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ISSN: 1329-878X |
FAQ
Why should I submit an article to MIA? Journals have a crucial role in academic culture, for they are based on a process of blind refereeing and this acts as a credentialing process for individual careers and government funding. As an established Australian journal in the field of media and communication studies, MIA takes great pleasure in publishing new work that affirms the health of the field and extends its scope. How should I go about writing for MIA? It’s good to show awareness of the journal you’re submitting to. Browse back issues and see if your topic has been covered before. Our policy is to publish relatively short articles, normally 3-5000 words, so remember that this will probably involve only part of a larger research project or thesis. If your article is taken from a larger project refer to the project so that interested readers can contact you or otherwise follow it up. Don’t try to reproduce the whole thing and avoid nonessential references. What are the chances of my article being published? Of our general articles under half of those submitted will be published, though this may take some time as the journal is committed to developing contributions through revision. Can early career researchers contribute to MIACP? MIA welcomes contributions from postgraduates and early career researchers. However, while MIA does not identify the early career researchers from other contributors, we do ensure that our primary referees are experienced reviewers. What’s the difference between theme and general articles? General articles may be on any aspect of the field and can be submitted at any time (see How to submit). They will be considered by the editor, reviewed and if accepted published in order of acceptance. Theme articles are submitted in response to a Call for papers for a particular issue. Proposals to edit a theme section may be submitted by anyone but will be considered by the board. We welcome ideas for themes and offers to edit from anyone who has published in a peer reviewed publication in the field. Although a theme section may be edited by a single person we prefer it to be done by two people with our editorial board members often working with theme proposers in editing issues. This involvement is designed to ensure that we meet deadlines and uphold the journal’s editorial standards. What is the balance between theme and general articles? We aim to balance out the thematic with the general contributions in a 60%/40% relationship, however, this balance does vary with each issue – sometimes there are more thematic contributions and sometimes less. We do strive to maintain this balance in order to ensure that MIA fulfils its general journal functions while consistently contributing to other topics. How do I submit a theme article or a general article to MIA? Calls for papers and the themes for future issues, as well as the editors in charge of these, can be found on the Forthcoming Issues page, as well as in current issues of the journal. You can contribute theme articles by contacting these theme issue editors. To contribute a general article you will need to send four copies of your submissions to: The Editor, MIA, For further information and style requirements go to: How to Submit. How are the contributions refereed? Once contributors have sent copies to the University of Queensland MIA office, MIA’s editor will consider the submission and if it’s suitable for the journal will send it to three knowledgeable referees, at least one of which is a member of the board. The reviewers are asked to acknowledge the strengths of the article as well as make suggestions for improvement. When the reports are received, the editor sends a consolidated message back to the author incorporating the various comments and making a decision in cases of disagreement. This will include a basic message that we are either accepting the paper as is (very rare), accepting it with minor revisions, provisionally accepting it following major revisions or rejecting it. Sometimes the editor will send the revised version back to one or more reviewers for further comment. Even following such major revision there is no guarantee that the paper will be published. How should I respond to criticism or rejection? In the peer review process everyone is vulnerable, and even the most widely published authors have stories about getting scathing criticism and summary rejections. It’s a risk in the system and shouldn’t be taken personally. There may be any number of reasons for getting a bad reception: the reviewer/editor is overworked, has read one too many pieces on that topic, is overreacting to some aspect etc. That’s why we seek three reviews. If the editor thinks a reviewer has been unnecessarily hasty or unkind she will overrule them or seek further comment from them. Our aim is always to give extensive and constructive feedback, especially to new authors. What is the process of editing the theme section? Issue editors vary according to issue and theme, but they have the responsibility for managing the review process for their section. Normally this will involve a call for abstracts, some of which will be accepted and full papers requested. Usually further selections need to be made once the full papers are received as the theme section has an upper limit. Although external reviewers are also sought, this process tends to be more deadline-driven and intense than the process of reviewing general articles, for the theme editors have an idea of the scope of their section, and can work with authors in shaping each article to fit. Any more advice for contributors? When you deal with the editor, theme editors, book review editor or production editor, remember Alan McKee’s advice: ‘be polite’. If you receive particularly helpful feedback from reviewers, let the editors know and