Getting the ball rolling

To encourage suggestions, I've made a start in compiling a Master List of significant titles: click to access. I have no illusions that this is the best choice—it may not even be a very good selection! Also, there are some obvious imbalances in coverage that I am aware of—for example, with respect to the Psycholinguistics of Bilingualism, and the whole area of Laboratory Phonology—as well as many others that I am not aware of: the purpose of this blog is that you can help to draw attention to these areas, and suggest indispensable articles.

A few words about the list: it is open-ended (though I hope we can agree on a total below 150 articles, particularly bearing in mind that there will be specialist lists for particular subtopics). It is also currently sorted by alphabetical order only: as I hear from other contributors with their rankings, the list will be regularly resorted first by rank order (Column G) and then alphabetically, to arrive at a Top 30 in a few months' time.

Please email me with any new suggestions or votes for existing entries, or post comments. In the medium term, I hope to be able to develop a form so that you can add and rank automatically, but for now, please write to me first.

Finally, notice that there is one important criterion for all list entries, namely, they must have been published in peer-reviewed journals. I am aware that many of the most influential papers—particularly in generative psycholinguistics work—appear instead in edited volumes or as monographs, or conference proceedings. While these will be referenced in the textbook, they will not appear in the lists for two reasons. The first is a practical one: undergraduate students should be able to easily access all sources, which is normally the case if the articles have been published in journals. The second reason is that I believe that articles that have been subject to anonymous peer-review—for all its many imperfections—should carry more weight than those that have not been so tested. So, at least for now, I'll start with peer-reviewed journals only.