Thank you to everyone who made our conversation about academic publishing so productive!  We had the unique chance to gain diverse perspectives from two faculty members in different places in their career.  It was also one of our largest turnouts!

Here are a few notes from the session:

• Book Reviews:
  • Book review essays, as opposed to single book reviews, are lengthy and include multiple books –Rhetoric Review…. You should be making comparisons
  • Dr. Harker’s Reading Response questions are a good start to a book review.  To remind you, here they are:
    • Why is this work important or useful?
    • What is the argument? What are the limits of the argument?
    • What counts as evidence in the book?
    • What 2-3 connections to other texts can I make?
    • What are key terms of the text?
    • What are some questions to consider?
• Where do you find CFP’s for special issues/call for papers?
  • Listserves
  • UPenn
  • Networking
• Should you publish for a University Press?
  • Research Heavy job, try for a UP first
  • Use a press that is recognized as reputable and academic
  • Press matters; think about peer review process
• Multiple Submissions
  • Don’t ask publishers about it—it’s unethical
  • Edited collections: make sure it’s already been accepted by a publisher
• What’s going to get me looked at?
  • 1-2 Peer-reviewed Journal Article for a research institution—nothing will compete with it
  • The kind of job you want determines what they will be looking for
  • Book chapters often aren’t as rigorously peer reviewed as an article
  • Book chapter on the market is a good thing because you can network at conferences
• Journal Articles
  • Selecting the venues:
    • How to position articles for multiple journals
    • Focus on specialty or broaden out?
  • Special Issues
  • • Think about review period when choosing journal and size of journal

*The importance and values of a writing group cannot be over-emphasized.  So, please check back for information about upcoming writing group meeting*