The Taylor & Francis Journals Editorial
Roundtables 2016 for South Asia were held at Le Méridien in Bengaluru and Vivanta
by Taj in Hyderabad on the 8 and the 9 of March respectively.
The theme for both Roundtables was ‘Indian Authors in the Global Arena.’ Both
venues saw several enthusiastic journal authors and editors in attendance. In
Bengaluru, there were 137 participants while Hyderabad saw an equally eager
participation of about 100 academics.
All
the participants received Taylor & Francis Online bags which contained a useful
folder and documents on publishing tips for authors, open access, Editors’
Resources newsletters, a South Asia journals catalogue and the Taylor &
Francis Peer Review White Paper. The kit also comprised a USB drive that had
all the electronic files of the documents and several useful videos such as ‘Article
metrics - what do they mean, and why are they important for researchers’, ‘Publish
your Open Access article with Taylor & Francis’, ‘What to think about
before you start to write a journal article, etc.
Both
days started off with a welcome address by Nitasha Devasar, the Managing
Director of Taylor & Francis India. She briefly outlined the South Asia
Journals Programme of the Taylor & Francis Group, and introduced the
esteemed panel seated on the dais, including Dr David Green, Publishing
Director – International; Gerald Dorey, Associate Editorial Director; and Dr
Colin Bulpitt, Publisher, Physical Sciences. In Hyderabad, our guest speaker
was Dr Ajaya Kumar Sahoo, Editor of South
Asian Diaspora.
Dr
David Green presented on ‘Sharing in Success! Indian Authors in the Global
Arena.’ He spoke about the increasingly demanding and complex world of
scholarly and academic publishing with people often in multiple roles such as
author, researcher, editor, reviewer, collaborator, analyst, fundraiser, etc.
and the role of the academic publisher. Dr Green stressed on the importance of
quality in journal publishing. He encouraged Indian authors to concentrate on visibility,
outreach, impact and public engagement by collaborating on research with the
international academic community.
The next presentation was by Gerald Dorey on
‘Digital Trends and Developments.’ He charted India’s research output and compared
it with data from BRICS, Asia-Pacific and the world. He talked about the
research from the top institutions in the areas of STM and SSH in India. The
fact that this showed a relatively lower research output from India in SSH
stimulated a discussion about the possible reasons amongst the participants. He
also spoke at length about the new developments in journal publishing such as
open access.
The next presentation was ‘Making your research have impact’ by
Anindita Pandey. She outlined the various platforms and social media networks
that can help authors engage with a larger audience beyond the academic
community. She also discussed tools such as Altmetrics that can enable authors
to measure the ‘social impact’ of their research and target the right kind of
audience for their papers. She also informed the audience about various
innovative means of promoting articles, such as the T&F cartoon abstracts,
video abstracts, blogging, etc.
The final presentation was Dr Colin Bulpitt’s on
‘Publishing Ethics.’ He defined common ethical issues such as plagiarism,
self-plagiarism, data fabrication, ‘salami-slicing’, etc. as per current
international standards. Following this, he described the processes and
procedures that Taylor & Francis follows to keep plagiarism and other
academic malpractices in check. He also talked about initiatives such as
‘Think-Check-Submit’ that guides authors to submit papers to genuine journals.
He then interacted with the audience by seeking their views on publishing
ethics by presenting case studies on issues such as authorship, text recycling
and duplicate publication.
At the Hyderabad roundtable, Dr Ajaya Kumar
Sahoo shared his experience of being an editor of a Taylor & Francis
journal. He talked about how the journal has grown and developed over the last
7 years. He illustrated the global nature of the journal by showing the
increase in international submissions that the journal has seen recently. He
also spoke about the high publishing standards that Taylor & Francis set
with regard to peer review, publishing ethics, production and dissemination.
Besides the presentations, the roundtables also
saw the participants releasing copies of a booklet on copyright – What is Copyright? – that was created by
T&F in collaboration with other stakeholders in the publishing industry. It
was preceded by a fun, although a tad tough, quiz on copyright, with the winners
receiving T&F mugs as prizes!
Both roundtables received an outstanding reception.
There was vigorous interaction among the participants regarding all the
discussions and presentations. Several issues were discussed and deliberated
upon. The discussions carried on into the tea breaks and the sumptuous lunches.
Most participants responded positively to both events in the feedback forms.
Taylor & Francis endeavours to continue the
conversation and keep the Indian academic community engaged and help them
become more visible globally. See you next year!
The roundtables were also featured in the monthly newspaper Book Link that covers news and events pertaining to publishing. One of the participants spoke to the Book Link correspondent:
‘I
would like to thank the Taylor & Francis Group for the opportunity to take
part in the roundtable convention held at Bangalore. We found the meeting very
fruitful and it gave us many insights into the STM publishing scenario.
- N.
Maheshchandra, Deputy Executive Secretary, Indian Academy of Sciences
Book Link, 8(4),
New Delhi: April 2014
Another report on the Hyderabad roundtable by Professor Jhilam Chattaraj from RBVRR Women’s College, Hyderabad can be found here on the blog of her college’s literary club: http://thequillsclub.blogspot.in/2016/03/a-tailor-made-event-report-on-taylor.html
Pictures of the event can be at:
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