Journals and Manuscript Submissions

Overview

Finding the right journal and the MLA Directory of Periodicals

How to write a cover letter for a journal submission

Where to find calls for special issuesWhat editors are looking for Readers' reports:  types of forms, types of

responsesHow to respond to a "revise and resubmit”Electronic submissions, bibliographic database

software, and other technical matters

How do you find the right journal?

What journals are cited in the articles you read?

What journals seem a good fit if you read them regularly?

MLA Directory of Periodicalshttp://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/flatbrowse?si

d=7aa79d47-6a3d-4855-a43e-4152ed10fbc8%40sessionmgr11&vid=2&hid=19

AAUP Directory (for books)

Cover Letters

Address the editor.Mention your title.Write a sentence or two explaining the

subject matter (and implicitly saying why it’s a good fit for the journal).

Provide contact information. Thank the editor.

Where to find Calls for Papers and Special Issues

The U Penn list: http://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/

Specialized listservs: VICTORIA, H-Amstdy, etc.

Specialized websites: HASTAC: http://hastac.org/ SSAWW: http://www.ssaww.org Modernist Studies: http://msa.press.jhu.edu/

Twitter and Facebook

What do Editors Want to See in a Manuscript?

Get to the point.Make a clear argument.Show familiarity with previous work.Describe how your work differs from that of

other critics.Good readings of the works but not JUST

readings of the works. Good writing style and organization. Don’t double-submit. No simultaneous

submissions.

The Editor’s Choices

Decides that the piece is within the scope of the journal, makes an original argument, and is solid enough to interest the journal’s readers - send out to readers

Decides that the piece is out of the scope of the journal’s mission, underdeveloped, simply a close reading, or not sufficiently original - send it back without sending it to readers

At some journals, only 2/5 get sent out to reviewers.

Readers’ Reports

What they see (forms). They do NOT see your name; you will be evaluated anonymously.

Editor will send it to a knowledgeable and sympathetic reviewer.

More journals are moving to online submissions and review. Example: Modernism/Modernity

http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/modernism

What will the editor’s letter and your readers’ reports tell you?

It’s accepted. Hooray! It may still need minor corrections.

It’s provisionally accepted but the readers may want you to address certain points.

It receives a revise and resubmit. (See next slide)It’s rejected. Typical reasons:

Essay doesn’t fit the scope of the journal. Journal has already published something on the subject

recently. Essay doesn’t make a sufficient contribution to the field. Essay doesn’t engage sufficiently with the critical discourse

surrounding the topic.

“Revise and Resubmit”

A “revise and resubmit” response is very common.

Read the reviewers’ comments carefully and the editor’s contextualization of those comments.

Revise with those guidelines in mind. Send the revision back with a narrative or

letter outlining how you responded.“Revise and Resubmit” is a positive sign.

Submissions

Via email (as at ESQ)http://libarts.wsu.edu/english/Journals/ESQ/m

anuscript.htmlVia central portal:

http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/exphttp://www.editorialmanager.com/al/By postal mail: http://www.press.uillinois.edu/journals/alr/alr

submissions.html

Bibliographic Software

Research citation (reference manager) software. • Research citation software isn't social networking or a

communications technology, but it can make the process of sharing research citations easier for researchers collaborating on a project.

• Most of these programs can format your references and generate a bibliography automatically.

• If you're in a research field and haven't tried a reference manager yet, I encourage you to look into them; they will save you time.

• Scientific journals will sometimes accept a reference library in one of these forms, but humanities journals won’t.

Citation Managers

• Endnote and Endnote Web. Endnote can download citations and format them. It's a stand-alone product, meaning that you don't need to be online to use it. It's a powerful program, but it isn't free. WSU has a subscription to Endnote Web,

• Sente is like Endnote, but for Mac/iPad.• CiteULike. CiteULike is a free medium for sharing

references. • BibTex and LaTEX. BibTeX is used in conjunction

with the LaTEX document formatting system; it requires more knowledge of formatting codes than the others.

Citation Managers, continued

Zotero. Zotero is a free, web-based citation and notes manager. This page at MIT will show you some of what it can do; here's a page comparing various forms: http://libguides.mit.edu/references.

Mendeley. Mendeley is free (like Zotero) and is optimized for sharing resources. See this article at The Chronicle of Higher Education by Julie Meloni, a WSU grad, or this one: http://libguides.mit.edu/content.php?pid=55486&sid=427307

RefWorks. RefWorks is another web-based citation software package.

Questions?