Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 32, No. 186.
            Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
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        Date: 2018-11-14 16:13:01+00:00
        From: Patricia Galloway 
        Subject: Re: [Humanist] 32.184: The art of the overview?

Here's one thing: your h-index will soar if you are good at broad views...
Pat Galloway

On 11/13/2018 11:59 PM, Humanist wrote:
>                    Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 32, No. 184.
>              Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
>                         www.dhhumanist.org
>                  Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
>
>
>
>
>          Date: 2018-11-14 05:49:26+00:00
>          From: Willard McCarty 
>          Subject: The art of overview
>
> In a discussion with colleagues about the merits of a particular essay,
> the one or two specialists among us had difficulty with this essay’s
> sacrifice of detail in the interests of achieving its broad view of the subject.
> As an interdisciplinary explorer of many subjects, I particularly value such
> overviews, perhaps too much — because I often am in desperate need of them.
> Another genre I value is one in which the author is intent on exploring where
> it might be possible reasonably to draw limits to a polysemous or radically
> inclusive concept (e.g. model, paraphrase). This means allowing that such
> expansiveness has a point, not disallowing the validity of the concept altogether.
>
> In both cases there’s an art to writing such things, or better, several
> ways of doing it well so that the specialist can reasonably be expected to
> allow their value. One scholar whose work I admire, the historian of Greek religion
> Walter Burkert, wrote such things in a kind of rhythm of close and far, zooming in
> for inspection of minute detail, then zooming out for the overall pattern. Somewhere
> Ian Hacking advises that it’s always good to have many examples to hand. Sometimes
> one simply knows an author has done his or her homework; the authority is implicit.
>
> So, my question. Who has written about this art or arts (with examples, please)?
>
> Thanks for any pointers.
>
> Yours,
> WM



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