The Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers recently held their annual meeting in London and one of the highlighted sessions was “What Does Academic Engagement Mean Now?” moderated by Isabel Thompson of Oxford University Press. The panel was supposed to address, among other things, whether we are achieving everything we aim to in regards to academic engagement through our current methods. There were some fresh perspectives offered, but accordingly to one attendee, it was the moderators’ framing of the session that was the most useful part. She lifted up the importance of roles; those of the reader, author, reviewer, and editorial board member or editor. The Scholarly Kitchen brought this interesting information to our attention in their article, “Caught in the Middle — Can Publishers Resolve Contradictory Expectations?”
The irony is that one individual can occupy more than one role and at the same time. Each one has its own priorities and they frequently conflict. Publishing platforms are frequently caught in this conflict of expectations.
Melody K. Smith
Sponsored by Access Innovations, the world leader in thesaurus, ontology, and taxonomy creation and metadata application.
