Current Issue
Guest Editor's Manual
Prepared by Beth L. Hewett and Cheryl E. Ball, 2008,
with thanks to the editors of Computers and Composition
Proposing and Editing a Special Issue
SPECIAL ISSUE POLICY
Kairos: Rhetoric, Technology, Pedagogy is a peer-reviewed, academic, online journal that focuses on the juncture of rhetoric, technology, pedagogy, and related fields in higher education. Kairos publishes webtexts—texts that are conceived and designed as native to the digital medium—regarding both theory and practice in a wide variety of educational subjects.
Kairos's editors invite special issues for publication once a year (summer/May) as conceived by guest editors. Please visit our archives to become familiar with previous special issues such as Classical Rhetoric and Digital Communication (11.3) or other themed issues such as Issues of New Media (8.1) and Disability and Technology (7.1). Generally, interested colleagues develop an idea for a special issue that they believe will be of scholarly interest to Kairos's readers. Inquiries for special issues should be directed to Kairos Co-Editors Cheryl E. Ball and Beth L. Hewett in a formal letter of proposal. Colleagues interested in proposing a special issue should first read this Guest Editor's Manual and then prepare and submit a proposal to the Kairos Co-Editors.
EDITING PHILOSOPHY AND PROFILE
Kairos is committed to exploring the intersections of rhetoric, technology, and pedagogy. The journal is known for addressing the rhetorical and pedagogical uses of various technologies in the classroom, writing programs, technical writing settings, the academy, and the world at large. As a review of the archives demonstrates, Kairos welcomes texts that engage such various forms of research as empirical studies, ethnography, and rhetorical analysis among others. We welcome webtexts that explore such concerns as technology access; fair use and copyright in a digital age; computer-based teaching strategies; modality and software concerns; student learning, publication, and service related to technology; the nature of technology-based rhetoric and/or rhetoric in a digital age; and controversial, legal, ethical, or social concerns related to contemporary (or historically recent) rhetoric, technology, or pedagogy.
Not only do the editors of the journal look for webtexts that have sound theoretical and/or pedagogical bases, but they strive to publish webtexts that demonstrate the high-quality writing and webtext design that the discipline teaches. These are generally accomplished not only through the content-based concerns of a coherent organization, well-developed and well-written arguments, and accurate documentation, but also through webtext design that addresses the audience's needs for orientation and reading options that enable guided and/or independent reading choices.
Authors should introduce subject matter within the context of those interested in rhetoric, technology, and pedagogy, using terms and cultural references that either are commonly understood within an international academic community or are carefully explicated within the webtext itself. However, because of the unique genre of a webtext, authors also need to contextualize the argument throughout individual nodes. Indeed, because Kairos seeks to push boundaries in academic publishing and at the same time to bridge the gap between print and digital publishing cultures, it is important for authors to remember that in many senses these texts are transitional and experimental in nature. Ideally, they should not be developed linearly for a print venue “article” and then remediated to a digital venue “webtext,” but rather both the content (argument) and its dissemination (design) should be developed with the electronic medium in mind. Strong webtexts rely on both the content and the form to convey the message.
APA style (5th edition of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association) provides the guidelines used by authors and editors to copyedit the journal. Kairos deviates from the APA guidelines in terms of publishing authors' (and editors') full names in both in-text citations and final references. We refer to this deviation as “modified APA style.” In addition to the modified APA style, Kairos authors and editors may choose to deviate from traditional APA style as needed to suit their argument, whether it be carried out in a change to written content or to other modes of communication. In other words, we are flexible in our style as long as such changes can be supported within the rhetorical situation and aesthetic experience of the webtext.
In the case of special issues (as with regular issues), the Editors reserve the right to question publication of a webtext if they deem its scholarly worth to be below Kairos standards. On such a rare occasion, the Editors will initiate a conversation with the Guest Editors directly so that a reasonable outcome can be found.
Features of the Journal
As with most journals, Kairos has several features that readers can count on encountering as they browse issues. “Logging On,” which is the letter from the editors may be written by the Guest Editor should she or he wish to do so; however, if the Guest Editor has written an introductory webtext or essay that establishes the focus and content of the issue, this may serve as the Guest Editor's “letter.” In many cases, special issues include both a Letter from the Guest Editors and a Letter from the Editors. Typically, special issues include only the Topoi, or “commonplace” section of the journal. However, webtexts in the form of Praxis-style texts and wiki entries, interviews, and reviews may be considered for publication in a special issue provided that they are related integrally to the issue's theme. Plans to include webtexts other than those commonly featured in the Topoi section should be detailed in the special issue proposal. The Advanced Assistant Editor (AAE), with the Communications Editors, collects and prepares the announcements for each issue, so the Guest Editor does not need to provide those materials unless he or she so chooses.
