Resource of the Week #196: “How to Get Published in an Academic Journal”

Hello again. This week’s resource is an article titled “How to Get Published in an Academic Journal: Top Tips from Editors”. It appeared January 3 in the Guardian Higher Education Network.

The article presents 17 tips from journal editors. The editors come from various disciplines in the humanities, natural sciences, social sciences, and more.

The list of tips has 3 sections: “The writing stage”, “Submitting your work”, and “Dealing with feedback”. Each tip is followed by commentary.

Among my favorite tips are the following:

• “2) Don’t try to write and edit at the same time.”
• “3) Don’t bury your argument . . . ”
• “4) Ask a colleague to check your work.”
• “6) Don’t try to cram your PhD into a 6,000 word paper.”
• “8) Pick the right journal: it’s a bad sign if you don’t recognise any of the editorial board.”
• “9) Always follow the correct submissions procedures.”
• “13) Respond directly (and calmly) to reviewer comments.”
• “14) Revise and resubmit: don’t give up after getting through all the major hurdles.”

The article ends with an excellent point: Although published articles might look as if they were easily written, they often reflect much hard work in writing and revision.

I encourage you to look at this article.

Until the next post—

Barbara