“We have to get our children to want to discover things, we have to stimulate their curiosity, treat them as if they were full blown adults, capable of understanding many more things than we think they do. That way, they’ll be stronger and more grateful for it”. Albert Barillé
There are now different ways of keeping up to date and accessing abstracts of published papers (E-notes, administering reading lists, etc.).
In later posts we’ll look at the sections a scientific journal should have.
I have deliberately made no distinction between paper and online journals, since the two formats coexist. Neither is there any intention to chart the history of the changes brought about by the appearance of internet.
3 minutos
Érase una vez…(“Once Upon a Time”…) was a classic Spanish TV programme for children in which the characters (Flor, Pedro,Maestro, etc.) brought “history” to life for their young viewers in cartoon form, combining entertainment with the dissemination of historically and scientifically accurate information.
Quite a few years have passed since then, but the series, created by Barillé,1 is still relevant in that it made knowledge accessible to society through collaboration with prestigious professionals and institutions like Alexander Dorozynski and Joel de Rosnay, chairman of CNRS, and the use of communication tools.
Communicating and disseminating knowledge is difficult at the best of times, and even more so when we are dealing with one specific field of knowledge where the content is limited. Although channels of divulgation are currently proliferating at an increasing rate, scientific literature is a complex field.2 Many journals are today freely accessible, but there are also online digital databases and catalogues which, despite making it easier to search for material, charge subscriptions.
Prior to the emergence of Internet, a medium which multiplied the alternatives for sharing and accessing knowledge, scientific knowledge was traditionally communicated through the publication of articles in specialized printed journals. But Internet also created a need to implement new control, production, and dissemination tools. In general, journals are still the quintessential medium for communicating and disseminating scientific knowledge, and they serve as the basis for future research.
A distinction can be drawn between two types of journal: ´academic` journals and ´professional` journals. Academic journals contain works with information aimed mainly at the corresponding scientific and academic community. They are typically peer-reviewed journals published at a regular frequency and controlled by editorial boards.3 In contrast, professional journals have content orientated towards professionals working in the corresponding sector and intended to keep them informed about different advances being made in their field.
The basic difference between the two types of journal is that `professional´ journals don’t have formal review procedures. This should not be interpreted as meaning that their content is any worse, or of lower quality (look at the number of highly relevant blogs/platforms currently online). It simply means that the readership served by these journals is different, more specialised.4
One type of academic journal is the scientific journal, which focuses specifically on science and contains scientific papers. It’s this type of publication that we’ll be looking at. One such journal, VAD, veredes, arquitectura y divulgación, appeared in 2019. This initiative had its roots in VEREDES, a project started in 2010 and aimed at disseminating architectural culture.
The objective of scientific journals is to “communicate” the results of research carried out by individuals or groups, and it is therefore necessary to classify the different fields of study so that other researchers can locate and submit papers. In our case, the nomenclature used is that of UNESCO, where architecture is classified as belonging to categories:
And now, after this brief introduction to the topic and having identified the challenge facing us, get ready: we have a lot of ground to cover…Once upon a time…
Related posts:
“We have to get our children to want to discover things, we have to stimulate their curiosity, treat them as if they were full blown adults, capable of understanding many more things than we think they do. That way, they’ll be stronger and more grateful for it”. Albert Barillé
There are now different ways of keeping up to date and accessing abstracts of published papers (E-notes, administering reading lists, etc.).
In later posts we’ll look at the sections a scientific journal should have.
I have deliberately made no distinction between paper and online journals, since the two formats coexist. Neither is there any intention to chart the history of the changes brought about by the appearance of internet.
