Re: a little something for all you wikipedia-lovers



On Jan 28, 1:12 pm, "Brian M. Scott" <b.sc...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 28 Jan 2007 08:31:06 -0800, "Peter T. Daniels"
<gramma...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<news:1170001865.970364.82760@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
in sci.lang:

On Jan 28, 10:28 am, Joachim Pense <s...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:[...]

So is it really acceptable to cite Britannica (rather than a research
paper or monography) in a research article? What would be a reason to
do so?
For some of the history-of-linguistics things I've done, encyclopedia
articles are excellent sources for the "common wisdom" of their age.

This is irrelevant. When you do that, you're not using it
as a general reference, but rather as a primary source, much
as one might use the Paston letters as a primary source for
15th century English social history. Its quality as a
reference work is not at issue in such applications.

Which I trust answers grapheus's question, and which provides a
further differentiation between Britannica and wikipedia, and for
which reason, totally banning citing EB in college work is unwise.

You snipped the further observation about overviews by the most
respected authorities, to which you comment applies equally well.

.

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