Publishing

Should PhD Students Embargo Their Dissertations?

Most universities offer PhD students the option to embargo their dissertations, usually for up to two years. During the embargo, access to the official dissertation is restricted. Its content is not placed online, and if someone wanted to read it, they would likely have to go to the library of the university at which the degree was earned and view the hard copy whil..

A Plea for More Short Journal Publications (guest post by Avram Hiller) (updated w/ reply to comments)

“The marginal increase in overall enlightenment that arises from the additional time philosophers use to perfect long articles (and for readers to read them) is in many cases less than what could be achieved by using our time in other ways.” (more…)

Self-Citation and Anonymous Review

How should you go about preparing an article for anonymous peer-review if you cite yourself in your article? There are a couple of issues here that suggest that mere redaction is not usually enough. (more…)

Submitting Book Proposals to Multiple Presses at Once

A reader writes in with a question about book publishing: (more…)

Peer Review or Perish: The Problem of Free Riders in Philosophy (guest post by Elizabeth Hannon)

“Here’s a radical suggestion, using the only weapon/motivational device editors have: If someone fails to fulfill their duties as referee, the journal will not accept submissions from that referee.” (more…)

Project to Develop Code of Publishing Ethics for Philosophy Awarded $75k

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded a $75,000 grant to a a team undertaking the development of a code of publishing ethics for philosophy. (more…)

New Form of Peer Review At New Philosophy Journal

The Public Philosophy Journal (PPJ) has published its inaugural issue. The editors describe the journal as “an open forum for the curation and creation of accessible scholarship that deepens our understanding of, deliberation about, and action concerning issues of public relevance,” and have instituted a novel form of peer review they think fits better with the jour..

Do Journals Favor Affiliated Authors?

“Do academic journals favor authors who share their institutional affiliation?” That’s the central question of a recent study, which finds evidence that suggests the answer is “yes.” (more…)

Journal of History of Philosophy Lifts Moratorium on Early Modern Submissions

Late last year, the Journal of the History of Philosophy (JHP) had announced that it would not be accepting new submissions on early modern philosophy and would be treating “revise and resubmit” verdicts on manuscripts as rejections. JHP editor Jack Zupko (Alberta) has now announced that these measures are no longer in effect. (more…)

Ethics Announces New Editors and Gender Data

The well-known and highly-regarded academic philosophy journal, Ethics, has announced its new editors. (more…)

Peter J. Schulz Plagiarizes Again—And Is Caught By Philosophy Prof.’s Class (updated)

Peter J. Schulz, who has a PhD in philosophy from Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt (Germany) and is currently employed as Professor of Communication in the Faculty of Communication Sciences at the University of Lugano, and who already had four plagiarism-related retractions (and three citation-related errata) to his name, was again found to have plagiariz..

Journal of the History of Philosophy Stops Accepting Papers in Early Modern (updated w/ reply from editor)

(NOTE: The moratorium reported on in this post was lifted in July 2018. The journal is now accepting submissions in all areas of the history of philosophy.) The Journal of the History of Philosophy, one of the leading history of philosophy journals, has announced that it will no longer be accepting submissions on “early modern philosophy up to but not including Kant..

Springer Agrees To China’s Demand To Censor Its Journals

Springer Nature, possibly the world’s largest academic publisher, has agreed to demands from the Chinese government to block access in China to more than a thousand articles, according to reports at Financial Times and The New York Times.

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Should You Referee the Same Paper Twice, for Different Journals? (guest post by Eric Schwitzgebel)

The following is a guest post * by Eric Schwitzgebel, professor of philosophy at the University of California, Riverside, and blogger at The Splintered Mind.

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On Amélie Rorty’s Use of a Pseudonym

Retraction Watch has posted an article on Amélie Oksenberg Rorty‘s use of a pseudonym and recent correction notices issued by the University of California Press regarding two chapters she wrote. (more…)

A Desk Rejection Scorecard (guest post by Antti Kauppinen)

The following is a guest post * by Antti Kauppinen, currently an Academy of Finland Research Fellow at the Department of Philosophy at the University of Tampere, and soon to be (as of 2018) Professor of Social and Moral Philosophy at the University of Helsinki. It’s about improving desk rejection: the practice of editors at academic journals rejecting papers without ..

Bypassing The Journals

In the lively and still ongoing discussion of “The Publication Emergency,” a few commenters suggest the use of an online archive for posting papers. See this comment from Jc Beall. In a related comment written at about the same time as Beall’s, jdkbrown says: (more…)

An Anonymous Peer-Reviewed Philosophy Journal?

Are some philosophical positions so controversial that we should have a journal that publishes peer-reviewed essays about them anonymously?

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Should Graduate Students Referee?

Should graduate students be called upon to serve as referees for journals? I was stunned a few years back to learn of the growing use of graduate students to serve as referees—stunned until I remembered the (arguably) over-publishing practice of our profession. But now the practice of enlisting grad-student referees—to my limited and aging eyes—appears to be g..

Statement From Hypatia Board Regarding Tuvel Controversy

The following is a guest post * from the Board of Directors of Hypatia, the non-profit corporation that owns Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy, in regards to the controversy surrounding the journal’s publication of “In Defense of Transracialism” by Rebecca Tuvel, an assistant professor of philosophy at Rhodes College.

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What Philosophy Journal Decisions Look Like

Sometimes a picture is worth a million words, or at least a number of numbers. Writer Natasha M. Frost has created a visual representation of publication decisions made at a number of academic philosophy journals, as reported by authors at the Blog of the APA’s new journal survey site: (more…)

Systematic Discrimination in Peer Review: Some Reflections (guest post by by Kyle Powys Whyte)

“As these issues of peer review and editorial review continue to arise every year, I hope people increasingly address the systematic problems—taking into consideration the ongoing history of discrimination and the thorough reforms that need to take place in the world of academic publication.”

The following is a guest post * by Kyle Powys Whyte, Timnick Chair in ..

Before We Go Forward (guest post by Alison Suen)

“…the conversation should have been about the issues, rather than the individual. Unfortunately, it did not begin that way.”

The following is a guest post * by Allison Suen, assistant professor of philosophy at Iona College.

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Citation Patterns Across Journals (guest post by Brian Weatherson)

“Anything can happen in a small sample, but it was enough to suggest to me a hypothesis: There is no such thing as a generalist philosophy journal.”

The following is a guest post * by Brian Weatherson, Marshall M. Weinberg Professor of Philosophy at the University of Michigan. It originally appeared at his blog, Thoughts, Arguments, and Rants.

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Plagiarism In Philosophy: How Publishers Respond

How do publishers respond to cases of plagiarism in philosophy? Michael V. Dougherty, professor and Sr. Ruth Caspar Chair in Philosophy at Ohio Dominican University, looks into the matter in a new article in Metaphilosophy, “Correcting the Scholarly Record in the Aftermath of Plagiarism: A Snapshot of Current-Day Publishing Practices in Philosophy.” (more…)..