IP Democracy: Middlebury's History Dept. Says No More Wikipedia

It’s so disappointing when Wikipedia is wrong because it’s such a cool resource. But, the fact remains that Wikipedia isn’t compiled according to scholarly standards and one respected university’s history department has taken the bold step of banning Wikipedia citations.

The history department of Middlebury College in Vermont has decided that Wikipedia cannot be cited in papers or exams. Students can, of course, still use Wikipedia but they won’t be allowed to cite it as a back-up for their research.

The ban came about when Japanese history professor Neil Waters discovered that half a dozen students made the same erroneous contention in their research papers and found out that Wikipedia was the source of the error. This latest bout of bad knowledge was the final straw — other professors had noticed the same kind of misplaced reliance on Wikipedia by other students.

Wikipedia’s founder Jimmy Wales isn’t bothered by this. He argues that students shouldn’t be relying on any encyclopedia when conducting research.

Jimmy Wales, the co-founder of Wikipedia and chairman emeritus of its foundation, said of the Middlebury policy, “I don’t consider it as a negative thing at all.”

He continued: “Basically, they are recommending exactly what we suggested — students shouldn’t be citing encyclopedias. I would hope they wouldn’t be citing Encyclopaedia Britannica, either.

“If they had put out a statement not to read Wikipedia at all, I would be laughing. They might as well say don’t listen to rock ‘n’ roll either.”

Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on February 21, 2007 9:18 AM to IP Democracy