Citation Theories: Move 1b

Move 1a

        Citations are widely recognized as being an important and distinctive property of academic texts. As a consequence, the presence or absence of citations allows the casual reader to get an immediate sense of whether a text is an "academic" or "popular" one. Because citation is such an obvious surface phenomenon, it has been much discussed in the academic world. Indeed, there are several theories about the role and purpose of citations in academic texts.

Move 1b

        This study attempts to identify the validity of six theories regarding the role and purpose of citations in academic text. The first theory is widely proposed in manuals and standard guides, the second one has some supporters, particularly in well-established fields like the sciences, and the remaining theories have been proposed by individual authors. All these theories lead into a comparison of the validity of citations in different disciplines.

The first theory seems straight forward and simple:

        Citations are used to recognize and acknowledge the intellectual property rights of
        authors. They are a matter of ethics and a defense against plagiarism.

I consider it to be valid for all disciplines, substituting the role of definition for the purpose of citations in academic text. While first theory is generally agreed upon, the second one," Citations are used to show respect to previous scholars. They recognize the history of the field by acknowledging previous achievements.", has a more narrow acceptance: it is considered to be more valid for sciences by indicating the fact that citations are used to show the point where a study was left off by previous researchers and used as a starting point by new researchers in the field.

        While these theories have a certain degree of validity, some of the earlier theories proposed by individual authors, such as Ravetz (1971) & Bavelas (1978), lacks a strong point in the role and purpose of citations and, therefore, are less valid. In contrast, the theory of Gilbert (1977) has become valid in all disciplines by referring to citations as "tools of persuasion", distinction that aim to describe the purpose of citations and clearly makes a powerful and relevant point. A later theory, Swales (1990), states that citations "are used to create a research space for citing author", distinction that provide useful points and make the theory valid, but does not provide the features that makes it always applicable. Clearly, there is space for a great deal more discussions about validity of these theories in the academic fields of different disciplines.