Author: jbolick

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CFP: Scholarly Communication Librarianship and Open Culture: Law, Economics, and Publishing

UPDATE: due to holidays and related downtime, feedback from peers, and respect for everyone’s work/life balance (including our own), we’re extending the CFP by 2 weeks, to Jan. 19. We will begin reviewing submissions on the 5th in an attempt to maintain the timeline below, but we hope this takes a little heat off and encourages more folks to submit.

We are pleased to announce a call for proposals for Unit 3 contributions (see more details below) in our upcoming edited open book, Scholarly Communication Librarianship and Open Culture: Law, Economics, and Publishing, to be openly published by the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) in electronic and print formats. Authors retain copyright of their contributions, but commit to open publication in the CC-BY-NC book.

Proposals will be accepted in three areas:

  • Perspectives – situated and self-reflexive discussions of topics of importance in scholarly communication
  • Intersections – examples of and reflections on the intersection of scholarly communication with other areas of academic librarianship or other stakeholders
  • Case Studies – stories and lessons learned drawn from experience by librarians engaged in scholarly communication work

Edited by (in alphabetical order)

Josh Bolick, University of Kansas Libraries, jbolick@ku.edu

Maria Bonn, School of Information Sciences, University of Illinois Urbana Champaign, mbonn@illinois.edu

Will Cross, North Carolina State University Libraries, wmcross@ncsu.edu

Proposal Deadline: January 5, 2020 

Notification of Selected Authors/Contributions

January 24, 2020

Authors Submit Completed Contributions

March 30, 2020 (editors may provide feedback and make revision suggestions and will work with selected authors to set timeline for resubmission)

Description

Scholarly Communication and Open Culture was conceived as an open textbook of scholarly communication librarianship, which we hope may be a vehicle to increase instruction on SC topics in LIS programs, as well as serve as a resource for continuing education. The book consists of three units. Unit 1 defines scholarly communication and scholarly communication librarianship, and provides an introduction to the social, economic, technological, and legal backgrounds that underpin and shape scholarly communication work in libraries. Unit 2 begins with an introduction to “open”, broadly conceived, followed by guest-edited sections on Open Access (Amy Buckland), Open Education (Lillian Hogendoorn), Open Data (Brianna Marshall), and Open Science & Infrastructure (Micah Vandegrift). Unit 3, the subject of this CFP, will consist of concise (approx. 1,000 words) Perspectives, Intersections, and Case Studies.

Perspectives, Intersections, and Case Studies should serve to stimulate discussion and reflection on theory and implications for practice. They might dive into more niche subjects/topics, or emerging areas. Suggested further reading, discussion questions, and reference to existing resources for more information/training are welcome.

Perspectives

Perspectives are intended to offer situated and self-reflexive discussions of topics of importance in scholarly communication and the ways in which libraries or librarians respond to those topics. Scholarly communications work inevitably leads to engagement with issues upon which opinions vary, as do the courses of action that address those issues. Personal and professional experience, as well as institutional context, and personal and community identity inform and shape the opinions and approaches of scholarly communication professionals.

Examples of Perspectives might include reflections from a solo scholarly communication librarian asked to spin up a new program, a community college librarian working to support open access with faculty that do not prioritize publishing in scientific journals, or a scholar working on politically contested topics balancing a commitment to openness with safeguarding themselves from hostile alt-right trolls and doxxing.

Intersections

Intersections invites examples of and reflections on the intersection of scholarly communication with other areas of academic librarianship, obvious or otherwise. Almost all work in academic libraries is arguably and ultimately in service of scholarly communication. While libraries increasingly designate scholarly communications specialists, those specialists often collaborate with colleagues throughout their organizations to provide their expertise in addressing scholarly communication opportunities and challenges. Conversely, any area of library work might turn to a scholarly communications specialist for an informed perspective and expertise. Intersections will explore how scholarly communication work can or should interface with other areas of academic librarianship, such as undergraduate engagement, public services, tech services, DEI work, and so on.

Examples of Intersections might include exploration of library-press partnerships for sharing nontraditional research, open pedagogy work done as a collaboration between the library and a center for academic support, or a scholarly project that connects with the knowledge, innovations, and practices of indigenous and local communities.

Case Studies

Case Studies present stories and lessons learned drawn from experience. Case Studies should provide specific, contextualized examples of the kinds of tasks and questions librarians working in scholarly communication encounter and strategies for response. A case study will describe and evaluate a case, reflecting upon the issues involved and their implications for scholars and scholarship. It will suggest possible responses to the case and evaluate the effectiveness and possible challenges of those strategies. A case study grounded in actual experience might also describe the actions that were taken and reflect upon subsequent outcomes.

Examples of Case Studies might include a specific course marking project done at an institution working to support OER and textbook affordability, a digital humanities project that used interdisciplinary expertise in the libraries, or a library research data management initiative that helps researchers meet funder mandates for open data.

