Intrepid Boston Herald media reporter Jessica Heslam has more today on the burgeoning kerfuffle surrounding Jon Keller’s book “The Bluest State,” and specifically his practice of lifting passages from newspaper articles without attribution or even indication that they’re quoted from somewhere.
First, Heslam has helpfully supplied a lengthy list of passages from the book, stacked up against the newspaper articles that Keller evidently copied. It’s pretty impressive.
Second, Keller’s editor has responded to the academic criticism of the book’s non-use of footnotes or endnotes:
Keller’s editor at St. Martin’s Press, Michael Flamini, said in an e-mail that “‘The Bluest State’ is a lively and controversial work” and “more akin to an op-ed piece than to a work of historical analysis or an academic treatise.”
“It is unreasonable to expect extensive footnotes for each and every quote, or a lengthy bibliography,” Flamini wrote…. Flamini, in his e-mail, characterized Keller’s highly touted tome as a political book written by a journalist for a “trade,” or general interest audience, and said that it did not require footnotes for every quote, nor a lengthy bibliography.
“References are made in the book’s index and throughout the text to quotes and facts reported in other newspapers,” Flamini wrote. “Thus, Jon Keller discloses to his readers, throughout his book, that he has occasionally relied on others’ reporting (in addition to relying on his own prodigious reporting).”
Flamini’s whole email is reprinted here. The journo profs remain unimpressed.
Samuel Freedman, a professor at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, found Flamini’s defense of Keller, who is also a Herald contributor, “completely unpersuasive.”
“It’s not just books by university scholars that require accuracy and integrity in sourcing. Books by journalists require it, too,” Freedman said…. “There are many ways that this author could have indicated that he was taking material from other reporters and the fact that he does that occasionally in the course of the book doesn’t absolve him of the need to have been honest with the reader about all the occasions in which he did it, or at least have published a bibliography that cited all the articles that he used.”
The Keller/Flamini notion seems to be that “general audience” or “trade” books (which I take to mean “non-academic” books) don’t require sourcing. This sounded unlikely to me, so I went to the bookshelf looking for other “trade” or “general audience” books, published by non-academic publishing houses, about politics or other related non-fiction topics. This is a completely unscientific survey — it’s just what I could quickly put my hands on.
My little mini-survey doesn’t support the Keller/Flamini view.
- Frank Rich: “The Greatest Story Ever Sold.” Penguin Press, 2006. 18 pages of endnotes.
- Joe Conason: “Big Lies.” St. Martin’s Press, 2003. 19 pages of endnotes.
- Al Franken: “Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them.” Dutton, 2003. 13 pages of endnotes, plus occasional footnotes in the text.
- Kevin Phillips, “American Dynasty.” Viking, 2004. 24 pages of endnotes.
- Ann Coulter, “Slander.” I don’t actually own this book, but its endnotes are discussed in “Lying Liars.” Al Franken reports that the book has 35 pages of endnotes. Good God, even Ann Coulter uses endnotes! (Franken says she misuses them, but that’s another topic.)
These books — including Conason’s, published by the same St. Martin’s Press that issued Keller’s book — all fall roughly into the same category as Keller’s book: general audience, “trade” books that are much more commentary on current events than academic or historical analysis. They’re all, in Flamini’s words, “akin to an op-ed piece” to pretty much the same extent as Keller’s. They all use endnotes. They all identify their sources. Doesn’t seem to be too much to ask.
If you have other books like these laying about, look to see if they have endnotes, and report what you find in the comments. Also, if you happen to be in a bookstore soon, take a stroll through the politics/current events aisle and see what you can find out. I’ll try to do the same.
BTW – Matt Margolis has oodles of footnotes in ‘Caucus of corruption’, which I looked at last night.
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Has ANYBODY looked at the varied Clinton and Shrum books? I’m still waiting for them to hit the dollar table like I did with Reich’s before I buy.
Hold down the “Control” key, click on the picture, and click on “Block images from …” You’ll never have to look at the annoying image/ad whatever again.
I haven’t seen Matt’s book, but good on him for sourcing it. There are books like (as you mentioned at Media Nation) Robert Reich’s memoir, and I’d add Richard Clarke’s “Against All Enemies,” that don’t use endnotes. But, as another commenter at MN correctly noted, those are largely memoirs — most of the information comes directly from the author’s personal knowledge. They probably could benefit from sourcing, since obviously they aren’t exclusively personal recollection, but it seems to me fair to say that they’re in a different category from the Keller “like an op-ed” kind of book.