CONSIDERING A SPECIAL ISSUE?
Before you propose to guest-edit a special issue, you should consider the following questions:
Do you have the time to commit to such a long-term project? Putting together such issues can be time consuming; plan your special issue according to its deadlines—we recommend allowing at least a year and a half from the time the first call for webtexts is issued to the actual publication date, which includes copyediting, formatting, and digital preparation of the issue. See the discussion of publication schedules below.)
- How are you going to acquire the webtexts? Occasionally, Guest Editors have been involved in an ongoing discussion or conference where a number of people working on a topic are each willing to produce a relevant webtext. More commonly, however, Guest Editors will prepare a CFW for distribution in various journals and on electronic discussion lists and news groups.
- What should be the contents and length of the issue? Early on, you will want to determine the final number of webtexts that you plan to submit for publication. Three to six webtexts are typical. At the same time, you will want to seek the advice of the editors on issues such as how theoretically, practically, or pedagogically focused the webtexts might be.
- Who should you work with on preparing a special issue? Although initial discussions are with the Co-Editors, Guest Editors also work closely with the AAE. The AAE assists as much as possible with Guest Editors to publish calls for webtexts and arrange publicity with the Communications Editors. She or he also is responsible for supervising Assistant Editors in preparing the special issue to meet our standards and conventions and for coordinating with the Co-Editors for timely publication. Once the special issue is ready for copyediting, Guest Editors work almost exclusively with the AAE. In addition to the AAE and Editors, Guest Editors might consider working closely with colleagues and/or (graduate) students to help with the process of solicitation, reviewing, coordinating webtexts, and so on.
PROPOSING A SPECIAL ISSUE
There are four required parts to a special issue proposal: cover email, theme description, timeline, and vita. These materials may be sent in whatever format the sender deems appropriate (attached documents, URLs, videos, etc.; attachments should be no larger than 2 megs). Queries and submissions for special issues are welcome at any time. The total/estimated length of the proposal documents (in whatever form they take) should be no more than the equivalent of 10–12 single-spaced pages.
Cover Email—inclusion of proposed guest editor(s) name(s) and email address(es), and a brief description of the proposed topic with pointers to attached documents, URLs, or other supporting materials as outlined below.
Special Issue Theme—a detailed description and examination of the special issue's theme that addressed questions such as: why the particular theme is needed at this time (which may take the form of a brief, but complete literature review with a bibliography that supports the need for this special issue in terms of relevance and scope), how the special issue connects and adds to current and prior special-issue work in Kairos and other journals in the field, its relationship to Kairos's readers, the procedure for acquiring webtexts, and a statement as to why the guest editors are especially suited to edit this particular proposed special issue. This part of the proposal should be no more than 3–5 pages single-spaced (not including the bibliography).
Call for Webtexts (CFW)—a draft of the CFW as it might appear in Kairos and similar venues. We recommend reviewing previous CFW in Kairos and similar publications to gauge an appropriate length and scope. A necessary component of any CFW is an issue-related logo. If the logo is not ready at time of proposal submission, ideas/sketches for it can be provided in the theme description. Also, please indicate where you believe the CFW would be most welcomed and also provide the names of colleagues who are either interested in submitting or who would make excellent candidates for the issue.
Timeline—a complete publication schedule, including proposed year of final publication, should be attached to the special issue theme description. If you want the authors to submit a full webtext instead of a proposal, sufficient time for interested authors to prepare their webtexts must be provided when setting submission deadlines. If calling for proposals, additional time must be allotted for reviewing and accepting the proposed webtexts and the final submission date for the authors to prepare them and have them reviewed/content-edited by either the Guest Editor or her/his review panel. We have shown an example publication schedule timeline based on a call for proposals in the section called Publication Schedule below. That timeline can be modified if Guest Editors choose to solicit already completed webtexts for the CFW.
Vita—please provide a 1–2 page vita(s) of the editor(s) who will guest-edit the issue. The vita should be specific to the person(s) qualifications to edit the topic being proposed and/or potential to edit such a topic.
