Author Guidelines

The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities invites four kinds of contributions. 

• First, we publish peer-reviewed articles at the intersections of humanistic, social-scientific, and futuristic thinking.
• Second, we also publish pieces to be reviewed by peers “post-publication.”  That is to say, we invite experimental, provocative or creative contributions (for example, manifestos, think pieces, autotheory, video essays, state-of-the-field essays, future-state-of-the-field essays) to be reviewed by the editorial board rather than undergoing the peer review process. 
• Third, we have a keen interest in the democratization of futures studies. We encourage our readers to hear the creation of possible futures as they are sounded by underrepresented voices. With this in mind, we invite proposals for carefully planned and thoroughly conceptualized guest-edited themed issues. 
• Finally, the Journal always holds open a space for the unforeseen. Given the Journal’s orientation, it is only fitting that we anticipate the unanticipated and welcome ideas beyond the stated aims and scope of the Journal but germane to its mission.

I. Peer-reviewed Articles

For the first kind of publication, all articles are subjected to a double-blind peer review. (For guidelines on the other kinds of contribution, see below). Articles should comprise no more than 7 000 words (including notes and references). An abstract of no more than 300 words should be submitted, as well as 5-8 keywords. In addition, a short author presentation (approximately 50 words) should be submitted, including affiliation, research interests and e-mail address. It is possible to include acknowledgements of funders of the article or the project, preferably in relation to the author presentation.

Manuscripts are submitted through The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities’s editorial support system OJS, and authors not already registered as users need to create an account and follow the submission instructions in OJS.

II. Creative Knowledge Production

In addition to peer-reviewed articles, we also publish pieces to be reviewed by peers “post-publication.”  That is to say, we invite experimental, provocative or creative contributions (for example, manifestos, think pieces, autotheory, video essays, state-of-the-field essays, future-state-of-the-field essays) to be reviewed by the editorial board rather than undergoing the peer review process.

In “A Futurist Turn in the Humanities” (College Literature, Volume 48, Number 3, Summer 2021), Mihail Epstein proposes the following thought experiment:

 "Is there any institution in contemporary academia in which creative thinkers, inventors and builders like Friedrich Schlegel, Friedrich Nietzsche, Filippo Marinetti, André Breton, or Walter Benjamin could flourish as professionals? Imagine Friedrich Nietzsche applying for the position of assistant professor at a department of philosophy somewhere in the United States.  He brings his book Thus Spake Zarathustra as a confirmation of his credentials.  A book without a single reference, with no list of sources, devoid of scholarly apparatus, and full of pompous and vague metaphysical declarations voiced by the arrogant author in the guise of an ancient Persian prophet. Most likely, Nietzsche would be denied even the position of an instructor, despite the fact that dozens of distinguished professors of philosophy have made their careers studying Nietzsche’s oeuvre and commenting on his philosophy."

With Epstein’s thought experiment in mind, the Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities encourages explorations of the linkages between creativity, experimentation, formal innovation and social and humanistic knowledge production.  (We would welcome a submission from the next Nietzsche or Benjamin, and we realize that the insights of creative thinkers are often inextricably intertwined with the way these thinkers re-imagine the limits of academic discourse.)

For contributors interested in submitting contributions (think pieces, autotheory, state-of-the-field-essays, proposals, syllabi, and so on) with affinities to conventional genres of academic publication, we encourage contributors to consult the guidelines for peer-reviewed article submissions noted above.  For contributors interested in submitting pieces beyond the boundaries of conventional genres of academic publication, we encourage creative, imaginative re-thinkings of the best practices of knowledge production and its discourses. 

 

III. Guest-edited Special Issues 

Scholars interested in guest editing a special issue of the Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities should contact the editorial collective via email (w.bridges@u.rochester.edu) to determine the suitability of the topic to the journal’s mission.  Please title the email “Special Issue Proposal–Title of Special Issue” (For example, a pitch for a special issue on a post-work world would read “Special Issue Proposal–Post-work World.”) 

Reading previous issues of the journal in general–and reading the introductions to previous special issues in particular–should give contributors a sense of the kinds of special issues we publish. 

If the topic proposed resonates with the intellectual concerns of the JSCP readership, scholars will then be asked to submit a more formal proposal, which is reviewed by the editorial collective and members of the editorial board.  

 

IV. Unforeseen Contributions

Rather than placing preconceived limitations on unforeseen contributions, we will ask instead that, if a contributor has an idea for the Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities that falls within the purview of the journal’s mission but outside the scope of the three categories noted above, the contributor contact the editorial collective by email (w.bridges@u.rochester.edu).  Please title the email “Unforeseen Contribution–Synopsis of Idea” (For example, a pitch for a self-interview by Fernando Pessoa would read “Unforseen Contribution–Pessoa Interviews Himself.”) 

