Post on 31-Mar-2015
42nd Annual ConferenceLIBER München 2013
Open Access – perspectives in the humanities
Dr. Hildegard SchäfflerBayerische Staatsbibliothek
1600 journals in the humanities (16,5%) (June 2013)
“When it comes to open access in the humanities, it does not feel, to many, as though they were born open or are achieving openness but, rather, that they are having openness violently thrust upon them.” (Martin Eve, Guardian Professional, 25.03.2013)
“The same disciplines [humanities and social sciences] have been slowest to adopt open access opportunities, […].” (Fred Friend, Knowledge Exchange Briefing Paper, 2011)
Secondary Open Access Born Open Access
Electronic journals Green Open AccessDelayed Open Access
Gold Open AccessWith or without APCs?
Scholarly monographs/ editions
Digitisation of published monographs/editions:
out of and within copyright
Open Access scholarly monographs
Open Access editions
Content aggregation
Subject-specific /thematic platforms Publication platforms
Social media communication
Academic blogging etc.
Secondary Open Access Born Open Access
Electronic journals Green Open AccessDelayed Open Access
Gold Open AccessWith or without APCs?
Scholarly monographs/ editions
Digitisation of published monographs/editions:
out of and within copyright
Open Access scholarly monographs
Open Access editions
Content aggregation
Subject-specific /thematic platforms Publication platforms
Social media communication
Academic blogging etc.
Electronic journals – secondary Open Access
• Green Open Access– Self-archiving policies of publishers in the humanities– Possibly longer embargo periods– PEER project: 28% of the articles self-archived by authors from the
humanities and social sciences
• Delayed Open Access– Moving wall concept– E.g. Francia (Thorbecke-Verlag and German Historical Institute Paris /
Bavarian State Library)> Public-private partnership over delayed open access for a
scholarly journal
Electronic journals – born Open Access
• Gold Open Access– Approx. 1600 peer-reviewed gold OA journals in the Directory of Open
Access Journals (June 2013)– Approx. 5% charge Article Processing Charges (APCs) (July 2012)– Majority published by universities and reasearch institutes – Where would the funding come from?– Will mega journals work for the humanities?
Structural changes in the journals market likely to be slower than in the STM fields
Secondary Open Access Born Open Access
Electronic journals Green Open AccessDelayed Open Access
Gold Open AccessWith or without APCs?
Scholarly monographs/ editions
Digitisation of published monographs/editions:
out of and within copyright
Open Access scholarly monographs
Open Access editions
Content aggregation
Subject-specific /thematic platforms Publication platforms
Social media communication
Academic blogging etc.
Scholarly monographs/editions – secondary Open Access
• Digitisation of out-of-copyright content– Vast corpus of (primary) content for scholarly research (still to be fully
explored)
• Digitisation of in-copyright content– Requires special arrangements with rights-holders and/or legislation
(e.g. for orphaned works)– E.g.: Project Digi20 (http://digi20.digitale-sammlungen.de/): Contains
4700 in-copyright monographs of German academic publishers– E.g. dMGH (http://www.dmgh.de): Digital Edition of the Monumenta
Germaniae Historica Moving Wall arrangements
Scholarly monographs/editions – born Open Access
• OAPEN (http://www.oapen.org/home) and DOAB (http://www.doabooks.org/) – DOAB: 1449 OA monographs (63% in the humanities, June 2013)
• Open Access monographs business models– Will an author-pays model work?– E.g. Open Book Publishers (http://www.openbookpublishers.com)
> Publication charge for open access and print on demand – E.g. Knowledge Unlatched (http://www.knowledgeunlatched.org/)
> Community-based funding– E.g. OpenEdition Freemium (http://www.openedition.org)
> OA content and paid for additional services
• Traditional publishers vs. new players
Secondary Open Access Born Open Access
Electronic journals Green Open AccessDelayed Open Access
Gold Open AccessWith or without APCs?
Scholarly monographs/ editions
Digitisation of published monographs/editions:
out of and within copyright
Open Access scholarly monographs
Open Access editions
Content aggregation
Subject-specific /thematic platforms Publication platforms
Social media communication
Academic blogging etc.
Content aggregation
• Subject-specific / thematic platforms for primary publication, self-archived and digitised materials
• E.g. recensio.net (http://www.recensio.net/) – Secondary Open Access aggregation of book reviews for
historical literature, usually published elsewhere
• E.g. perspectivia.net (http://www.perspectivia.net/) – Online publication platform for the institutes of the Max Weber
Foundation – German Humanities Institutes Abroad– Hosts both documents published in born Open Access as well
as digitised material (journals, reviews, monographs, conference proceedings)
Secondary Open Access Born Open Access
Electronic journals Green Open AccessDelayed Open Access
Gold Open AccessWith or without APCs?
Scholarly monographs/ editions
Digitisation of published monographs/editions:
out of and within copyright
Open Access scholarly monographs
Open Access editions
Content aggregation
Subject-specific /thematic platforms Publication platforms
Social media communication
Academic blogging etc.
Social media communication
• Social media techniques open new channels for scholarly research communication
• E.g. hypotheses.org (http://hypotheses.org/)- International publication platform for academic blogs in the
humanities and social sciences- Covering field work reports, current research projects, reviews etc.- 657 blogs (June 2013)
• E.g. presentations / live reviews in recensio.net- Authors can present the core statements of their publications
(monographs or articles) on recensio.net and enable expert discussions to take place
- Make use of the potential of online communication in the academic world
A few final observations
• Open Access helps to enhance accessibility, visibility and reusability of scholarly research communication in all subjects
• Potential of the moving wall concept, e.g. delayed Open Access for complete journal runs or in-copyright monographs
• Development of business models for Open Access monographs rather than APCs for journals
• Traditional publishers vs. new players vs. new roles for libraries
• Social media techniques as a means of scholarly communication
• Open Access in the humanities is much more than the green and gold roads to journal publishing…
Comments or Questions?
schaeffler@bsb-muenchen.de