In an effort to address current discussions regarding Africa-based scholars in academic publishing, the editors of African Affairs reached out to Celia Nyamweru for input from her personal experiences. Celia Nyamweru spent 18 years teaching at Kenyatta University (KU) and another 18 years teaching at a US university with a strong undergraduate focus on Africa.
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What is the future of academic publishing? We’re celebrating University Press Week and Academic Book Week with a series of blog posts on scholarly publishing from staff and partner presses. Following on from our list of academic books that changed the world, we're looking to the future and how our current publishing could change lives and attitudes in years to come.
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“Fordham professors write your books, right?” This is often less a question than an assumption and probably the biggest misconception about not just our, but all, university presses.
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Charles Darwin was widely known as a travel writer and natural historian in the twenty years before On the Origin of Species appeared in 1859. The Voyage of the Beagle was a great popular success in the 1830s. But the radical theories developed in the Origin had been developed more or less in secret during those intervening twenty years.
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In thinking about the future of scholarly publishing – a topic almost as much discussed as the perennially popular ‘death of the academic monograph’ – I found a number of themes jostling for attention, some new, some all-too familiar. What are the challenges and implications of open access?
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This March, Oxford University Press is celebrating Women in Philosophy as part of Women’s History Month. We asked three of our female staff members who work on our distinguished list of philosophy books and journals to describe what it’s like to work on philosophy titles. Eleanor Collins is a Senior Assistant Commission Editor in philosophy who works in the Oxford office. Lucy Randall is a Philosophy Editor who works from our New York office. Sara McNamara is an Associate Editor who assists to manage our philosophy journals from our New York offices.
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Disseminating scholarship is at the heart of the Oxford University Press mission and much of academic publishing. It drives every part of publishing strategy—from content acquisition to sales. What happens, though, when a student, researcher, or general reader discovers content that they don’t have access to?
For example, while a majority of Oxford Handbook Online (OHO) and Oxford Scholarship Online (OSO) users have access through their institutions, not everyone does; sometimes even those who do need to conduct research at home or while on leave, when they aren’t connected to their campus networks. To facilitate such research, Oxford has partnered with the Copyright Clearance Center to begin offering chapters on a pay-per-view basis. Pay-per-view is a well-established business model in journal publishing but is only recently gaining traction for book-based content.
Beginning in October, unauthenticated users of Oxford Handbooks began seeing buy buttons on articles. Clicking the button will allow them to purchase 24-hour access or, for a premium, unlimited perpetual access. And starting in the New Year, just in time for the start of the new term, this option will be available at the chapter level in Oxford Scholarship Online.
As with any change, we didn’t take this lightly. Oxford, like any other publisher, needed to fully weigh the risks against the benefits. Our partnership with the Copyright Clearance Center is focused on expanding access while maintaining our robust global institutional partnerships. The benefits were clear from the start: allowing more users to access our content—from any device at any hour of the day—and in a multitude of currencies. A student rushing to finish a paper at the end of the term or a researcher away from her library can have full access to the best scholarship with just a few clicks and a credit card. They can cite with confidence.
With just a few months under our belt, the early results are incredibly encouraging. Customers from around the globe are accessing award-winning content—some for just 24 hours, others choosing to retain the article in perpetuity. We’re working with these users throughout to learn more—from their geographical location to the ease of the transaction. All of this feedback helps us further develop this new access model, our platform, and the overall user experience. Over the next year, we will further experiment with discounting, personalization, and recommendations to make the most of this important project.
In the end, we hope to have learned great deal about getting the best research into the hands—and minds—of as many users as possible. That, after all, is our mission.
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By Alice Northover
A recent Publishers Weekly story highlighted some of the innovative work that many university presses are undertaking: video marketing. Slick mini-films uploaded to YouTube may be common for the latest YA sensation at the trade presses, but cameras tend not to be seen among the spires of higher education. But Oxford University Press is one of many academic publishers using videos to present scholars’ ideas in a dynamic way – and further serve the press mission of excellence in research, scholarship, and education.
