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Merger of Features and CoverWeb

 

To streamline the publication process and make Kairos more usable and understandable for readers, the journal has merged two sections—Features and CoverWeb—into one section called Topoi. The main section's new name indicates that this is the "commonplace" to look for new ideas or to find relationships among ideas in Kairos. This section will welcome general submissions and will be unthemed for the Fall and Spring issues, although themed sections are possible in guest-edited, summer issues. The Computers and Writing issue will still be a feature of each spring issue, along with open-call webtexts, when available.

Background

We have instituted this change for several reasons. When it was developed, the CoverWeb section was intended to offer an online space for authors to present their scholarly webtexts, to interact with other authors about these webtexts, and to create a unified multi-vocal collection of texts around a central theme. While the notion of themed issues remains in the most recent iterations of the CoverWeb, the changing media with which authors compose has shifted how both authors compose their texts and how the CoverWeb Editors have perceived these texts, making multi-vocal hypertexts less relevant (given the other interactive, multi-voiced options that technology affords) than they were when the journal was started. Thus, the CoverWeb has evolved into a themed section that publishes texts on a specific topic one issue a year. (The other themed issue has been reserved for Computers & Writing conference scholarship for many years.) Over the last five years, during this evolution in the CoverWeb’s purpose, the Features section became a place where non-themed webtexts were published and, thus, it began to be known as existing in an accidental contrast to the CoverWeb. Both sections contained excellent scholarship, but editorial discussions have revealed that the division between the two sections seems less useful now than at the creation of the journal. In particular, some readers have questioned how the journal can be said to publish innovative scholarship when the scholars have been limited either to those presenting at the Computers & Writing conference or to those with interested in specified themes (although the journal has always published open-call, unthemed webtexts, whenever we had them). This concern highlights a sense that readers and authors may have viewed these two sections as unequal in terms of scholarship and/or interest levels.

Changes

In essence, this restructuring and the advent of the single section Topoi proposes that themed issues—with the exception of the Computers & Writing issue—will occur only during guest-edited, summer issues (see more on this point below). Our new publication timeline thus will be:

  • Fall issue (August): Open issue;
  • Winter/Spring issue (January): Computers & Writing (C&W) section and Open-call section (both within Topoi); and
  • Summer issue (May): Themed issue (when proposed and as needed).

The C&W issue is considered “themed” only in that it contains scholarship composed by presenters at the previous year’s conferences, which we hope will encourage scholarship that continues to be diverse. And the Topoi section will be more robust by only publishing webtexts once a year (unless we have an abundance and can include an open-section in the Spring issue). Thus, readers can look forward to both the C&W issue and a robust Topoi-based issue each year. In addition to these section changes, we have instituted a deadline for the Fall open issues: October 15. While we will continue to accept rolling submissions, the October deadline will allow authors and editors to better plan for when possible publication may occur.

While the implications of removing the themed CoverWeb from Kairos might seem counter to the journal’s mission (i.e., Michael Salvo’s introduction to the purpose of the CoverWeb has certainly been a guiding principle to CoverWeb editors), there also is a need for change in order to recruit more submissions on a range of topics. To take advantage of technologies that allow for the multi-vocality and cross-talk that the CoverWeb once fostered, a redesign of the whole journal to a content-management system will take place in Spring 2007. This redesign will allow for author chat and reader feedback more readily than the current design does.

Summer Special Issues

Because the value of special/themed issues remains, the journal will start encouraging the proposal of themed issues to be developed by guest editors for summer (May) publication. The Editors will facilitate guest-edited issues after receiving editorial board and staff feedback on any themed-issue proposals. Soon, we will publish timelines and guest-editor manuals to help potential guest editors. Our first themed issue (originally conceived as a CoverWeb, and thus edited by Beth and Cheryl) will be 11.3 in summer 2007: “Classical Rhetoric and Digital Communication: A Canon Blast into the Net.”

Special summer issues do not have to be full Kairos issues in that these proposed issues may only contain webtexts about the theme. Other sections of Kairos—Praxis, Interviews, and Reviews—do not have to participate in the summer issues unless desired. However, guest editors can propose to include webtexts that relate to these sections without the direct interaction of section editors. This publication change will only occur for the summer issues, and the Editors may elect to ask section editors for guidance and support if guest-editors propose to include praxis-, review- or interview-like webtexts.

 

Overview

Kairos 11.1

Vol. 11 Iss. 1 Fall 2006