The Editors will contact Guest Editors approximately one month (or less) after submission of a special issue proposal with its approval status.
PUBLICATION SCHEDULE
Once a special issue has been arranged, deadlines for a number of major steps should be established. Typically, guest-edited issues take two years from proposal to publication. The following example is for a special issue to be published in May 2010.
- May 2010: Issue goes live.
- February 2010: Guest editor sends final webtexts to Kairos Editors for in-house copy-editing, final author queries, and proofing.
- October 2009: Guest editor receives final, revised webtexts from authors, checks for revisions, and does basic copy-editing.
- August 2009: Guest Editor notifies authors of submission (and revision) status.
- May/June/July 2009: Guest editor solicits outside reviews for submissions.
- March 2009: Submissions deadline; full webtexts submitted to guest editor; Guest Editor internally reviews submissions.
- December 2008: Guest Editor notifies authors of (accepted) proposal status.
- November 2008: Webtext proposal deadline (if Guest Editor chooses to include one).
- September 2008: CFW for the special issue goes out.
- August 2008: Proposal acceptance status received from Kairos Editors.
- July 2008: Proposal for special issue submitted to Kairos Editors.
PLANNING FOR & PUBLICIZING THE SPECIAL ISSUE
Guest Editors are encouraged to work with the Advanced Assistant Editor to reach as large an audience as possible. The AAE will work with the Kairos Communications Editors, who are responsible for publicizing both the CFW and the published issue; to assist their efforts, Guest Editors should suggest listservs, blogs, or other virtual or real locations (such as conferences) that should receive the CFW. They also may contact colleagues on their own and draw from panels presented at conferences and workshops. For the best results we recommend using these strategies together in order to gather as broad a sampling of work on your topic as possible. Below we include more details about each method.Contents of a Call
When timing permits, the call will appear in the journal; thus the Advanced Assistant Editor can assist in its preparation to some extent. The call can also be sent to other journals and handed out at conferences and workshops to generate interest among potential authors.
Exchange of Announcements
Although Kairos cannot pay for announcements in other journals, Guest Editors may work out an exchange of publicity for special issues or calls for webtexts with other journals.
Publicizing the Final Product
Once the issue is published, the Communications Editors work to make its availability known in each relevant scholarly community. Kairos asks its Guest Editors to provide input as to where the issue should be publicized. There are several avenues for such efforts:
The Communications Editors can produce appropriate flyers for a special issue for dispersal at CCCC, Computers and Writing (C&W), and other conferences when timing permits. However, a minimum of two months lead time is necessary for designing, production, and delivery of such materials. Typically, the Guest Editor (or her or his assistants) will hand out copies of the flyers at sessions pertinent to the issue as well as place copies on the informational tables around the conference site. Additionally, copies are available at the publisher's booth if the journal is exhibiting at the conference. The Guest Editor should alert the Advanced Assistant Editor of the actions she or he desires. (This process can also be used for soliciting calls during the CFW stage. Kairos cannot guarantee that it will be available to print flyers, but will do its best.)
WORKING WITH AUTHORS
As a Guest Editor, you will be working with your authors on revising the content of their webtexts both to build coherence into the special issue and to retain the high quality of the journal. Advising authors on the form and content and direction of their thoughts is an art in itself. Style also is idiosyncratic to some extent, and we rely on the Guest Editor to assist the author in creating an excellent piece of digital scholarship, in both form and content.
While these aspects are the basic responsibilities of authors, the Guest Editors may need to bring to bear their own expertise both in the revision phase and the copy-editing phase. Guest Editors will need to be able to articulate what they see as viable and necessary to both the content and the form of the webtext. If the text has been peer reviewed and the reviews will in some way be conveyed to the authors, the Guest Editors will need to write a letter that summarizes the stronger and weaker points of the webtexts, what the reviewers think, whether they have decided to publish the piece, and what specifically needs to be revised before publication. In this effort, the Guest Editors may need to call on the Advanced Assistant Editor for advice—such as to read and comment on a draft letter—and they may need to counsel authors on where and how to get assistance with technical issues.
Formatting the Text
Because the variations of formatting a webtext are as great as the number of technologies available to compose them, we refrain in this manual from offering specific advice that Guest Editors can provide authors. However, the Guest Editor should contact the AAE if formatting questions (either written or multimediated) arise during the review or revision process. (We prefer Guest Editors to contact the AAE with author's issues so that she or he may decide in consultation with the Editors whether to respond to the Guest Editors or ask for direct conversation with the authors, depending on what is best for the situation.)