Over 40 marketers from across the academic publishing division — including publicity, end-user marketing, product marketing, and journals marketing — participate in some form of video production as part of their job. While the majority of their time and resources are still spent on traditional marketing activities, and the amount each person works on varies (from one a year to a dozen), video is seen as crucial to communicating the often complex ideas inside academia. Marketers may hire an outside production team and plan an elaborate day of filming with multiple interviews, or simply sit a lexicographer down in a meeting room for a couple hours to discuss their work. Sometimes freelancer editors are brought in to polish employee-filmed videos, or staff edit and polish videos in-house. Our New York office has a basic studio for DIY work. And, of course, the occasional author may produce their own video which we can edit and finalize, or simply host on our YouTube channel.
TYPES OF VIDEOS
The most basic form of video we produce – and in fact the majority of videos we produce – is the author interview. Whether visiting our New York office and spending 20 minutes in the studio, or in the Long Room of Trinity College Dublin Library, authors present the ideas conveyed in their latest work. And we’re not averse to an interactive interview, especially when it means a visit to a brewery. We spoke to Garrett Oliver, editor of the Oxford Companion to Beer, at the Brooklyn Brewery, where he gave us a tour of the facilities and explained the science behind beer.
While reference works have clearly moved from print to online, our understanding of them often hasn’t. Product videos deliver clear explanations of our online reference products, what purpose they serve, and how academics can use them. Instructional videos provide a crucial guide to many of our products and services. What better way to illustrate search tricks and tips on Oxford Handbooks Online than to show it in action?
Journals offer us with a unique way of addressing current research and trends in the field — both in print and on camera. The European Heart Journal’s EHJ Today pairs editors with leaders in the field of cardiology to discuss their work and the impact it will have – whether or not it appears in the journal. These discussion videos can also bring people around a common theme. For example, Arne Kalleberg, editor of Social Forces, interviewed sociologists from around the world on inequality (the theme of the American Sociological Association Annual Meeting in 2013).
Both journals and our higher education textbooks generate another a unique opportunity: creating supplemental material to demonstrate ideas within the text. Chemistry³: Introducing inorganic, organic and physical chemistry, Second Edition by Andrew Burrows, John Holman, Andrew Parsons, Gwen Pilling, and Gareth Price is accompanied by over 90 videos illuminating key concepts. Scientific journal articles are often accompanied by animated models, and in some cases a live demonstration:
Click here to view the embedded video.
YouTube provides us with a chance to share conferences and webinars with people who couldn’t attend the original, whether it’s Psychtalks, an OED Symposium, or the Teaching of Public Law.
Video also presents a unique way to share our Press history, whether its lexicographers explaining the process of words entering the OED, or silent films from 1925. Watch out for some interviews with our Press Archivist, Martin Maw, on the Press and the First World War later this year.
Click here to view the embedded video.
There are even videos that members of the public don’t see. When introducing new journals or textbooks, we sometimes create videos for our sales staff to better explain them. Authors or editors reveal what’s unique and can provide more information in two minutes than a packet of papers that takes 15 minutes to read.
But perhaps our favorite videos are ones that we didn’t produce. In 2012, Oxford University Press partnered with the Guardian for the Very Short Film competition. Students from across the United Kingdom competed to explain a concept in less than 60 seconds. The winner, Sally Le Page, showed how it is impossible to understand biology without evolution by natural selection in “A Very Short Film on Evolution.”
Click here to view the embedded video.
PURPOSE OF VIDEOS
But what’s the point of all these videos? Has anyone ever sat down to watch a video and decided to buy a book immediately afterwards? Well it’s misleading to consider these videos in isolation. We never spend hours creating a video only to have it sit on YouTube for no one to see.
First off, we put a tremendous amount to time and effort into writing titles, descriptions, and tags to ensure they show up in search results – giving people basic information and a direction at the beginning of their research journey. (YouTube is the second most popular search engine in the world.)
