mercoledì 8 luglio 2009

Where does this substantial discrepancy between the English and Italian wikipedia description of sociobiology come from?

[EN]

OK, so if you can read both texts, you will notice that there is substantial discrepancy between the English and Italian wikipedia description of sociobiology.
Now, obviously wikipedia is just a multi-writers thingy, and there are different people writing about certain things in one language and in another. And maybe one could find other, more academic, sites where there is no such difference. I don't know enough yet, and I will enquire about it.
However, I'd like to start by doing this in English - I'll do in Italian separately.
The English wikipedia (EW) is pretty straightforward, trying to provide a balanced presentation of the topic of sociobiology, and naturally explaining that it has had some kind of "sequel", so to speak, with a rather different slant, however, and that's evolutionary psychology.
The Italian wikipedia (IW) is a rather bizarre piece, actually.
First of all, sociobiology is introduced as a sub-branch of sociology, ("La sociobiologia è una corrente della sociologia nata nella prima metà degli anni settanta come diretta conseguenza della crisi della stessa." transl.: "sociobiology is a trend in sociology born in the first half of the 1970s as a direct result of its crisis") and in order to do that, IW mentions some rather obscure people who, it claims, invented the name after 1945 ("John P. Scott and Charles F. Hockett"). However, EW makes no mention of any John P. Scott, while there is a Charles Francis Hockett, who was an American linguist; and, considering that he is known for "his stinging criticism of Chomskyan linguistics", it can't have been much of a linguist either!
Then, the only two people actually linked to sociobiology are Wilson and Barash. And the years listed as a reference are 1975 and 1977.
If you read the IW page on sociobiology, you would be excused for thinking that for the past 30 years nothing much has happened which could be related to it.
And that's precisely my point.
Any Italian trying to approach sociobiology finds her/himself in a devastated no-man's land.
Just one book is all that the IW "sociobiologia" mentions: a 1980 "Sociobiologia e natura umana" by various authors, among them E.O.Wilson, edited by Luciano Gallino).
There are other items in IW, which are somehow related to this "sociobiologia" opprobrium, which I'll dig up and comment.

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