Academic Publishing – March 2023
2023 Independent Publishing Awards shortlists announced
The 2023 shortlists for the IPG’s Independent Publishing Awards have been announced. A five-strong list for the ProQuest Academic and Professional Publisher of the Year comprises Bloomsbury Publishing, Bristol University Press, Class Publishing, Edinburgh University Press, and Edward Elgar Publishing.
Judges highlighted Bloomsbury’s ‘commitment to improving diversity’ and celebrated Bristol University Press – shortlisted for the third time in the last four years – for being ‘consistently innovative’, and for its ‘energy … and its passion for social justice’. Class Publishing, producer of content for emergency responders and family law professionals, was noted for ‘a great strategic and customer-centric approach to its publishing’, with its work for ambulance staff drawing particular attention. Edinburgh University Press was praised for ‘looking to the future’ in a year in which it launched an ebook collection sales partnership with De Gruyter and refreshed its publishing in the humanities and social sciences, while Edward Elgar Publishing won notice for achieving another record year of growth and refreshing its ElgarOnline platform.
In addition, Emerald Publishing has been shortlisted for The Alison Morrison Diversity and Inclusivity Award for the third year in a row and was praised by the judges for having ‘cemented inclusivity across the whole business’. The individual award winners, along with the overall CPI Independent Publisher of the Year, will be announced at the 2023 Independent Publishing Awards Lunch at the OXO Tower in London on 22 March.
Cambridge wins most PROSE awards, but Princeton takes top prize
The Association of American Publishers has announced the winners of the 2023 PROSE awards. The top prize, the R.R. Hawkins Award – created in 1976 to recognise outstanding scholarly works in all disciplines of the arts and sciences – was awarded to Spiderweb Capitalism: How Global Elites Exploit Frontier Markets by Kimberly Kay Hoang, published by Princeton University Press, which also won the award for excellence in the social sciences. The Humanities award went to Necropolis: Disease, Power, and Capitalism in the Cotton Kingdom, written by Kathryn Olivarius and published by Harvard University Press, and the prize for Physical Sciences and Mathematics to Daniel Baumann’s Cosmology, published by Cambridge University Press.
Of the 40 category prizes, Cambridge University Press led the way by winning eight, with Princeton taking home seven. MIT Press, Oxford University Press, Harvard University Press, and Elsevier were amongst the other multiple winners.
Knowledge Unlatched 2022 pledging round results released
Knowledge Unlatched has shared the results of its first pledging round since its acquisition by Wiley. Around 280 books will be made available as open access titles: 184 books from the KU Select 2023 HSS Books Collection, two Focus Collections on Climate Change and Global Health, and around 99 books from KU’s partner collection. A further 700 peer-reviewed blogposts and ten videos will also be made available.
Wiley issues disappointing figures for Q3 2023
Wiley has issued its results for the third quarter of the financial year 2023, with President and CEO Brian Napack describing the figures as ‘clearly below our expectations’. Academic revenues declined by 10%, largely due to a decline in print, while research revenues fell by 2%, a fall ascribed to ‘a pause in the Hindawi special issues publishing program … due to the presence in certain special issues of compromised articles’, causing Hindawi revenues to fall by 9%, cancelling out gains elsewhere in Wiley’s open access publishing.
SAGE invests in new start-up
Technology from SAGE, the publisher’s new division comprising a portfolio of tech start-ups, has invested in Skilltype, a talent management platform for libraries. The platform enables libraries to identify and fix skills gaps within their teams while helping staff to manage their professional development. SAGE VP of Product Innovation Martha Sedgwick will join the Skilltype board.
SAGE and Emerald collaborate for International Women’s Day
SAGE and Emerald worked together to improve the representation of women in social and behavioural sciences on Wikipedia on International Women’s Day, 8 March. In Washington and London, staff from both companies created Wikipedia entries for some of the notable authors they published as part of the Wikipedia edit-a-thon.
Tributes paid to Routledge publisher Alan Jarvis
Tributes have been paid to Alan Jarvis, global publishing director for Advanced Learning at Routledge, who has died at the age of 57. Jarvis had worked for the company since 1986, and was much loved and respected by his colleagues.
AUP condemns interference in Florida education
The Association of University Presses has joined the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC), the American Historical Association (AHA), and the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) in denouncing proposed legislation in Florida which aims to give political appointees control over what is taught in the state’s higher education system. The AUP describes the bill – HB 999 – as ‘an unprecedented overreach of partisan appointed officials into public university and college governance … dictating which events from and interpretations of history will be taught in the state’s college classrooms.’
New podcast from Manchester
Manchester University Press has launched a new podcast. One Book at a Time aims to encourage people to take time out to consider important social issues and histories; each of the six half-hour episodes in the podcast’s first series will focus on a different title from MUP’s trade non-fiction list, featuring a conversation between the author and an in-house editor or expert in the field. The first two episodes are already available.
Alastair Horne is a lecturer in publishing studies at the University of Stirling.
Alastair writes our STM Publishing and our Academic Publishing Newsletters.