Selection Criteria
Proposals will be selected based on:

  • Alignment with goals and theme of book
  • A clear sense of intent/purpose
  • Quality of writing
  • Feasibility
  • Basis in theory, research, and/or practice
  • Contribution to book as a whole
  • Offering a new or underrepresented perspective on scholarly communication and scholarly communication librarianship

Acceptance of a proposal does not guarantee inclusion in the book. In addition to the above criteria, editors are keen to include contributions from a variety of institutional types, from authors at different career status, and with diversity and representation in mind. Co-authoring is welcome but not required, particularly where senior authors can partner with rising/early career authors.

Proposal Information required:

  • Section (Perspective, Intersection, or Case Study)
  • Title of contribution
  • Keywords
  • Proposal abstract (up to 250 words)
  • Justification: tell us why it’s important, including links to any supporting documentation (materials, sites, news stories, etc.)
  • Author(s) name, title, institution, and preferred email
  • Author bio (up to 100 words)
  • Acknowledgement of Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial license of the entire book

Submission Process:
Authors interested in submitting Unit 3 contributions should complete the proposal form on or before January 5, 2020. UPDATED: CFP open until January 19, 2020.

Please direct questions to Josh Bolick (jbolick@ku.edu), Maria Bonn (mbonn@illinois.edu), and/or Will Cross (wmcross@ncsu.edu).

Note: this CFP is also available as a Google Doc with comments enabled. Feedback on the CFP itself (including suggestions for improving it) is welcome and appreciated.

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Open Access Section Editor

We’re super stoked to share that Amy Buckland is contributing to the forthcoming ACRL Intro to Scholarly Communication Librarianship as Open Access Section Editor. Amy is Head, Research & Scholarship at the University of Guelph. Her professional life revolves around open access initiatives, publishing support, digital scholarship, and research data services. Her considerable experience as a passionate advocate for openness is a huge boon to the project, particularly on an aspect of SC (and broader) librarianship that has become so pivotal. She’s done more rad things than can be quickly listed here, among them raising critical awareness of SC issues in the ACRL Scholarly Communication Roadshow. Prior to joining libraryland, Amy worked in publishing for 14 years, and left that industry to build a better system with libraries at the centre. She generously wrote the following post to announce her involvement:

Hey everyone! I am excited to be joining this extremely great super awesome group of folks working on an open textbook for scholarly communication. As someone who has been working in open access for almost 15 years (yowsa), I was honoured to be invited to edit the section on open access. Just as Brianna (open data) and Lillian (OER) have mentioned in their posts, I’d love to hear from you about what should be included (I mean, don’t get me wrong, I have lots of ideas, but the magic lives in our community). Since this topic is near and dear to my heart, rest assured that we will not shy away from controversies, nor will anyone be mollycoddled.

Give me a shout at @jambina or buckland[at]] uoguelph.ca with questions, comments, criticism, and cathartic confessions.

This leaves one more section editor announcement to round out the editorial team, to be made in the next couple of weeks. #highfive #nomollycoddling

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Open Data Section Editor

We’re very excited to announce that Brianna Marshall is joining our effort to create an open textbook of scholarly communication librarianship, which is currently under advanced contract with ACRL, to be published in 2020. Brianna is the Director of Research Services at the University of California Riverside Libraries and Chair of the ACRL Digital Scholarship Section. She’s generously agreed to serve as the editor of the open data section, a role that she is incredibly qualified to fulfill. We’re excited to bring her considerable expertise, knowledge, and enthusiasm to the project and look forward to working together on creating the best possible resource to support teaching and learning scholarly communication topics, including open data. Brianna kindly authored a post about her involvement, which is shared below. If you see any of us, Josh Bolick, Maria Bonn, Will Cross, and Brianna at ACRL in Cleveland next week, please say “hi”!

Hi all! I am excited to share that I have been asked to step in as editor for the open data section of the forthcoming open textbook on Scholarly Communication.

Many thanks to Josh, Will, and Maria for inviting me to join this project. They’ve laid out a solid outline for the book and I’ve been working closely with them to think through the open data section. As the authors have shared, the end product will be an introductory text intended to be useful to anyone interested in learning about scholarly communication librarianship. Contributing to this vision presents a fun and interesting opportunity. As someone who lamented the dearth of these topics in the LIS curriculum while I was a graduate student, it’s exciting to think of the possible impact that this type of open resource could have. Admittedly, this means that the pressure’s on to create something useful!

As I’ve started to consider the open data section, I’m imagining that it will touch on topics like reproducibility and managing data for re-use, sharing and publishing data, understanding funder mandates, and talking points for working with researchers. To tap into the collective wisdom of librarians who work with open data, I’ll be putting out a call for practitioner-contributed perspectives; Josh, Will, and Maria will be also be soliciting case studies for the book in the summer and early fall. Keep an eye out for more on those calls. For now, I would love to hear your ideas on what to include in the open data section!

  • 1. If you are a current student, what are you most interested in learning about in relation to open data (or open research more broadly)?
  • 2. If you are an instructor, what do you want to make sure your students learn about as they head into the field?
  • 3. And if you are a practitioner, what do you wish you had learned about when you were in graduate school? What do you want to pass along to new librarians and information professionals?