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Dan Kennedy claims that Keller’s practice is “rampant throughout the entire book industry.” Asked by a commenter to produce some examples, he demurred, claiming that it “would take hours of research, which I’m not going to do.” He then went further, because, he said, finding 10 examples “would take two weeks, full-time, to document.”
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Respectfully, it took me about 10 minutes to grab a few books from my bookshelf and see if they had endnotes. PP did the same. So far, our anecdotal research doesn’t support Dan’s “everyone’s doing it” thesis.
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Ball’s in his court.
especially given they have places called libraries and bookstores where you can look at large collections of these kinds of books.
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if it were rampant, like you said, Dan could go to a store–I suggest Twice Upon a Time in Middleboro when he visits his hometown next–and give us the results of the first 15 books he picks up in the section where Keller’s book would be found.
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If it’s really, really rampant, what’s a far ration between how many are Kellerized and how many are properly done?
to come up with examples to prove his argument, but frankly, this thread says more about this Web site than it does about John Keller.
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Would we be having this discussion if people LIKED Keller’s thesis?
… people elsewhere had similar complaints about Bob Woodward.
… one example.
On completing the first 10 minutes of your project. Now, as for the ones without footnotes, read them all, being sure to look for quotes that are not explicitly presented as coming from an interview conducted by the author or with an once told to the Los Angeles Times-type of construction. Now that you have your list of suspect quotes, hit LexisNexis or the news database of your choice and start trying to trace them to the source. Good luck, and be sure to set aside plenty of time. You’ll need it.
The issue is not whether the books that don’t use footnotes or endnotes nonetheless identify their sources in some other way (such as “as reported in the Globe”). It’s established that Keller neither used notes nor took that alternate approach. Nor is the issue whether Keller made things up — no one (as far as I know) is claiming that he fabricated quotes or otherwise invented material, though as Charley argued today Keller’s non-sourcing makes it unnecessarily hard to figure that out.
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Rather, the issue is whether — as you’ve repeatedly claimed at Media Nation — it’s “customary” or even “rampant” for “trade” books not to identify their sources, either via notes or in the text. The anecdotal evidence developed so far suggests that, in fact, most trade, general audience, current-affairs type books like Keller’s do identify their sources, most often via endnotes. See my related post with more on that subject today.
is the key, which is why you need to do far more research than people are doing here. If there are no footnotes or endnotes, then you’ve got to read the books. You’ve got to check every quote. All I see happening here is that people are letting you know whether the books they’ve grabbed have endnotes or not.
that almost every book does have endnotes. For those books, it’s not necessary to read through them to see if they identify sources in the text. They don’t have to — they use endnotes. You’d only have to read the ones that don’t have endnotes to see if they identify their sources in the text. I haven’t read through the very few on my list that didn’t use endnotes. But I have indeed read Keller’s book, and have established that he does not identify most of his sources in the text.
… I did spot check the text where necessary. Not thorough certainly, but will do to get a general impression.
peter, i remember a few months ago seeing a picture of a sort of shrine built from books about the romneys on your website. how do those titles stack up, notation-wise?
… read Clinton or Shrum, but these days I read very little other than political or philosophical non-fiction and I can’t remember the last book I read that didn’t have citations (if there is even one).
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Here’s a list of some of my reads from the past several years and to the best of my memory they all had citations when needed:
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Conservatives Without Concience
Worse Than Watergate
Kingdom Coming
The Big Con
Why Darwin Matters
The Authoritarians
American Fascists
Perfectly Legal
End of Faith
The God Delusion
Letter to a Christian Nation
Lapdogs
What Liberal Media
Supreme Injustice
Rise of the Vulcans
Confessions of a Former Dittohead
Armed Madhouse
The One Percent Doctrine
Hubris
The Great Unraveling
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I’m sure I’ll think of a bunch of others after I post this.
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Is my memory right? Does anyone know if any of adhere to the ‘Keller Op-Ed book citation rules’?
it’d be great if you can grab some of these off your bookshelf and report what you find. I’d like to establish some actual data here.
what's the point of creating such a list if all you can say is . . . . Heck I think i remember blah blah blah . . . .
That comment gets a zero
… if having personally seen and read the book and working off of memory is insufficient for you, may I suggest that nobody ever talk about anything having to do with a book ever unless they have the book right next to them while they are typing.
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(sigh)
Like David says “it'd be great if you can grab some of these off your bookshelf and report what you find. I'd like to establish some actual data here”
That's “actual data” Mr. Lynne. why must you turn this blog into a house of lies?
so far you’re only on this thread to do the usual – spit and kick. do you have anything of substance to offer? what non-fiction have you read lately, and does it cite sources? and no, the dictionary and encyclopedia don’t count.
