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Editors' Note: February 2022

Editors' note on the February 2022 issue of Reviews in Digital Humanities

Published onFeb 14, 2022
Editors' Note: February 2022
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Editors’ Note

Roopika Risam and Jennifer Guiliano

Welcome to the February 2022 issue of Reviews in Digital Humanities! In this month’s editorial note, we look to the future of Reviews, share our analytics, launch a call for proposals for special issues, and preview this month’s issue.

Planning for the Future

In addition to the regular work that makes monthly issues possible, we’ve been analyzing our work thus far and developing plans to both sustain and scale Reviews. It’s an exciting time for the Reviews community!

When we founded Reviews, we thought we were in this for a year-long pilot, without much hope that there would be interest or demand. Two years later, we have more than we can sustain with our current governance and business models. Keep an eye out for new developments this year as we experiment with new ways to meet the needs of digital humanities communities.

Our Analytics

As of February 2022, in quantitative terms:

  • Reviews has received 63,500+ total page views;

  • Reviews has 13,700+ total unique users; and

  • Our users come from more than 115 countries.

A map showing 115 countries where users of Reviews in Digital Humanities are located, a chart showing time-distribution of 63,505 pageviews, and a chart showing time-distribution of 13,745 unique users

Reviews in Digital Humanities analytics, from PubPub’s impact feature

Call for Proposals for Special Issues

Special issues have been an important part of Reviews, offering guest editors opportunities to curate a collection of projects in a particular field of study, topic, or method. To make this process more transparent, we have launched a call for proposals for special issues. Proposals are due April 1, 2022.

The process of editing a special issue is simple: the guest editors provide the journal editors with a list of 8-10 projects they would like to include and a list of potential reviewers. The journal editors and editorial assistant manage the process of soliciting overviews from project directors and participation from reviewers. The guest editors have the option to edit overviews and reviews as they come in, if they wish. Once we have received all the reviews for the special issue, the guest editors write their guest editor note, framing their vision for the special issue. On average, this process takes 3-4 months.

We are particularly interested in special issues that shed light on areas of study and methodologies that receive comparatively less attention in mainstream digital humanities publications. We also encourage participation by guest editors located outside the U.S. or for U.S.-based guest editors to invite a colleagues from another country to collaborate with them. For information about special issues we have published in the past, please see the full list on the call for proposals.

This Month’s Issue

Projects in the February 2022 issue come from our open submissions process. These projects were nominated for inclusion by their project directors, the journal editors, editorial board members, and other participants in the Reviews community. In their own ways—and in varied areas of scholarship—the projects show deep interest in teaching and pedagogy. This month, we feature:

  • East Asia for All, a podcast analyzing East Asian pop culture, directed by Stephanie Montgomery and Melissa Brzycki and reviewed by Paul Vierthaler;

  • The Jane Addams Papers Project, a scholarly editing project on the work of Jane Addams, directed by Cathy Moran Hajo and reviewed by Núria Sara Miras Boronat;

  • Literature in Context, a digital anthology of literature, directed by Tonya Howe and reviewed by Mattie Burkert; and

  • Undisciplining the Victorian Classroom, a pedagogical resource for teaching Victorian studies through a race-conscious lens, directed by Pearl Chaozon Bauer, Ryan D. Fong, Sophia Hsu, and Adrian S. Wisnicki and reviewed by Roopika Risam.

These projects aim to reach a range of audiences—pop culture enthusiasts, high school and college students and instructors, and scholars—but they are linked by a commitment to teaching. East Asia For All offers a proof-of-concept for how lesson plans accompanying podcasts can make them more accessible for teaching. Also invested in providing teaching resources, Undisciplining the Victorian classroom offers a range of resources to shift away from teaching Victorian literature in ways that center whiteness. Both the Jane Addams Papers Project and Literature in Context serve dual purposes of providing access to high-quality, digitized texts and offering students opportunities to learn about textual editing and digital humanities. We’ve learned a lot from these projects and hope you will too!

If you are interested in editing a special issue of Reviews, send us your proposal! You can also submit a project for review, nominate a project you admire, volunteer for our reviewer pool, and tell your colleagues and students about the journal.

Questions? Thoughts? Concerns? Contact the editors, Jennifer Guiliano and Roopika Risam, by email or through the Twitter hashtag #ReviewsInDH.

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