Publishing history stuff

[DCguy]

hey guys, I know there's another forum about publishing stuff but i wanted to talk directly to history people. I'm in a phd program and want to start publishing some more stuff (i have 1 published journal article). I'm talking more about book reviews and book chapters than journal articles. finding out how to review books has been super easy. but does anyone have any advice on how to get the attention of publishers so i could write a book chapter over the summer or something? any insight would be super awesome. 

[remenis]

There are two ways I know of that enable people to write book chapters - typically you have to know the person who is editing a volume to be invited to contribute a chapter to it, or you have to have participated in a conference in which all the attendees papers are collected and published as a book. In my understanding it is very rare for graduate students to publish book chapters and not even necessarily recommended. For example, if you do attend a conference where they wish to publish all the papers in a book - this is often not "peer-reviewed" which is less distinguished than publishing in a peer-reviewed journal.

[dr. t]

This is an area in which your adviser should be way more of a help than an online forum.

[kotov]

I have a book chapter coming out (hopefully shortly); I found the call for papers for the volume on H-Net (this was in like the spring of 2012 if you want an idea of how long this kind of thing takes). 

[TMP]

The faculty in your program should be teaching you this stuff as part of professionalization.  If not, bug them.

[Riotbeard]

There are two ways I know of that enable people to write book chapters - typically you have to know the person who is editing a volume to be invited to contribute a chapter to it, or you have to have participated in a conference in which all the attendees papers are collected and published as a book. In my understanding it is very rare for graduate students to publish book chapters and not even necessarily recommended. For example, if you do attend a conference where they wish to publish all the papers in a book - this is often not "peer-reviewed" which is less distinguished than publishing in a peer-reviewed journal.

 

A lot of edited collections I see are printed by academic presses, which to my knowledge means their peer-reviewed.  Ditto on everything else though, it gets done through conferences and networking.  I am on a UK grant proposal for a multi-meeting roving international symposium/ and likely book if the grant is received.  This came out of asking the professor to be on a conference panel, and we share a close archivist friend, so he asked if I would be interested.  In other words, it's really more about building up networks.

[Riotbeard]

This is an area in which your adviser should be way more of a help than an online forum.

 

This is pretty much true of everything in these forums, haha.

[dr. t]

This is pretty much true of everything in these forums, haha.

 

Yes, but it's more true for some things!

[Sigaba]

@DCGuy, with respect, the fact that you felt the need to come here to ask this type of question should be a cause of (considerable) concern to you--if not also your adviser. Are the two of you on different pages (e.g., you want to get published, he/she wants you to prepare for qualifying exams)?

[DCguy]

@DCGuy, with respect, the fact that you felt the need to come here to ask this type of question should be a cause of (considerable) concern to you--if not also your adviser. Are the two of you on different pages (e.g., you want to get published, he/she wants you to prepare for qualifying exams)?

I should have been way more clear about stuff when I asked. I don't want anyone to think that I am unable to get the advice from my department. I was reviewing the textbook we use in the class I TA for at whatever time it was, midnight or so, and thought "I wonder how or if I could write a chapter to pad my CV." So I did a little late night googling and came up with nothing, that's why I asked on here. I just got worked up about it and knew Dr. B was asleep by midnight (not checking his email) so I figured I would throw it on here and see if anyone had any ideas. 

Publishing chapters just hadn't come up with him yet. Of course he and I have worked on trying to get my essays/articles out there. 

Sorry about the confusion.

 

Thanks to everyone for the info about networking and stuff!

[wacyeah]

 

DCguy, I can't help but to ask this even though it's out of this topic: I saw your location as Salisbury but are you from the eastern shore of MD? coz I attended Washington College and I miss MD sooooo much now lol

[DCguy]

 

 

DCguy, I can't help but to ask this even though it's out of this topic: I saw your location as Salisbury but are you from the eastern shore of MD? coz I attended Washington College and I miss MD sooooo much now lol

 

yeah. i'm in North Carolina for my PhD now but I am from ocean city/berlin and went to salisbury for my undergrad and MA!