Journals and PeriodicalsAILEEN FYFE

Journals and PeriodicalsAILEEN FYFE1The late seventeenth century is usually taken as the origin of scholarly journals, including those devoted to the sciences. However, an emphasis on origin myths has obscured the fact that the meaning and significance, as well as the format and style, of scientific authorship and reportage have changed considerably over the last four centuries. Most of the features we associate with the modern scientific journal, includ- ing originality of research, self-authorship, refereeing procedures and standardized rhetoric and structure, were nineteenth-century developments, while the emergence of English as the international language of science, professionalism among authors and editors, and profitability, are largely twentieth-century phenomena. Scientific research journals have never operated in a vacuum, and the most successful ones have always required connections to, and an understanding of, both science and commerce.