My work got either scooped or plagiarized-- what, if anything, to do?

[Cheerful]

In my social sciences fields, I've seen lots of redundant work across different journals, book chapters, and entire monographs. An article appears in one journal; a year later, someone else publishes much the same in another journal, often not citing the first article. Or a young scholar claims to create a new concept but it was already published by someone else under a different label 10-20 years prior.  It's increasingly common for people not to cite relevant works due to laziness, ignorance, and/or deliberate intent to ignore other works.  More competition than collegiality.

Observe pedanticromantic's and octoprof's advice to move faster on getting your work out if you don't want to be scooped.

Submit your manuscript.  Don't send it to the same journal that published B's article.

[larryc]

• -- Does the fact that "B"-author published their article first mean that I must now cite "B" in my draft of "A"?  If so, is also citing my (clearly earlier-dated, copyrighted, formally filed) dissertation sufficient to clarify that these ideas are, indeed, original and mine?  Would any of this have possible impact on the publishability of "A" for the journal?
  
  -- How much do I now need to slim down my coverage of the "B"-overlapping portions?  My article includes a lot of additional material not covered in "B", but the balance of the thing works better with a thorough treatment of the "B"-portions of the thesis, as well.
  
  --Do I contact "B"-author, with a link to my dissertation, to note the overlap in content?  Because I'm in a teaching-heavy position, it's quite possible "B"-author will end up getting around to the book version of this before I do.  If so, I would definitely like to be cited in said book.  However, I don't want to put "B"-author on the defensive or prompt them to try aggressive countermeasures that might interfere with the publication of "A" (which I need for my tenure file!). 
  

1. Yes--but do it thusly, either in your text or footnotes: [Me] has suggested this idea in 2007 [cite your diss]. B made  a similar argument in 2009 [cite]."

2. Not at all.

3. I wouldn't--but maybe?

[dr_codex]

When I earned my Ph.D. in Canada, the government instituted the requirement that all dissertations be freely available online. (The rationale was that every student and institution received substantial state support.) The internet was still pretty new, and students squawked that this would both hinder publication, and encourage scooping. In the end, it was agreed to have a time-lag, attempting to satisfy everybody.

In a case like the O.P.'s, the public dissemination of the dissertation would also be a kind of priority claim.

dc

[Caracal]

Also not in the humanities, but in my experience we tend to
a) Over-estimate how unique our ideas are. After all, we used past work to come up with our ideas, so other people can too.
b) Over-estimate how close a "scooping" paper is to our own, at least at first read. Pretty much every time I've had an oh-no someone scooped us reaction to seeing a title/abstract, further detailed reading revealed that there were substantial differences.

Ding Ding Ding. Puget just scooped me. Just as true in the humanities. Academia is a small world and all of us end up following trends in scholarship. People are reading the same new books and going to the same conferences. It isn't really that weird that two people come up with similar ideas. And yeah, once you look at it again you might find that there are some big differences in the topic and approach.

How much of a problem this is really depends on the details of the research and argument. If your project relies heavily on a particular set of sources that scholars have not used before you might have a problem. Publishers might not want to publish the second book in two years about John Donne's previously unknown letters to his mistress. However, if you're using sources that have been used before, it might be less of a big deal, especially if you can emphasize all the ways that your work differs from this other thing. There's probably room for two books about Shakespeare and Tudor politics, even if they use some of the same sources and make some similar points.

[larryc]

A new colleague of mine (who is wonderful!) has told me multiple times that their ideas have been stolen and published after they presented them at a conference. I am not sure what to make of this.

[Kron3007]

A new colleague of mine (who is wonderful!) has told me multiple times that their ideas have been stolen and published after they presented them at a conference. I am not sure what to make of this.

It's possible, but it is also just as likely (IMO) that others were already working in the same direction.  Most people I know mostly present work at conferences that is close enough to publishing that it would be unlikely to give anyone enough time to scoop it, which seems like sound reasoning.     

[Caracal]

A new colleague of mine (who is wonderful!) has told me multiple times that their ideas have been stolen and published after they presented them at a conference. I am not sure what to make of this.

It's possible, but it is also just as likely (IMO) that others were already working in the same direction.  Most people I know mostly present work at conferences that is close enough to publishing that it would be unlikely to give anyone enough time to scoop it, which seems like sound reasoning.   

Also what's the line between stealing someone's work and being inspired by it. If I go to a conference and as part of someone's paper, I learn about some source I was unaware of, but is relevant to my work, am I not allowed to go to the archives and use it? Obviously, it would be appropriate and good manners for me to put a footnote in that acknowledges my debt to the presenter in this situation. But really this is what conferences are supposed to be for. Otherwise, they are just places for people to add lines to their C.V and have awkward interactions with other awkward people.

[Dismal]

You add a footnote that says, "B's work was published just as I was readying my final draft.  On [topic] and [topic], now see also B [reference]."  You might also pare down the part that is most similar, as it is no longer new and cutting-edge, and beef up whatever parts are less similar — for one thing, that will make it more attractive to journals.

This.

And, of course, it's obvious why we encourage new PhDs to get their dissertation article(s) out as soon as possible.

Being so explicit seems a little off-putting to me, kind of like making some excuse where none is required.  At the end of the day, it was published first, so I would just cite it (and your thesis) as appropriate.  Anyone reading it will see the dates etc.

I definitely agree to expand on the areas that make sense and perhaps dial down what they did cover well.

I also wouldn't include the phrase "while I was readying my final draft."  Just cite your dissertation and the newer paper.