 

What You Need to Know Before Submitting Your Manuscript

The text should be clearly organized, avoiding jargon as well as racist or sexist language. Only articles in English are accepted—use either UK or US spellings consistently. The article must be written in adequate English. There must also be a coherent hierarchy of headings and subheadings (three levels at the most). Before you submit your manuscript to the journal, please consult the alphabetically ordered subject points below. These describe and explain our reference-system, formatting, and other important information regarding the publishing process.

Abstract

An abstract of no more than 300 words should be submitted, as well as 4-6 keywords, as part of the article metadata but please also include the abstract in the main manuscript file.

Acknowledgements

Any acknowledgements must be placed below the end notes.

Funding

The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities requires all authors to acknowledge their funding in a consistent fashion under a separate heading, or state that: This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. 

Declaration of conflicting interests

The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities encourages authors to include a declaration of any conflicting interests.

Anonymity

The manuscript should be anonymous which means that the author(s)’s name has to be removed from all pages of the manuscript. It is also crucial that the author’s name is removed from any references in the body of text (or from the metadata of the file submitted) and do not include the works with titles or co-authors in the bibliography. Make sure that the end notes do not refer to any research context which might lead the reviewer to suspect the identity of the author of the manuscript.

Bibliographic References

Below you will find examples on how to format your bibliography correctly. Please note that authors’ names are referenced in full (first names rather than initials) and that references to online newspaper articles require information about the date of access.

Articles in Journals

Author surname, author first name, “Title”, Journal title, volume: issue/number, year of publication, page numbers. Example: Goode, Luke & Michael Godhe, “Beyond Capitalist Realism: Why We Need Critical Future Studies”, Culture Unbound, 9:1, 2017, 109-129.

Books

Author surname, author first name, Title followed by place of publication: publisher, year of publication in brackets. Example: Bridges, Will, Playing in the Shadows: Fictions of Race and Blackness in Postwar, Japanese Literature (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2020).

Editions

When referencing a later edition of a classic work, the original year of publication should be included in the reference before place of publication: publisher, year of publication in brackets, e.g. Mumford, Lewis, Technics and Civilization (1934; Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2010). If there are several editions of a book or an edited book, this should be stated clearly in the reference before the place of publication, e.g., Butler, Judith, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, 4 th ed. (London, New York: Routledge, 2006).

Articles in edited books

Author surname, author first name, “Title of publication”, editor first name, editor surname, (ed.): Title of Book followed by place of publication: publisher, year of publication in brackets, page numbers. Example: Willis, Carol, “Scyscraper Utopias: Visionary Urbanism”, Joseph J. Corn (ed.), Imagining Tomorrow: History, Technology, and the American Future (London: The MIT Press, 1986), 164-187.

Newspaper articles with author

Frost, Stephen, “The state of work in Singapore”, Find Singapore.net, 13 May 2009: http://www.findsingapore.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=9862&sid=8a5b8b4abea5fd 1aa4, (accessed 10/06/09).

Theses and Dissertations

Print: Author’s surname, author’s first name, Title followed by Qualification, Awarding institution, year of publication in brackets. Example: Nyström, Andreas, Places of Rest in Worlds of Ruin: Havens in Post-Apocalyptic Fiction (doctoral dissertation, Karlstad University, 2021).

Films

Title [Medium], director’s first name director’s surname, followed by Production company/companies and year of release in brackets. Example: Escape from New York [Film], John Carpenter (AVCO Embassy Pictures, Goldcrest Films International, International Film Investors, 1981).

Television Programmes

Series title and episode number, “Episode name,” Broadcasting organisation and (if relevant) Channel/online platform, Full date when episode was first shown/broadcasted. Station Eleven, “Survival is Insufficient,” HBO Max, December 30 2021.

Radio Programmes

Note: only use a presenter or contributor’s name if the intellectual content of an item can be clearly attributed to them. Presenter’s Surname, presenter’s first name/Contributor’s Surname, contributor’s first name (Year of release): Title, Broadcasting organisation and station (if applicable), Date of broadcast. Example: Naroskin, Per (2018): Känsligt Läge, Sveriges Radio P1, May 25 2018.

Podcasts

Host’s surname, Host’s first name (Year of Publication): Programme title, Series Title (if relevant) [type of medium], Date of broadcast, [listening date], url (if applicable). For example: Joe Trotta & Houman Sadri (2019): 37—The GotPop Popular Culture Podcast, Critical World Building [Podcast], September 4 2019 [February 10 2022].

Biography

A short biography of the author should be added to the second copy of the manuscript submitted through OJS. This bio should include University affiliation, research background and any ongoing scholarly projects.

