Doctoral snobbery: justified, or just elitism?

Birks, Melanie;Watson, Roger

Abstract

[Extract] Doctoral snobbery exists. It is a thing (Parnell, 2016). It is an extension of “academic snobbery” (Martin & Sorensen, 2014) more generally, and probably originates from “title snobbery” (Valverde, Mueller, Paciotti, & Conway 2016). Successfully completing a doctoral qualification is no small achievement and so some degree of elitism is probably reasonable. But is it reasonable for there to be an elitist division between the traditional PhD and the relative newcomer, the professional doctorate? And what about the doctorate in nursing practice (DNP) now apparently overtaking the PhD in the USA? Our recent participation in a round table on doctoral education in Hong Kong prompted us to explore the issue further and, by implication, to invite further comment.

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Journal of Advanced Nursing

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1365-2648

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Blackwell Publishing

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DOI

10.1111/jan.13326