
taxonomic monograph or flora - every relevant taxonomic work written
since
the mid 16th century is in there.

The problem is not with the citations themselves, but with the
citation
indexers skipping over this bread and butter of the taxonomic
literature...  If they didn't, Linneaus would still be way up there in
the
contemporay citation stakes...  :)

jim

~ Jim Croft ~ jrc at anbg.gov.au ~ 02-62465500 ~ www.anbg.gov.au/jrc/ ~