Maybe he doesn’t actually own a book. He appears — and I use the term advisedly — to be able to read, but more than a few hundred words may be beyond his limited abilities.
No Laurel
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More like point out BS – BMG answers when I see them. That’s why David needs delet my account.
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Sorry – Mr. Lynne needs to back up his BS
… omitting that I’m relying on memory. Mind you when I do read I actually pay careful attention to end notes,… I use two bookmarks when reading almost anything because, like I said, it seems everything I read has end notes or chapter notes. That is why I place a reasonable high confidence in my memory. But not being an idiot, I invited others to correct me.
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Incidentally, I never got an answer from my question to you.
schoolzombie1987 replacing schoolzombie87
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This looks fishy.
I’ve finally had it. Someone ban this loser please. BTW, you can give THAT a zero, Zombie.
… but many are in boxes (recently moved) and some are lent out to others, but I’ll do what I can.
…I have about 35 +/- on my ‘active’ political bookshelf (Origins of Totalitarianism and The Anarchist’s Cookbook are boxed up) so I’ll look when I get home.
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http://bp2.blogger.c…
should all be out and in the section near the dining room, FYI. I believe I unpacked ’em all – at least, all the ones we still have in our possession that you didn’t lend to your family. 😉
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It’s the GAMING books which are still in boxes, waiting for the basement to be finished, so they can go down in the gaming room. ;P Last to be unpacked: WoMD (aka WoD).
My original list:
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Conservatives Without Conscience – End notes
Worse Than Watergate – Can’t find, probably at a relatives – Same author as above so likely to have End notes
Kingdom Coming – Can’t find, probably at a relatives
The Big Con
Why Darwin Matters – End notes & selected bibliography
The Authoritarians – Chapter notes
American Fascists – End notes & bibliography
Perfectly Legal – Can’t find, probably at a relatives
End of Faith – End notes & bibliography
The God Delusion – End notes & bibliography End notes are a little sparse, but when needed, he also attributes in the text.
Letter to a Christian Nation – End notes
Lapdogs – End Notes
What Liberal Media – End notes
Supreme Injustice – End notes (also peer reviewed)
Rise of the Vulcans – End notes
Confessions of a Former Dittohead – At my brother’s
Armed Madhouse – Can’t find, probably at a relatives
The One Percent Doctrine – Can’t find, probably at a relatives
Hubris – Can’t find, probably at a relatives
The Great Unraveling – Can’t find, probably at a relatives
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Other titles on my shelf that I didn’t think of earlier today:
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The Decency Wars – End notes
Off Center – End notes
The Republican War on Science – End notes plus a listing of interviews.
Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas – End notes
Fooled Again – End notes
The Lies of George W. Bush – No end or chapter notes, but a random sampling indicates that it appears to attribute well in the text.
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Other titles on my shelf that I have never gotten around to starting and/or finishing:
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The Five Biggest Lies Bush Told Us About Iraq – As “The Lies of George W. Bush” above
Downsize This – No notes. Quality of text attribution seems OK, but a more in depth evaluation is probably necessary.
Stupid White Men – As “Downsize This” above
Race Matters – Not that much attribution, but what when there is it is in the text. A more in depth evaluation is probably necessary.
Democrac Matters – As above
A Vast Conspiracy – Source notes and bibliography, plus attribution in the text.
Blinded by the Right – No End or Chapter notes. Text attribution was hard to verify with a short flip through the pages because most of it refers to direct experience.
Against All Enemies – As above, but with much more attribution in the text.
What’s Liberal About the Liberal Arts? – End notes
Summer of the Gods – End notes
Shouting Fire – End notes
The Chomsky Reader – End notes
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OK – I’m done for the night.
… left one blank
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The Big Con – End notes
It’s lazy and it’s dishonest for him not to cite. Mix the percentages of ingredients in whatever ratio you think fits.
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He’s stuffing his book with other people’s work and making money off of it. Least he could do is recognize them for doing a significant part of his work.
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We’re talking about individual reporters who picked up a phone or went out on the street to collect those quotes or arrange their own thoughts into stories as well as the institutions that exist to chronicle the world that John Keller is later going to analyze. The least he can do is mention that he’s picking up their work.
When I think about the effort that I as a blogger and blog commenter, make in order to give due credit by providing links whenever I quote or discuss a story that I’ve read elsewhere, I’m incensed that this “journalist” thinks it’s okay to appropriate the intellectual property of others and pass it off as his own.
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I say that with this caveat: I have not personally read the book in question and am relying on the accuracy of description in David’s blog post.