Capitalization

In English titles and subtitles the first letter of each word should be given in capital letters. Exceptions to this rule include prepositions, conjunctions and articles which have fewer than four letters (unless they are at the beginning of the title).

In the author presentation, all titles should be written in lower casing, i.e. Luke Goode is editor-in-chief for The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities. However, if the title precedes the name the title should be written in capital letters, i.e., Editor-in-Chief William Bridges IV.

Directions that refer to names (geographical locations etc) should be given in capital letters. Examples include: Western and the Far East.

Copyright

The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities is an Open Access journal, indicating that all its content is freely available to anyone with an internet connection. We publish all our articles under a Creative Commons license that specify what a user can do with a document. Creative Commons licenses are not an alternative to copyright. They work alongside copyright and enable you to modify your copyright terms to best suit your needs. The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities uses a so called “Attribution Noncommercial” (CC BY-NC) license which allows users to distribute the work and to re-work it without the author’s permission, but not for any commercial purposes and never without acknowledging the original author.

Authors are welcome to parallel publish their articles without embargo as long as they include a full reference to the original source. The author(s) should state if the manuscript has been previously published elsewhere or if it has been submitted to another publisher. While being processed by The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities, the manuscript should not be submitted to another publisher without informing the journal’s editors. The author guarantees that no other publisher has copyright demands that prevent publishing in Culture Unbound. Copyright for all manuscripts rests with the author(s). The editors reserve the right to edit manuscripts.

Fees

The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities does not charge any publication fees from its authors.

Formatting

Manuscripts should be in MS Word format, set in Times New Roman or other standard font, with minimal formatting. Quotations exceeding 40 words are to be set as block quotations in separate, indented paragraphs. Avoid unnecessary abbreviations. Necessary abbreviations should be written accordingly: ibid.; et al.; no.; i.e.; e.g.; etc. Avoid bold or underlined letters. Numbers exceeding four digits should be written with a single spacing before the last three digits (e.g., 15 000). References to centuries should be spelled out in letters, i.e., “nineteenth century.”

Illustrations and Photographs

It is possible to include illustrations and photographs in the manuscript as long as they are directly relevant to the discussion. You can embed illustrations and photographs in the main document as this makes the review process easier, but all illustrations, including pictures, tables and diagrams, should also be submitted separately, preferably in jpg or tif format. Illustrations and photographs should be included in high resolution, print quality and preferably 300 dpi. They should be numbered consecutively, with short descriptive captions including source information, and with a clear indication in the text of where they are to be 5 inserted. Please contact the editorial team of The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities if you wish to include film clips or other forms of moving images. Please note that authors are responsible for acquiring all permissions from the copyright owners for the use of quotations, illustrations, tables, etc. This is important! Please make sure this is in order as early in the publication process as possible. Seek advice if you are unsure on issues of copyright and fair use.

Multiple authors

If there are multiple authors in one reference these should be denoted with all the surnames or the first surname and “et al”. If there are two authors there should be an “&” sign between their names, both in the in-text reference and in the bibliography.

Notes

Notes should have the form of numbered endnotes (1 , 2 , 3…). If several references are listed in the same endnote they should be chronologically ordered, i.e., the oldest publications first.

Publication

Articles are made available through advance access on The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities’s webpage if finalised ahead of the publication of the issue they will be included in. The fact that The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities is an e-journal does not mean that an article can be revised after publication. Every author should be aware that once a text is published it is just as final and irrevocable as if it was published in a printed journal. Final publication decision rests with the The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities editorial team. It is assumed that by submitting an article to the journal, the author agrees to publication of the article by the Temple University Electronic Press which hosts the journal.

Punctuation

Double quotation marks should be used for quotes, and single quotation marks should be use for denoting in-citation quotes and words which are not direct quotes. Periods and commas (but not colons and semi-colons) should be placed inside the quotation marks when used at the end of an uncited sentence (i.e., “The period comes before the quotation mark.”).

Titles and subtitles in the endnotes or in the bibliography should be separated by a colon, i.e., Haunted Images: Film, Ethics, Testimony and the Holocaust. If an edited book has one editor the name should be followed by “(ed.)” (with period), and if an edited book has several editors their names should be followed by “(eds)” (sans period).

In the bibliographic references, commas, periods and colons are used. Take special note of the fact that colon is used after the year of publication, that commas (not periods) are used in between titles and editors, between authors first name and surname and between cities (if there are more than one place of publication). Periods are only used to denote a single editor and at the end of the reference.

Referencing

The Journal of Social and Cultural Possibilities uses end-note references based on the Oxford author-date system (outlined above under Bibliographic reference). If several references are listed in the same endnote they should be chronologically ordered, i.e., the oldest publications first.