A new partnership between Liverpool University Press, the University Library and the Department of Cultures, Languages and Area Studies has launched with the aim of transforming research dissemination in the Modern Languages.
Modern Languages Open (MLO) is a peer-reviewed platform for the open access publication of research from across the modern languages to a global audience. With a focus on interdisciplinarity, it offers rigorous peer review pre-publication, interactivity post-publication, rapid turnaround from submission to publication through continuous publication, flexibility on article length and rewards for article reviewers.
Selected by the Association of American University Presses for their ‘Ideas Unbound’ showcase, as a project ‘that exemplifies innovation in scholarly publishing’, MLO has already attracted wide acclaim, with the author of the HEFCE Review of Modern Foreign Languages provision in higher education in England, Professor Michael Worton, observing that MLO “will transform the nature of publishing by explicitly encouraging interdisciplinarity, ensuring that high-quality and original work is published in a timely way, and significantly enlarging and democratising both the creation and the readership of modern language research.”
Anthony Cond, Director of Liverpool University Press, said: “Modern Languages Open links two of the most important recent trends in dissemination of modern languages research: it channels open access to provide a sustainable future for interdisciplinarity. While MLO will be a sustainable forum for scholars whose research transcends traditional subject boundaries, authors with more conventional papers can also benefit from its rich feature set.”
Martin Wolf, the Library’s Research Support Lead, added: “MLO is a great example of collaboration not competition between publishers and libraries on open access issues, with the university’s press and library working together to create a new open access platform.”
For more information, see www.modernlanguagesopen.org.