Lesson plan
Multiple-use name
A multiple-use name or anonymity pseudonym is a name used by many different people to protect anonymity. It is a strategy that has been adopted by many unconnected radical and cultural groups, where the construct of personal identity has been criticised. One of the first modern multiple-use names was Nicolas Bourbaki, used by a group of French mathematicians associated with the École Normale Supérieure from 1935 onwards to exemplify the collective effort that goes into mathematics. The name Alan Smithee has been in use in Hollywood since 1968 by directors who wish to disavow creative credit for a film where control has been taken away from them. Other multiple identities in use in the artistic world include Luther Blissett, Sandy Larson, Monty Cantsin, Geoffrey Cohen, and Karen Eliot. These multiple-use names were developed and popularized in the 1970s and 1980s in artistic subcultures like Mail Art and its offshoot Neoism, which coined the multiple-use name concept of the "open pop star." The avant-garde pre-texts include the pseudonym Rrose Sélavy jointly used by Dada artist Marcel Duchamp and the surrealist poet Robert Desnos. In publishing, a long-running book series may be written by numerous authors but published under a uniting collective pseudonym. Examples include Carolyn Keene for the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series and other mystery stories, and Franklin W.…
Article summary
A multiple-use name or anonymity pseudonym is a name used by many different people to protect anonymity. It is a strategy that has been adopted by many unconnected radical and cultural groups, where the construct of personal identity has been criticised. One of the first modern multiple-use names was Nicolas Bourbaki, used by a group of French mathematicians associated with the École Normale Supérieure from 1935 onwards to exemplify the collective effort that goes into mathematics. The name Alan Smithee has been in use in Hollywood since 1968 by directors who wish to disavow creative credit for a film where control has been taken away from them. Other multiple identities in use in the artistic world include Luther Blissett, Sandy Larson, Monty Cantsin, Geoffrey Cohen, and Karen Eliot. These multiple-use names were developed and popularized in the 1970s and 1980s in artistic subcultures like Mail Art and its offshoot Neoism, which coined the multiple-use name concept of the "open pop star." The avant-garde pre-texts include the pseudonym Rrose Sélavy jointly used by Dada artist Marcel Duchamp and the surrealist poet Robert Desnos. In publishing, a long-running book series may be written by numerous authors but published under a uniting collective pseudonym. Examples include Carolyn Keene for the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series and other mystery stories, and Franklin W.…
Key claims
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Discussion questions
- Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
- Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
- If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?
Bibliography
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Key claims and bibliography are generated from the same tracked claims and sources as the article page.