[Air-l] Trouble with journals

[James Whyte]

The issue of peer review could be eliminated by peer rating (all readers)
   
  James

John Postill <jpostill at usa.net> wrote:
  ------ Original Message ------
Received: Wed, 25 Apr 2007 09:54:32 AM BST
From: "John Postill" 
To: "Maximilian C. Forte" ,

Subject: [Medianthro] Trouble with journals

Max Forte wrote:

> I am 
> also a very passionate proponent of open access publishing, and in that
vein
I am the 
> editor of a specialized, peer reviewed journal titled, KACIKE: The Journal
of Caribbean 
> Amerindian History and Anthropology (at www.kacike.org), which has
encountered absolutely 
> *none* of the problems that opponents of open access journals normally
list.
> 

I'm glad Max has brought up the subject of journals as I've been discussing
this issue with colleagues recently and it seems to me (and others) that
something's seriously wrong with how the system works. I've experienced
firsthand and heard stories of journal submissions where one is kept waiting
anything between 12 and 24 months before hearing any substantial news, and
that's after having chased this up with the journal a number of times. At the
same time, authors are not allowed to submit the same piece to another
journal, so often at the end of a very long wait a rejection comes and
they're
back to square one having wasted precious months. 

It's clear that people are busy and that peer reviews take time, but should
we
really have to wait 12-15 months, or even longer, for a response? Perhaps
journals should commit themselves to a reasonable waiting period (say, max 4
months) and publish figures of the time it takes them on average to get back
to prospective contributors? Or perhaps contributors themselves should
publish
or circulate these figures in the public domain? 

Any thoughts on this? 

******************************************

EASA Media Anthropology Network
http://www.media-anthropology.net

For further information please contact:
Dr John Postill
Sheffield Hallam University, UK
jpostill at usa.net

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