Feel free to tweet me at @notsosternlib or send me a note at briannahmarshall [at] gmail.com. I look forward to hearing from you! -Brianna

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Reflections on a Busy Fall

The OER+Scholcomm team has been busy this fall! In early October, Maria and Josh joined 900+ OER advocates at the Open Education Conference in Niagara Falls, NY (Will was unfortunately waylaid by the remnants of Hurricane Michael moving up through the Southeast). Josh gave a lightning talk on our LIS faculty research, and Maria and Josh led a session on lowering barriers to participation in OER creation by focusing on granularity: small-scale projects. Will attended OpenCon in Toronto a few weeks later where he led an active discussion on the hidden curriculum of scholarly communication, and then immediately joined Josh and Maria in South Carolina for The Charleston Conference, where we ate all the oysters led a full-day preconference and hosted a “lively discussion” session.

Rather than intense breakdowns and analysis of each event (you can read some excellent examples of that, from Lillian Rigling at Open Ed and from Monica Brown at OpenCon), we wanted to share a few reflections across the events:

  1. DEI and related critiques are on the minds of many, and for good reason. Jess Mitchell’s OE keynote was a fantastic example of this, calling out many of the excellent sessions by our peers that centered on social justice and critical reflection. Jess asked us to critically reflect on who we’re leaving behind or excluding, even as we’re celebrating our successes. OpenCon made these issues the central theme of the event, with amazing speakers, hands-on workshops, and so many opportunities to meet and talk with new people that the event left one open scientist literally speechless!
  2. Like minds; we heard from colleagues who are doing related or adjacent work to ours. Lots of folks are thinking about practitioner-driven training for librarians, particularly in emerging or otherwise under-addressed areas of LIS curricula, and the best ways of identifying and addressing the gaps. This is really exciting! We’re not thinking in a vacuum, but as part of a growing movement to be proactive in identifying curricular gaps and filling them as practitioners. Check out “Everything Nobody Taught You About Library Acquisitions Work” by Lindsay Cronk and Rachel Fleming (mega bonus points for playing Bikini Kill to warm up the crowd in Charleston). We can’t wait to see what grows out of these spaces and projects and to discover the opportunities to collaborate and support each other.
  3. Community-owned infrastructure; it’s increasingly obvious to many that openness entails more than “5R” permissions. Along with the recognition that issues of inclusion and equity are critical to openness, the open community is exploring how openness can be grounded in a decentralized practice and space that empowers all participants. Steel Wagstaff and Billy Meinke spoke about this at OpenEd18 in the context of student data and open education, citing Chris Gilliard’s call to recognize open as freedom from “surveillance, extraction, and monetization of data.” As open education wrestles with the rise of for-profit services built around OER and Elsevier is developing a business model as an analytics company, this vision of openness built on decentralization and digital inclusion is increasingly vital to supporting the agency and autonomy at the heart of open values. As Robin DeRosa observed in her recent keynote for “Making Knowledge Public,” at the 2018 President’s Dream Colloquium at Simon Fraser University:

“open is most centrally about designing infrastructure from the perspective of our publics. This is not about openly licensing any one particular artifact. This is not about saving students $100 on a textbook here or there. This is about taking a stand for an ecosystem powered by infrastructure that actively strengthens the public good [and creating] open ecosystems in government, data, science, research, education, and software that are contextual, tied to community need, and reflective of the diversity of the real people who depend on our universities to do good work and improve the condition of the world.”

As we continue our own work on open, we are excited to make the OER+ScholComm project not just an openly-licensed resource or collection of resources, but the locus of an active, inclusive, and empowered community of practice for teaching and transforming scholarly communication and related areas. We’ll be talking more about this project in the spring, but we have great aspirations for the project as a model for openness that reflects the values of inclusion, the diversity of our communit[ies] of practice, and as infrastructure that goes beyond any single author or publisher to empower everyone to control their identities and share their stories on their own terms.

Good luck wrapping up your fall/year. Reach out to us if you have comments/questions/feedback.

High fives to everyone – Maria, Will, and Josh

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Big News!

A couple weeks ago, I teased on Twitter that we have some exciting news:

Now we’re at #OpenEd18, which is a great place to share:

The ACRL New Publications Advisory Board recently “enthusiastically” approved our proposal to publish the cornerstone of our collaboration: an open textbook of scholarly communication librarianship! ACRL Content Strategist Erin Nevius wrote sharing this news, adding:

The board loves the idea of a text of this type and the open ethos around its publication

We’re thrilled to be working with ACRL on this, and deeply grateful to  Erin and the Advisory Board for advancing this piece of the project to the next step. We’re working on a Memorandum of Agreement to nail down some specifics, and to create a plan of work to get it done, with a probable publication date in 2020 under the new working title: Scholarly Communication Librarianship and Open Culture: Law, Economics, and Publishing. We’ll share more details as we have them. In the meantime, thanks to the many many people who’ve participated in conversations up to this point!