You may have heard that the BILD Research Community has a new and exciting initiative! It’s called J-BILD (Journal of Belonging, Identity, Language, and Diversity).
We are still accepting submissions for our July 31 deadline (see the Call for Papers) and aim to publish the inaugural issue in November 2017. We thought it would be helpful to provide answers to some of the questions you may have about J-BILD.
1. What is J-BILD?
J-BILD (Journal of Belonging, Identity, Language, and Diversity) is an open access, non-anonymized, peer-reviewed journal. We publish scholarly works from all stages of the research cycle, including research proposals, literature reviews, research articles, and book/article reviews. Our aim is to promote academic scholarship and critical discourse related to issues of belonging, identity, language and diversity, particularly as they intersect with the fields of Education, Sociolinguistics, Critical Sociolinguistics, Applied Linguistics, and Linguistic Anthropology. In an effort to support emerging voices in scholarly conversations, we welcome submissions from graduate students and new scholars.
2. Who runs and pays for J-BILD?
J-BILD is a non-profit journal that is managed by Senior Managing Editor Dr. Alison Crump, Managing Editor Dr. Lauren Godfrey-Smith, and Senior Advisor Dr. Mela Sarkar. We have a small annual operating budget of less than $100 to cover the costs of self-hosting (Reclaim Hosting) WordPress to ensure we don’t have ads on the journal site and for our domain name (bild-lida.ca).
3. How did J-BILD come to be?
J-BILD is the culmination of many years of idea sharing, discussion, and collaboration within BILD. When BILD first started in 2013, we were already excited about the potential of what we could achieve.
4. I’ve never published before. Can I submit to J-BILD?
Yes! Please do. We think you’ll find the non-anonymized mentoring model of peer review to be a constructive, informative, and supportive publication experience.
5. Who can publish in J-BILD?
While J-BILD aims to provide a platform for graduate students and new scholars to publish, we invite submissions from more seasoned scholars as well.
6. I don’t have any data. Can I submit to J-BILD?
Yes! J-BILD accepts manuscripts from all stages of the research cycle, including research proposals, literature reviews, and critical book/article reviews.
7. What does open source mean and why is it important?
Open source means that all J-BILD publications will be immediately and permanently free for everyone to read, download and share. We provide immediate open access to our content with the view that making research freely available to the public supports and strengthens the global exchange of knowledge.
8. What is the non-anonymized mentorship review process?
Most academic journals use a double-blind peer review process. J-BILD takes a different approach. Part of the ethos of the BILD Research Community is that we aim to promote a non-hierarchical community. For J-BILD that means approaching the peer review process in an open and non-anonymized fashion. Once the Managing Editors deem that a submission is suitable topic and scope for J-BILD, they pair a peer mentor with the author(s). The peer mentor and author(s) go through one to several iterations of feedback and revisions until the peer mentor feels the manuscript is ready to proceed to the next step of the publication process – copy editing. Managing Editors have oversight of the entire process and offer support if and when necessary.
9. What are the benefits of non-anonymized peer review for authors and the journal?
Authors receive personalized and constructive feedback on their writing from a peer mentor. For emerging scholars, this can be a formative and positive experience that supports their identity as a writer. For the journal, we feel good about this approach and want to provide a platform for publishing scholarly work that is aligned with the BILD Research Community’s aims to promote publicly engaged and open scholarship through peer support and collaboration.
10. I’m not from McGill. Can I still be involved as an author or peer mentor?
Yes! BILD and J-BILD were born at McGill, so a lot of our members are associated with McGill either as students, faculty, staff, and/or alumni. However, just as with the BILD blog, we welcome and encourage submissions from authors and applications for peer mentorship from elsewhere.
11. How long is the process from submission to publication?
Typically, the process from submission to publication will take 6 months. However, this will depend on the number of submissions we receive as well as the amount of time needed for revisions to a manuscript.
12. Who is the J-BILD audience?
J-BILD reaches an international and diverse audience of scholars.
13. Do you publish manuscripts in languages other than English?
J-BILD suggests that manuscripts be written mostly in English and/ or French, but welcomes manuscripts that include languages other than French or English (e.g., in data sets, vignettes, quotes, etc.). In order to facilitate the peer review process, authors whose manuscripts include languages other than English are asked to provide translations of non-English/ French passages (e.g., as an addendum to their manuscript – not for publication). Publication of manuscripts written entirely in languages other than English or French will be subject to a final review by an independent reviewer and the availability of suitable reviewers may limit J-BILD/ R-LIDA’s ability to publish some languages/dialects. Please contact the Managing Editors at editor@bild-lida.ca if you have questions about multilingual manuscripts.
14. What advice do you have for authors? (style, length, what to include in submissions?)
The best advice we can provide is to read the policies and submission guidelines carefully and contact the Managing Editors if you have any questions. If you have an idea for a manuscript (topic, language, or format), please do get in touch. We’re a young journal and open to ideas!
15. What topics would appeal to J-BILD?
The tenets of BILD (Belonging, Identity, Language, and Diversity) serve as the main criteria for the selection of manuscripts that will be suitable to proceed through the publication process. We are open to submissions from a range of fields including, but not limited to Education, Sociolinguistics, Critical Sociolinguistics, Applied Linguistics, and Linguistic Anthropology.
16. How traditional is J-BILD in terms of style and register?
The BILD Research Community has always been about pushing boundaries in how we talk about and do research. Similarly, J-BILD is open to considering a range of scholarly genres. Also, publishing solely on an online platform gives us a lot of flexibility with respect to integration of media. If you would like to propose a non-traditional format for a manuscript, please contact the Managing Editors and we’ll be happy to discuss this with you.
17. Why isn’t your website in French?
We welcome submissions in French and we would like our website to be bilingual. As we run through first publication cycle, we are still working out the infrastructure of the journal and building a team. We will be working to make our journal and website bilingual over time and according to our capacity to do so. The translation of our website and documentation has potential as a volunteer project. If interested, please contact us.
Please visit the J-BILD website for more information.
Still have questions? Please post them in the comments section below or send us an email at editor@bild-lida.ca.
Thanks!
~ From Dr. Alison Crump (Senior Managing Editor) and Dr. Lauren Godfrey-Smith (Managing Editor)
This ongoing blog series is one of the projects of the BILD research group. We invite you to contribute to our blog or submit to our journal, J-BILD.
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