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Writing Your First Scholarly Article: A Guide for Budding Authors in Librarianship
Scott Nicholson
Scott Nicholson (srnichol@syr.edu) is an Assistant Professor in the School of Information Studies, Syracuse University, New York.
This
series of questions and answers is designed to help you take the first
steps toward the successful production of a scholarly article in
librarianship. You may find yourself in a library position that
requires writing or you may have just decided that you are ready to
share your findings, experiences, and knowledge with the current and
future generations of librarians. While following the guidelines listed
here will not guarantee that you will be successful, these steps will
take you closer to discovering the thrill of seeing your name in print
and making a difference in the field.
What should I write about?
Perhaps
you already have an idea based upon your experiences and expertise, or
perhaps you aren’t sure which of those ideas you should write about.
The best way to start writing is to read other articles! Many scholarly
articles end with a Future Research section that outlines other
projects and questions that the article suggests. It is useful to
contact the author of a piece that holds a Future Research seed to
ensure that the author has not already taken on that challenge.
Sometimes, the original author may be interested in collaborating with
you to explore that next question.
How do I start?
Scholarship
is an iterative process, in that works that you produce are bricks in
an ever-rising wall. Your brick will build upon the works of others
and, once published, others will build upon your work. Because of this,
it is essential to begin with a review of related literature. Search in
bibliographic and citation databases as well as Web search tools to see
if others have done similar projects to your own. The advantage of
finding related literature is that you can learn from the mistakes of
others and avoid duplicating works (unless your plan is to replicate
the work of others).
Starting
with the work of others allows you to place your brick on the wall. If
you do not explicitly discuss how your scholarship relates to the
scholarship of others, only those having familiarity with the
literature will be able to understand how your work fits in with that
of previous authors. In addition, it’s easier to build upon your work
if those who read it have a better idea of the scholarly landscape in
which your work lives.
As you
go out and discover literature, it is crucial to keep citation
information about each item. Much of what you will cite will be book
chapters or articles in journals, and you will save yourself time and
trouble later if you make a printed copy of source items and record
bibliographic information on that copy. Recording the title of the
work, the full names (including middle initials) of authors and
editors, page range, volume, issue, date, publisher and place of
publication, URL and date accessed, and any other bibliographic
information at the time of collection will save you headaches later
when you have to create your references list. As different journals
have different citation requirements, having all of this information
allows you the flexibility of adapting to different styles.
One type
of scholarship produced by libraries is the ��how our library did
something well�� article. While a case study of your library can be an
appropriate area of discussion, it is critical to position these pieces
within the scholarship of the field. This allows readers to better
understand how applicable your findings are to their own libraries. The
concept illustrates the difference between the practice of
librarianship and library science. Library science is the study of
librarianship and includes the generalization of library practice in
one setting to other settings.
Before
starting your writing, talk about your idea with your colleagues, which
will help you refine your ideas. It will also generate some excitement
and publicity about your work, which can help inspire you to continue
in the writing process. Colleagues can help you consider different
places where similar works may already exist and might even open your
eyes to similar work in another discipline. You may find a colleague
who wants to coauthor the piece with you, which can make the project
easier to complete and richer through the collaborative process.
Another
important early step is to consider the journals you would like to be
published in. Many times, it can be fruitful to publish in the journal
that has published works that are in your literature review.
Considering the journal at this point will allow you to correctly focus
the scope, length, and style of your article to the requirements of
your desired journal. Your article should match the length and tone of
other articles in that journal. Most journals provide instructions to
authors in each issue or on the Web; the information page for ITAL authors is at www.ala.org/ala/lita/litapublications/ital/information
authors.htm.
How can I find funding for my research?
Some
projects can’t be easily done in your spare time and require resources
for surveys, statistical analysis, travel, or other research costs. You
will find that successful requests for funding start with a literature
review and a research plan. Developing these before requesting funding
will make your request for funding much stronger, as you will be able
to demonstrate how your work will sit within a larger context of
scholarship.
