Talk:Mary Poovey

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I have now several times included the "Scientist stub"-tag. I have done so for this reason. Mary Poovey is a professor at the NYU's Faculty of Arts and Science. As such, she is active in the academic field of humanities and arts. The humanities are, according to the article, "generally considered to be, along with the social sciences and the natural sciences, one of three major components of the liberal arts and sciences." According to the list of academic disciplines, its academic status is not debated. Therefore I see no reason to question the scientific status of Mary Poovey's field of play, and I therefore don't see why a "Scientist stub"-tag shouldn't be included. According to Wikipedia itself, Mary Poovey is a scientist. Aecis 10:11, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC) PS. I have now included the "Academic bio stub"-tag instead of the "Scientist stub"-tag. I hope my right honourable co-editors can agree with that. Aecis 10:14, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Mary Poovey is, yes, an academic in the field of the humanities. And you could also say that humanities are included in "liberal arts and sciences" (although the latter term is a bit ambiguous). The problem in your reasoning is that "liberal arts and sciences" is not the same thing as "science." Notice the "and"?

People who work in the humanities generally cannot be considered scientists (although I'm willing to appreciate there might be a few exceptions if they do multidisciplinary stuff). I didn't make the rule, so I won't try to justify it... but it probably has something to do with the humanties' qualitative approach, as well as its focus on meaning rather than objective facts.

Anyone else agree that this page ought to be recommended for deletion? Very few of Mary Poovey's contemporaries are listed on wikipedia--i.e., important literary critics--and even then I'd contest the terms of her importance in relation to the general public sphere. There's a pretty big drop-off in visibility between her and, say, Bloom or Greenblatt.