It was back in 2008 when I first wrote about titular colonicity, which isn't near as interesting as it sounds and has to do with the growing use of colons in academic titles, especially as a field matures or becomes more complex. I even did a quick-and-dirty analysis of my field's major journal, Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly. I've often considered a more formal analysis to submit to a journal, but I suspect it's such a navel gazing exercise that most would pass on publication. Here's the piece that created what's called the Dillion Hypothesis of Titular Colonicity. Always worth a look.OK, fine Hollander, but why mention this today?
Because I stumbled on this abstract, which talks about the length of journal article titles but also, apparently, touches on titular colonicity. Unfortunately I don't have access to the entire piece (see also this recent analysis). I'd never heard of APA's recommended 12 words or less in an academic journal title. That's interesting (if you're a PhDweeb like me, at least).
So work continues to be done and I really really really should tackle a mass comm journal analysis of colons. Problem is, who the hell would publish it? Maybe as a conference paper. Yeah. Maybe. If nothing else it'd give me the opportunity to say "titular colonicity" in front of others. I'm not above such sophomoric enjoyment.
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