Second, we use these videos across our social media, from this blog to Facebook, Tumblr to Google Plus, and everything in between. They can provide some much needed refreshment in a sea of text and engage or re-engage readers. Social Bakers found that videos uploaded directly to Facebook see 40% higher engagement than YouTube links shared to Facebook.
But social media isn’t the only place you’ll see videos pop up. You can find them in e-newsletters, on product pages on our website, even on vendor websites, such as Amazon or Barnes & Noble.
Our publicity team also uses video to pitch radio and television producers, demonstrating how enlightening our authors — and their ideas – are. And authors use these videos for future speaking engagements and media appearances.
But most importantly, these videos disseminate Oxford scholarship around the globe, and even help the occasional student pass their final exam.
Alice Northover is a Social Media Manager at Oxford University Press. She works with many of the marketing staff producing videos, whether issuing branding guidelines, advising where to make a cut, or just uploading videos to YouTube.
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Image credit: Close-up shot of a lens from high-end DV camcorder. Photo by TommL, iStockphoto.
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Today Peter Mayer, MD of Gerald Duckworth & Company Ltd, and Nigel Newton, Chief Executive of Bloomsbury Publishing, announced the sale of the Duckworth Academic list to Bloomsbury. Integral to the sale, the Duckworth Trade list will be sold by Bloomsbury in the UK and all overseas markets from March 1, 2011. Duckworth remains independent.
Duckworth Academic will operate henceforth as Bristol Classical Press, taking effect immediately. Duckworth’s Academic list has long been known for its strong publishing centered on books about the ancient world. This new arrangement will allow Bloomsbury Academic to build on its inherent strength alongside the company’s worldwide strategy in other academic disciplines.
Mayer comments, ‘After seven years of growth at Duckworth, our Trade list now matches in size the traditionally strong Academic list. Bloomsbury is the perfect home for the Duckworth Academic list. This sale gives Bloomsbury Academic the ability to build that side of Bloomsbury’s business but the important thing for us is that it gives Duckworth a much broader infrastructural sales context within which to continue to build the Trade list, working closely as well with our US sister company, The Overlook Press.
‘To that end, we have recently appointed Jon Jackson, previously of Osprey and before that Weidenfeld, as Editorial Director of the Duckworth Trade list and Ben Slight, coming from a position as a Waterstone’s regional manager, as Duckworth Sales Coordinator, both working with Publicity Manager Suzannah Rich.’
Nigel Newton, Chief Executive of Bloomsbury Publishing said ‘Bringing such a distinguished academic list into Bloomsbury Academic is an important stepping stone in the development of our publishing in this area. We are also delighted to be representing the Duckworth Trade list, one which I have long admired, in the UK and overseas markets.’
Mayer adds ‘The Duckworth name is one of the oldest and most famous in British publishing. It has grown from what had become a small base in 2003 by nearly five times since then. Working together with Overlook in the US, with a strong staff and the support and facilities of Bloomsbury in the UK and abroad, this growth looks set to continue.
‘We have sought to develop a structure for our two parts and we found it with Bloomsbury. The new structure looks to a future in which both parts of the present Duckworth can prosper in different ways. On the General side we aim to fulfil the promise of the historic Duckworth Trade list, a trade publisher since its founding by Gerald Duckworth in 1898. It continues as independent as ever.
‘Two Duckworth stalwarts, Deborah Blake and Ray Davies, will be joining Bloomsbury Academic and, based on long years of service, I can truly say that they have both been the soul of our publishing. Even in the time of Colin Haycraft, when Duckworth embarked on Academic publishing, Deborah, as Editorial Director of the Academic list, helped form it. She finally came to be virtually the Academic list’s embodiment. Also that in the first very difficult years after Overlook and Duckworth became associated, she and Ray, our Production Director, were the sturdiest of linchpins connecting the past with the present.
‘I believe Academic publishing, like many editorial areas, needs a larger environment today in which to prosper. I really have no doubts that both the creative and economic sides of the Duckwo
This week, we're shining the spotlight on another one of our Place of the Year 2015 shortlist contenders: Cuba.
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