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November 23, 2008
Navigating the rough (and ambiguous) seas of scholarly open access publishing
Jennifer Howard's November 21, 2008 article, "For Advice on Publishing in the Digital World, Scholars Turn to Campus Libraries" in The Chronicle of Higher Education addresses several of the major issues and dangers in the current forum of scholarly open access publishing. Howard notes that in the often ambiguous and confusing arena of open access publishing, scholars are turning to their institutions' libraries and librarians for guidance. She states that "institutions are creating or beefing up offices and programs in scholarly communication or hiring librarians with expertise in copyright and intellectual property" (Howard A8). Howard cites Karla Hahn of the Office of Scholarly communication for the Association of Research Libraries, who indicates that ARL has noted several major themes emerge in these programs in scholarly communication such as faculty outreach and help with copyright issues, help with institutional repositories and help with publishing services (Howard A8).
In addition to offering an overview of increased activity in scholarly communication programs, Howard presents several examples of individuals in these scholarly programs and the roles that they play. Her first example, Kevin L. Smith the "Copyright Czar," is a scholarly communications officer at Duke University. Howard notes that Smith maintains the Scholarly Communication@Duke blog at Duke University, which provides an additional source for information on current topics in scholarly communication.
The second example Howard provides is the Office for Scholarly Communication at Harvard, run by Stuart M. Shieber, professor of computer science, and "in the domain" of Robert Darnton, director of Harvard University Library. The article refers to the new mandate for Harvard University faculty to publish open access in Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard, or DASH, Harvard's new digital repository. However, as DASH is currently in Beta testing, it is only available to users with Harvard IP addresses.
Howard's final example is David Stern, associate university librarian for scholarly resources at Brown University, who in addition to collection development, now is responsible for scholarly communication issues including campus awareness, NIH public access compliance, and open access publishing options for scholars. Brown University Library also hosts a Scholarly Communications Information page as a resource for the Brown University community.
Howard's article offers a good overview of the types of roles that librarians can find themselves in due to the current move toward open access publishing and the use of institutional repositories. Her profiles of the services provided by Smith, Shieber, and Stern certainly serve to help modern librarians navigate the uncertain waters of open access scholarly publishing. The article is a must read for those concerned about issues in current scholarly communication (and for those new--or not so new--librarians interested in a potential career as a scholarly communications officer).
This blog posting refers to the online edition of the following article:
Howard, Jennifer. "For Advice on Publishing in the Digital World, Scholars Turn to Campus Libraries." The Chronicle of Higher Education 55, no. 13 (November 21, 2008): A8.
Online full text of the article is available through subscription at The Chronicle of Higher Education or through the University of Tennessee E-Journal link with appropriate login authorization.
Entry posted by Burr Osoinach--Collection Development IS 560, Fall 2008
Posted by colldev at November 23, 2008 10:03 PM