You will
need to develop a budget for your funding request. This budget will
come together more easily if you have planned out your research. It may
be useful or even required for you to develop a set of outcomes for
your project and how you will be assessing those outcomes (find more
information on outcome-based evaluation through the IMLS Web site at
www.imls.gov/grants/current/crnt_obe.htm). Developing this plan will
give you a more concrete idea of what resources you will need and when,
as well as how you can use the results of your work.
Resources
for research may come from the inside, such as the library or the
parent organization of the library, or from an external source, such as
a granting body or a corporate donor. In choosing an organization for
selection, you should consider who would most benefit from the
research, as the request for funding should focus on the benefit to the
granting body. Many libraries and schools do have small pots of money
available for research that will benefit that institution and that,
many times, go untapped due to a lack of interest. Granting
organizations put out formal calls for grant proposals. These can
result in a grant that would carry some prestige but would require a
detailed formal application that can take months of writing and
waiting. Another approach is to work with a corporate or nonprofit
organization that gives grants. If your organization has a development
office, this office may be able to help connect you with a potential
supporter of your work.
How do I actually do the research?
Just as
the most critical part of a dissertation is the proposal, a good
research plan will make your research process run smoothly. Before you
start the research, write the literature review and the research plan
as part of an article. It can be useful to create tables and charts
with dummy data that will show how you plan to present results. Doing
this allows you to notice gaps in your data-collection plan well before
you start that process. In many research projects, you only have a
single chance to collect data; therefore, it’s important to plan out
the process before you begin.
How do I start writing the paper?
The best
way to start the writing process is to just write. Don’t worry about
coming up with a title; the title will develop as the work develops.
You can skip over the abstract and introduction; these can be much
easier to write after the main body of the article is complete. If
you’ve followed the advice in this paper, then you’ve already written a
literature review and perhaps a research plan; these make a good
starting point for your article.
One way
to develop the body of the article is to develop an outline of headings
and subheadings. Starting with this type of outline forces you to think
through your entire article and can help you identify holes in your
preparation. Once you have the outline completed, you can then fill in
the outline by adding text to the headings and subheadings. This
approach will keep your thinking organized in a way typically used in
scholarly writing.
Scholarly
writing is different than creative writing. Many librarians with a
humanities background face some challenges in transitioning to a
different writing style. Scholarly writing is terse; Strunk and White’s
The Elements of Style (2000) focuses on succinct writing and can help you refresh your writing skills.1
If you
are having difficulty finding the time to write, it can be useful to
set a small quota of writing that you will do every day. A quota such
as four paragraphs a day is a reasonable amount to fit into even a busy
day, but it will result in the completion of your first draft in only a
few weeks.
I’m finished with my first complete draft! Now what?
While
you will be excited with the completion of the draft, it’s not
appropriate to send that off to a journal just yet. Take a few days off
and let your mind settle from the writing, then go back and reread your
article carefully. Examine each sentence for a subject and a verb, and
remove unneeded words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs, or even pages.
Try to tighten and clean your writing by replacing figures of speech
with statements that actually say what you mean in that situation and
removing unneeded references to first- and second-person pronouns.
Working through the entire article in this way greatly improves your
writing and reduces the review and editing time needed for the article.
After
this, have several colleagues read your work. Some of these might be
people with whom you shared your original ideas, and others may be new
to the concepts. It can be useful to have members of different
departments and with different backgrounds read the piece. Ask them if
they can read your work by a specific date, as this type of review work
is easy to put off when work gets busy. These colleagues may be people
who work in your institution or may be people you have met online. If
you know nobody who would be appropriate, consider putting out a
request for assistance on a library discussion list focused on your
research topic.
Dealing
with the comments from others requires you to set aside your defenses.
You did spend a lot of time on this work and it can be easy to slip
into a defensive mode. Attempt to read their comments from an objective
viewpoint. Remember��these people are spending their time to help you,
and a comment you disagree with at first blush may make more sense if
you consider the question ��Why would someone say this about my work?��
Putting yourself into the reader’s shoes can aid you in the creation of
a piece that speaks to many audiences.