… that I articulated at medianation:
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“Dan, I think I agree with you about the existence of similar books that have exactly the same lack of citation. Personally I can’t remember the last non-fiction book I read that had that problem. I don’t think anyone here is saying he broke a law, its a criticism that either is or isn’t legitimate. I don’t think the fact that other examples can be brought up delegitimatizes the criticism in principal. The fact that publishers have seen fit to accept the practice doesn’t mean that the criticism is any less relevant, unless the only standard we want to hold up as acceptable is ‘what other people do’. That is a child’s plea to ones parents when forbidden from something desired (‘But mooooommmm… all the other kids get to do it’).”
because I think they’re all blathering self righteous acts of brainwashing….
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….but Freakonomics has 22 pages of endnotes.
… on my ‘to go get’ list for a while.
Is that similar to Borges’ Notes section, where he had a general disclaimer that other sources were used. Now that was defined on the same page as the notes, you couldn’t miss it. Borges was suspended plagiarism then “retired”.
As I noted in the post, “Lying Liars” does have endnotes. It’s actually a pretty well-documented book, however annoying that may be to you.
Franken went out of his way to note all references. He even discussed it in detail when his book came out. Similar to Keller’s book, he’s making a political statement which will likely be challenged. So why don’t you attribute your sources? You want to tell your audience that your facts are correct and where you got them from.
is not okay in newspapers but is okay in books?
… when I was reading “Supreme Injustice” it was kind of a bid deal because, at the time, it was the only book on the subject that went through peer review.
…(I’ve never heard of him), but there are two issues.
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“Plagiarism” is an academic concept. But if someone plagiarizes to a sufficient extent, it may be a copyright infringement. That is one danger for a nedia outlet that allows its columnists to copy major portions of other peoples’ work. And that is true whether or not they give the other people attribution.
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Recall Mike Barnicle a few years ago? He was fired by the Globe probably because of the potential copyright infringement issue, but also because, by his copying, he was essentially defrauding his employer. The Globe was paying him for original work, not for copying works of others.
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And that is also true in book publishing. Recall the dust-up regarding Doris Kearns Goodwin a few years ago? Goodwin was accused of copying extensive sections from another person’s book. (I forget the subject matter, but that’s irrelevant.) That would obviously have been copyright infringement, and it has been reported that she settled out of court for a significant sum.
…almost every book in our rather extensive library of science (not just popular science), history and political science books has, if not footnotes, definitely endnotes. And more than a few of them have bibliographies.
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And the references to the footnotes or endnotes were not just citations to the sources from which quotations might have been lifted, but also to sources that gave rise to the ideas expressed in the text, whether or not they were quotations.
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If Keller’s editor refused to publish at least endnotes, he was not well served by his editor. If Keller refused to supply at least endnotes, he only has himself to blame.
or a bibliography
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The Presumes Allaince – Vaca
The Saudis – Mackey
Tritium on Ice – Bergeron
Toxic Sludge is Good for You! – Stauber & Rampton
Blowback – Johnson
Fateful Harvest – Wilson
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This was in interesting exercise, mainly because it makes me realize that I read a lot of history and biography, but very little “political pulp editorial”.
This looks like a GREAT book!
has 27 pages of notes in “Dude, Where’s My Country?”
…that references and notes (foot, chapter or end) can help readers assess the reliability of the assertions of fact made in the text.
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I’m not sure whether many of you are award of Scott Lively’s book The Pink Swastika. The thesis of that book was that the Nazis were basically a homosexual cabal. It was because Lively cited many references and provided many notes that gay activists were able to debunk all of the assertions in Lively’s book (see The Annotated Pink Swastika, available for free over the Internet.
Newt Gingrich To Renew America – No notes or bibliography.
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Ronald Kessler A Matter of Character: Inside the White House of George W. Bush – End notes.
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Peggy Noonan When Character was King: A Story of Ronald Reagan – Select Bibliography
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Rudolph W. Giuliani Leadership – No notes or bibliography.
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Dan Quayle Worth Fighting For – No notes or bibliography
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Michael K. Deaver A Different Drummer – No notes or bibliography
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George W. Bush A Charge to Keep – No notes or bibliography.
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Michael Graham Redneck Nation: How teh South Really Won the War No notes or Bibliography
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So 8 books, six with no end notes or bibliography, two with.
😉
…apparently wingnuts don’t want to be fact-checked.
I don’t remember if Turnaround or Why We Fight had them….
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I KNOW Six Crises and Profiles in Courage don’t…not sure about Declaration of Conscience
Neither book is a memoir…have you ead them?
What does MOSTLY mean to you?