{"id":599,"date":"2013-09-24T15:54:12","date_gmt":"2013-09-24T18:54:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/?p=599"},"modified":"2016-01-15T13:44:06","modified_gmt":"2016-01-15T15:44:06","slug":"from-lists-to-rankings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/2013\/09\/24\/from-lists-to-rankings\/","title":{"rendered":"From lists to rankings"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe list is the origin of culture. It\u2019s part of the history of art and literature. What does culture want? To make infinity comprehensible. It also wants to create order \u2014 not always, but often. And how, as a human being, does one face infinity? How does one attempt to grasp the incomprehensible? Through lists, through catalogs, through collections in museums and through encyclopedias and dictionaries\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n

Umberto Eco (Beyers and Gorris 2009)<\/p>\n

\"eco-23-160_0\"In the excerpt above, Umberto Eco advocates that the list is the origin of culture, being part of the history of art and literature as a tool to make the infinite comprehensible. For the Italian semiotician and medievalist, this attempt to \u201cgrasp the incomprehensible\u201d operates though lists, through catalogs, through collections in museums and through encyclopedias and dictionaries – understood as cultural achievements. In his book \u201cThe Vertigo of Lists\u201d\u00b9, Eco comprehensively explores the compilation of the vast repertory of lists over the centuries, organizing them in different typologies: visual lists, lists of things, lists of places, lists of wonders, lists by the properties and essence of things, chaotic lists and giddy lists, among others – reflecting infinite possibilities of systemizing humanity\u2019s cultural elements and alluding to the founding structure of Western thought, conditioned, over time, by reason and order: \u201cSe o ser humano sempre procurou padr\u00f5es que unem ou diferenciam tudo o que existe, \u00e9 porque essa tem sido sua ferramenta para lidar com uma inquieta\u00e7\u00e3o at\u00e1vica: a necessidade de dar ordem ao caos\u201d \u00b2 (Marthe 2010).<\/p>\n

In this book, besides giving an insight into how the innumerable uses and customs of lists evolved throughout history, Eco also suggests that this compulsion to list functioned as an element of distinction and economic interest: \u201cA presen\u00e7a de uma rel\u00edquia constitu\u00eda, na Idade M\u00e9dia, um motivo de atra\u00e7\u00e3o para uma cidade ou para uma igreja e, portanto, representava, al\u00e9m de um objeto sagrado, tamb\u00e9m uma preciosa \u2018mercadoria\u2019 tur\u00edstica\u201d\u00b3 (2010), with collections of ancient religious relics provoking competition between cities and European medieval churches as they vied for pilgrims.<\/p>\n

From Umberto Eco\u2019s list to the sophisticated technological artifacts of information organization in the age of globalization, there are profound changes in these records of ordering and distinction, culminating in the emergence of global hierarchical listings showing the positioning of universities, also known as rankings. The current rankings of universities represent the optimization of lists and other proven forms of listing in different historical periods, with the intention not only of organizing information, but also its prominence as conferred by society. The ancient lists evolved right up to the emergence of League Tables – the global rankings of universities – in a context that culminates in the current globalized era, where knowledge-based assets have become a cornerstone of economic, social and political power, determining the historical locus favored for the emergence of these listings. The growing internationalization of higher education is also bringing about a growing interest in attracting students, that base their choice on the rankings of the educational institution in which they will study, which brings us to the analogy with the lists of collections of relics which attracted pilgrims in the Middle Ages.<\/p>\n

The means change, but does the essence remain?<\/p>\n

Notes<\/h3>\n

\u00b9 ECO, U. A Vertigem das Listas. Rio de Janeiro: Record, 2010. 408 p.<\/p>\n

\u00b2 Translation: “If human beings always sought patterns that unite or differentiate all that exists, it is because this has been their tool for dealing with an atavistic restlessness: the need to bring order to chaos”.<\/p>\n

\u00b3 Translation: “The presence of a relic was, in the Middle Ages, a reason of attraction for a city or a church and thus represented, not only a sacred object, but also a precious tourist ‘commodity'”.<\/p>\n

References<\/h3>\n

BEYERS, S. and GORRIS, L. Spiegel Interview with Umberto Eco. Der Spiegel<\/i>, 11 nov. 2009. Available from: http:\/\/www.spiegel.de\/international\/zeitgeist\/spiegel-interview-with-umberto-eco-we-like-lists-because-we-don-t-want-to-die-a-659577.html<\/a><\/p>\n

ECO, U. A Vertigem das Listas<\/i>. Rio de Janeiro: Record, 2010. 408 p.<\/p>\n

MARTHE, M. A lista das listas. Revista Veja<\/i>, 22 dez 2010, 2196th ed., vol. 43, n\u00ba 51.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Sibele<\/a>About Sibele Fausto<\/h3>\n

Collaborator on the SciELO program, post-graduate in Information Science from the School of Communication and the Arts of the University of S\u00e3o Paulo (PPGCI-ECA-USP), specialist in Health Sciences information at the Federal University of S\u00e3o Paulo in partnership with the Latin American Center for Health Sciences Information (UNIFESP-BIREME-PAHO-WHO), Sibele Fausto is a librarian in the Technical Department of the Integrated Library System of the University of S\u00e3o Paulo (DT-SIBi-USP).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Translated from the original in Portuguese<\/a> by Nicholas Cop Consulting<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Based on Umberto Eco\u2019s book \u201cThe Vertigo of Lists\u201d, this blog post recalls the historical origin of lists, discussing their evolution to today\u2019s sophisticated technological artifacts of information organization, and culminating in the emergence of global hierarchical listings showing the positioning of universities, also known as rankings. …<\/span> Read More →<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[7],"class_list":["post-599","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-analysis","tag-scholarly-communication"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=599"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1686,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599\/revisions\/1686"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}