Generally speaking, Kairos attempts to practice sustainable design (see http://www.sustainablewebdesign.com/) and avoids publishing texts with rhetorically inappropriate use of 100%-width tables, inline CSS, or anything written in Word and Saved As HTML.
Each webtext must include the following:
- title at the opening of the webtext
- author(s) name(s) and email address(es). In addition, authors may include title(s), affiliation(s), and other biographical information.
- a 100–200 word abstract
- 5–10 keywords suitable for tagging/indexing
- a single references node prepared in modified APA style (Note: Authors can elect to supply references in other formats/designs as well, but a single APA-style node is required.)
- a list of links to nonstandard plug-ins (e.g., RealPlayer, etc.) that readers would need to access materials in the webtext.
Permissions
For specific instructions regarding copyright and author's rights, please review “Kairos and Copyright” [http://kairos.technorhetoric.net/copyleft.html]. Of note is that we require authors to have obtained permission to use students' real names and/or to include student work in their webtexts (publicly available student work is acceptable to externally link to). Please contact the Editors if you have any concerns about permissions issues.
SUBMITTING WEBTEXTS TO THE EDITORS
Guest Editors typically handle the majority of their webtext negotiations directly. Once any revisions are approved and the webtext is finalized, the Guest Editor should request that authors submit electronic webtext files directly to the Guest Editor. (If the Guest Editors needs FTP/server space to conduct business for the special issue, such arrangements can be made through the AAE or Editors.)
Once the Guest Editor has reviewed and finalized all webtexts to be published in a special issue, the Guest Editor should upload all files to our server. FTP information will be provided at that time. To prepare for the upload of final webtexts, each authors' webtext should be placed in a folder that is clearly labeled according to the author's last name (with no spacing, capitalization, or non-Web-friendly characters). As well, all author folders/webtexts should be placed within a single folder labeled with the special issue title abbreviation and journal volume and number (e.g., /manifestos-12.3/).
Once the author files are submitted, the Guest Editor should contact the Advanced Assistant Editor to confirm the status of the files so that we can begin the copy-editing process.
Working with the Advanced Assistant Editor
Although Guest Editors negotiate special issues with the Co-Editors, the editor they work with most closely is the Advanced Assistant Editor. The Advanced Assistant Editor is the most knowledgeable person about our style, procedures, and editing process. Thus, Guest Editors are encouraged to remain in contact with the Advanced Assistant Editor and should feel free to use him or her as an information source and problem solver. As the special issue enters the in-house copyediting phase of production, the Advanced Assistant Editor will generally make author queries directly rather than routing copyediting questions through the Guest Editor.
The Advanced Assistant Editor works with the Assistant Editor and Co-Editors to review and copy-edit each webtext submission for Kairos journal style. Webtexts should be submitted in as clean a copy-editing state as possible, including the use of 5th-edition APA style with modification of authors'/editors' first names listed in the references), and the AAE will ensure all other in-house style changes are made.
Finalizing and Proofing the Issue
Just prior to publication, the AAE will send authors final queries (e.g., to provide missing citations, etc.). Authors will have approximately one week to answer queries. The webtexts will be in a temporary, online location for authors to refer to. Authors will not be invited to make any changes at this point, but rather to respond to the queries on the query document. Final changes are under the purview of the Advanced Assistant Editor and the Co-Editors.
Once queries have been completed, the Guest Editors and lead authors for each webtext will receive ‘proofing URLs'. Each group has approximately 5 days to proof their material. Guest Editors generally skim the issue looking for any egregious errors, omissions, or broken links rather than doing a word-for-word proofing because many changes may have been made to meet our style standards and/or have been previously approved by the author. Authors proof their webtexts and supply a list of errors to the AAE, who makes the final changes before the entire Kairos staff does a final proofing of the entire publication before it goes live.
This finalization and proofing stage, just prior to publication, lasts approximately one month, so authors and Guest Editors need to be at an available email address in April and early May to complete these steps in a timely manner.
A FINAL NOTE AND CORRESPONDENCE ADDRESS
We hope this manual serves as a good starting point as you contemplate or begin guest editing a special issue for Kairos. We always profit from the new perspectives Guest Editors bring to the journal. Please let us know if we can be of any other service or of any ways this manual can be improved.