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Video Q&A ViewAttendees 7

Systematics, Evolution, and Biodiversity

10-Minute Paper

SysEB: Biodiversity

Framing the future for taxonomic monography: Improving recognition, support, and access

Sunday, October 31, 2021
10:00 AM – 10:12 AM MT
Location: Colorado Convention Center, Meeting Room 501-502
In-Person

Taxonomic monographs synthesize biodiversity knowledge through recent and geological time for a particular organismal group, sometimes incorporating cultural and place-based knowledge. These comprehensive biodiversity treatments are also crucial for policy, conservation, human wellbeing, and developing sustainable practices. Despite forming the basis of all biological work, taxonomic monographs are undervalued. Taxonomists also lack consistent support for their monographs, which often take longer to produce than typical funding cycles. We must acknowledge how the historic and ongoing role of colonialism and racism within our own institutions exerts significant influence on the practice of monographic work, limiting this practice to those with access to global resources to the detriment of the field. While most resources, including comprehensive scientific collections and historical literature, are located in the global north, the most critical need for monographs is in the global south, where species diversity is the most rich. Furthermore, a majority of taxonomic studies are led by, or exclusively include, scientists from the global north, thus perpetuating the ‘parachute science’ phenomenon. Traditional knowledge-holders are not often included in the practice of monography despite having integral place-based knowledge. We discuss how to address and modernize taxonomic monography along three critical axes: recognition, support, and access. To address some of these issues, we propose a system of multidimensional mentoring, a new framework for contributorship and citations, and two models (the communities of practice model and the collective model) which seek to include all members of a community in the process of generating a systematic monograph.