What goes on when I submit my work?
At this
point, your readers have looked at the piece, and you have made
corrections on it. Now you’re ready to submit your work. Follow the
directions of the target journal, including length, citation format,
and method of submission. If submission is made by e-mail, it would be
appropriate to send a follow-up e-mail a few days after submission to
ensure the work was received; it can be very frustrating to realize,
after a month of waiting, that the editor never got the work.
Once you
have submitted your work, the editor will briefly review it to ensure
it is an appropriate submission for the journal. If it is appropriate,
then the editor will pass the article on to one or more reviewers; if
not, you will receive a note fairly quickly letting you know that you
should pick another journal. If the reviewing process is ��blind,�� then
you will not know who your reviewers are, but they may know your
identity. If the process is ��double-blind,�� neither reviewer nor author
will know the identity of the other. The reviewers will read the
article and then submit comments and a recommendation to the editor.
The editor will collect comments from all of the reviewers and put them
together, and send those comments to you. This will always take longer
than you would prefer; in reality, it will usually take two to six
months, depending upon the journal.
After a
few months, it would be appropriate for you to contact the editor and
ask about the progress on the article and when you should expect
comments. Do not expect to have your article accepted on the first
pass. The common responses are:
-
Reject. At this point, you can read the comments provided, make changes, and submit it to another journal.
-
Revise
and resubmit. The journal is not making a commitment to you, but they
are willing to take another look if you are willing to make changes.
This is a common response for first submissions.
-
Accept with major changes. The journal is interested in publishing the article, but it will require reworking.
-
Accept
with minor changes. You will be presented with a series of small
changes. Some of these might be required and others might be your
choice.
-
Accept. The article is through the reviewing process and is on to the next stage.
This is
an iterative process. You will most likely go through several cycles of
this before your article is accepted, and staying dedicated to the
process is key to its success. It can be disheartening to have made
three rounds of changes only to face another round of small changes.
Ideally, each set of requested changes should be smaller (and take less
time) until you reach the acceptance level.
Do not
submit your work to multiple journals at the same time. If you choose
to withdraw your work from one journal and submit it to another, let
the editor know that you are doing this (assuming they have not
rejected your work).
My article has been accepted. When will it come out?
Once
your article is accepted, it will be sent into a copyediting process.
The copy editor will contact you with more questions that focus more on
writing and citation flaws than on content. After making more
corrections, you will receive a proof to review (usually with a very
tight deadline). This proof will be what comes out in the journal, so
check important things like your name, institutions, and contact
information carefully. The journal will usually come out several months
after you see this final proof. The process from acceptance to
publication can take from six months to two years (or more), depending
on how much of a publication queue the journal has. The editor should
be able to give you an estimate as to when the article will come out
after full acceptance.
Can I put a copy of my article online?
It
depends upon the copyright agreement that you sign. Many publishers
will allow you to put a copy of your article on a local or
institutional Web site with an appropriate citation. Some allow you to
put up a preprint, which would be the version after copyediting but not
the final proof version. If the copyright agreement doesn’t say
anything about this, then ask the editor of the journal about the
policy of authors mounting their own articles on a Web site.
Conclusion
Writing
an article and getting it published is akin to having a child. Your
child will have a life of its own, and others may notice this new piece
of knowledge and build upon it to improve their own library services or
even make their own works. It is a way to make a difference that goes
far beyond the walls of your own library, to extend your professional
network, and to engage other scholars in the continued development of
the knowledge base of our field.
Reference
1. W. Strunk Jr. and E. B. White, The Elements of Style (Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 2000).
For More Information:
W. Crawford, First Have Something to Say: Writing for the Library Profession (Chicago: ALA, 2003).
R. Gordon, The Librarian’s Guide to Writing for Publication (Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow, 2004).
L. Hinchliffe and J. Dorner, eds., How to Get Published in LIS Journals: A Practical Guide (San Diego: Elsevier, 2003), www.elsevier.com/framework_librarians/LibraryConnect/lcpamphlet2.pdf, (accessed Feb. 8, 2006).
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