Hi everyone. I've been asked by another academic in my department whether I would like to co-author a paper with him. It's probably a really good opportunity and I recognise the advantages (reputation, networking and all the important stuff), but I'm so busy at the moment. Does anyone know what co-authorship involves? How much extra work is it? I don't want to throw this opportunity away unless I have to.

Congratulations wally, you've clearly been making your mark :-) As for the workload, I think it depends very much on the individual. A student I work with tidied one section, sorted the references and got first author, others have done a lot of donkey work for considerably less recognition. Could you have a chat with him and ask how he wants to divide the work, writing, etc?

I think it is worth taking on the paper, if you possibly can, since every paper will count when it comes to postdoc or academic job hunting. And once the thesis is done, it maybe be harder to get opportunities like this.

My humanities thesis has taken, so far, 3 years and 8 months. Yes, finishing in 3 years would have been great. But as it stands I will have 3 papers and 1 book chapter (which I am doing the torturous corrections for now, distracting me from thesis!) which is supposedly going to help me on the job market (it hasn't so far). Eitherway, meh - get as much as you can into print without going insane.

PS: I have gone insane.