they’ll pass it back. When academics spend a great part of their working lives reviewing other people’s work in one form or another, they appreciate knowing that this is valued! MIA has industry contributions – what are they and who contributes? Industry contributions are important to MIA and we take them very seriously. Industry contributions are either solicited by the editor and editorial board members, or proposed and provided by contributors. For example. Mark Ryan contributed an interview with the Shadow Minister for Communications Lindsay Tanner (Issue 110 2004) in response to a earlier article on Tanner’s counterpart from the opposing party, Richard Alston. But industry contributions aren’t just about politics and politicians. MIA also welcomes research and commentary from policy agencies, and recognises the importance of legal opinions and commentary in communications and telecommunications policy and regulation. How is MIA a useful research tool? Since 1976 MIA has been the ‘journal of record’ for the study of Australasian media and cultural industries. We have made it our business to cover major political, policy, cultural, social and economic issues facing the aforementioned industries in Australia, with some attention also to New Zealand, Southeast Asia and the Pacific. Despite our regional focus we are a truly international journal with contributions from every continent. We aim to provide a typically Australian inflection to the topical issues and perspectives we cover, and pride ourselves on the timeliness of our contributions to important public debates. An example of this would be MIA’s detailed examination of the cultural and industrial implications of the US-Australia Free Trade agreement (2004) which it published just as the Australian parliament was debating the issue. We are a rich source of opinion and commentary on the media and culture and, with four issues per year, we represent the work of a large range of Australian and international a scholars. So, not only do we provide a forum for media and cultural issues but we also act as a representative for what is generally defined as the scholarly communications and cultural community. Is MIA only useful to media and communications researchers? No. MIA intersects with a wide constituency beyond that of cultural and media studies academics and we pride ourself on our wide coverage and inclusion of other sectors. MIA welcomes contributions from other industries and encourages scholars and practitioners to engage in dynamic interaction. From issue to issue we have targeted communication aspects of a number of different sectors including the telecommunications industry (Issue 96:Australian Telecommunications: Liberalising, Privatising, Reregulating); human Rights scholars, advocates and policy makers (Issue 109: The New ‘Others’, media and Society post September 11); and health communication professionals and scholars (Issue 108:Drugs and the Media). What was Media Briefs and how can I use it as a research tool? MIA maintains a close surveillance of the media and from 1987 to February 2002, we published Media Briefs which covered a selection of major print media issues from the previous quarter. Media Briefs was compiled with support from the Australian Film Television and Radio School but was discontinued when the school withdrew its support. Regardless, Media Briefs is one of MIA’s most useful research tools with the section organised into subheadings according to the issues at hand. For example, these could be ‘advertising’, ‘Australian Broadcasting Corporation’, ‘ethics and professional standards’ and so on and so forth. Media Briefs effectively chronicled press coverage of major media issues during that period. What is the function of MIA book reviews? MIA provides readers with a large number of relatively brief book reviews and reviews of policy documents and conference proceedings by experts in the field. These are an important part of MIA’s agenda and our book review section has always been very popular, being used in publishers’ publicity and by many library officers as a guide to new publications. MIA occasionally has books available to be reviewed. See our reviews page for details. MIA’s articles are indexed in the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF), the Australian Public Affairs Information Service (APAIS), the International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS), and Ingenta. Each database specialises in a different area of interest making it easier for researchers to access specifically related articles. As well, some provide full-text articles, others only abstracts, so researchers can access MIA in a number of different forms. FIAF provides references to periodical articles on film and television, a directory of film and television, documentation collections, details of film archives and a bibliography of FIAF members’ publications. Its records date back to the early 1970s. APAIS is an indexing and full-text database providing access to social science and humanities articles. The research service is produced by the National Library of Australia and covers subjects such as business, health, current affairs, economics, humanities, law, literature, politics and social sciences in Australia. IBSS provides researchers with international social science bibliographic data and references to journal articles, books and reviews, and abstracts and full-text versions for some of its articles. It contains MIA records from 2004 onwards and these can be accessed via www.ibss.ac.uk. Ingenta works on a larger scale, hosting a number of databases, websites and catalogues. Ingenta users can access more than 6000 articles on any subject from over 260 popular scholarly, academic and business (online) journals (including MIA). Users can access Ingenta via www.ingentaselect.com.
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