This blog post was written by Dr Graham Stone, Jisc Collections senior research manager.
This event, which took place at Goldsmiths College, University of London, aimed to widen the dialogue on open access books, examining the implications of UK policy for research culture and values. It reflected on the most recent findings from the Universities UK open access reports and provided a platform for gathering additional evidence and feedback from across the university sector.
Representatives from funding agencies, the UUK working group on open access monographs, REF panellists and PVCrs, publishers, learned societies, scholarly associations and researchers from a range of institutions highlighted the challenges and opportunities of open access monograph publishing.
The event was structured around the following questions:
- What is the current UK policy on open access, and on open access monographs in particular?
- What is at stake for REF 2027, research culture and values, ECRs and diversity in scholarly publishing and practice?
- Who benefits from open access or from publishing as usual?
- What are the challenges of open access monograph publishing?
- What kind of experiments are made possible, what collaborations might emerge?
- Why publish, and where might online, open and platform-based publishing lead us next?
- What changes might be respectively desirable, equitable and feasible at national and global scale? Or result as consequences from open access developments?
During the day a number of us took extensive notes that will now be compiled and posted in a future blogpost. Once we have received further feedback from the community, we will forward the report to colleagues at UKRI in order for the report to be considered alongside other information gathering, ahead of the UKRI policy review later this year.
In the meantime, we are pleased to be able to share a number of the presentations (where available) that preceded the various panel discussions:
Update on current UK policy, Graham Stone, Senior Research Manager, Jisc
Key issues in open access and scholarly communications panel session
- The 2015 Report to HEFCE on Monographs and Open Access: Reflections Four Years On, Geoffrey Crossick, Distinguished Professor of the Humanities, School of Advanced Study, University of London
- Enough About Ideology, Let’s Talk About Values, Sarah Kember, Professor of New Technologies of Communication, Goldsmiths and Director of Goldsmiths Press
- We Started Building a Progressive Ecosystem for the Arts and Humanities in 1999 – You Won’t Believe What Happened Next! Gary Hall, Professor in Media and Performance, Coventry University
- Open Access and the Humanities, Peter Mandler, Professor of Modern Cultural History, University of Cambridge
- QUOTE/UNQUOTE: The Future is Open-ish, Ronan Deazley, Professor, School of Law, Queen’s University Belfast
Which issues are being addressed? Which still need to be? Panel session
- Funding and policy, Steven Hill, Director of Research, Research England
- Research Excellence Framework (REF), Sylvia Walby, Professor of Sociology, City, University of London
- The unfulfilled promise of Open access: four issues, Samuel Moore, Researcher and Consultant: Critical Information/Publishing Studies
- Unaffiliated and Retired Researchers, John Scott, Honorary Visiting Professor, Universities of Exeter and Essex
- Difference and Diversity, Roopika Risam, Assistant Professor of English, Faculty Fellow for Digital Library Initiatives, Salem State University
- Quality Assurance and Peer Review, Joe Deville, Lecturer in Sociology, Lancaster University
- Academic Freedom, David M. Berry, Professor of Digital Humanities, University of Sussex
Roundtable panel
- Steven Hill, Director of Research, Research England
- Sunil Manghani, Professor of Theory, Practice & Critique, Director of Research and Enterprise, Winchester School of Art
- Simon Tanner, Professor of Digital Cultural Heritage and Pro Vice Dean Research, King’s College London
- Chris Banks, Director of Library Services, Imperial College London
- Susan Bruce, Professor of English and Co-Chair Arts & Humanities Alliance, Keele University
- Anthony Cond, Managing Director, Liverpool University Press
- Geoffrey Crossick, Distinguished Professor of the Humanities, School of Advanced Study, University of London