Questions: How important is it for an author to have a significant social media presence and to demonstrate that to the publisher? –SR
Answer: Generally a social media presence is less important in academic publishing than in trade publishing (which are books for the general reader).
But obviously being able to utilise your contacts for promotion of the book is certainly a plus and may well reach people we wouldn’t naturally get to with our own marketing.
It wouldn’t be a sticking point really though on whether a project was signed up – there are plenty of hugely successful academic authors who barely touch social media.
Your background, the project and the reviews are the most significant aspects for us. It’s nice to be able to say when presenting a new book idea to our committee that an author has 10,000+ followers, and we would certainly exploit that with the author’s help, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the book will sell any better than one which relies on our own marketing contacts.
With fairly limited marketing budgets across academic publishing, having a pro-active author, whether on social media or through other channels, is a big help in reaching the right people.
Louise Baird-Smith Commissioning Editor – Design and Photography
Bloomsbury Visual Arts
“Ask the Editor” is a Design Incubation series, where design academics, researchers, and practitioners pose their questions to editors of books, journals, conferences and other academic and design trade publishing organizations. If you would like your questions answered by publishing professionals, send your questions to Design Incubation via the “Ask the Editor” form on our website.
Answer: This is an interesting question and one which has caused much discussion even in our office!
Question: Can an author approach more than one publisher at the same time? -MR
Answer: This is an interesting question and one which has caused much discussion even in our office!
In some cases, publishers will request that you only approach one at a time, but this isn’t always enforced in every subject or publisher. Some editors I’ve heard will not consider a project if it has been sent to multiple publishers – the argument being that it can seem like you’ve just sent it out haphazardly to everyone, without fully considering which is the best publisher for you and the project. It’s best to really consider who already publishes in the area you’re working in, where the best books are coming from and whether the reputation of the publisher is right for you (for instance, if you need a university press for tenure, or you need a publisher who double reviews the manuscripts, and so on). As each publisher will invest time and money in the review process, submitting to various places is a difficult one, but you should certainly feel free to submit elsewhere if you haven’t heard back.
I’d personally say that given the fact it can sometimes take a little while to hear back from editors initially, it might be worth approaching a few to start with to gauge interest – however, it is best to be upfront about this, and certainly once you have had contact with an editor you need to make it clear to everyone if the project is also being considered by another publisher (for politeness as well as practicalities). It is tricky if you were to get to the point of being offered a contract by two publishers at the same time without either knowing you’d been discussing the project elsewhere, especially as by that point there will likely have been a significant amount of input from the publishers and reviewers in developing the overall approach of the project. Again, if in doubt have a look at the publisher’s website and see if there is guidance on multiple submissions. And individually submitting the same project to several editors at the same publisher is generally poor form – if you’re not quite sure who to approach, try one editor and ask them to pass the project on to a colleague if it’s not right for them, or copy the editors into the same email so they don’t all end up individually assessing the same project.
Louise Baird-Smith Commissioning Editor – Design and Photography
Bloomsbury Visual Arts
“Ask the Editor” is a Design Incubation series, where design academics, researchers, and practitioners pose their questions to editors of books, journals, conferences and other academic and design trade publishing organizations. If you would like your questions answered by publishing professionals, send your questions to Design Incubation via the “Ask the Editor” form on our website.
Question: Is there any difference between writing a single-authored book and a co-authored book? -AB
Answer: While different publishers or series may have set rules on when they will (or won’t) accept co-authored titles, in most cases, there usually isn’t a problem from the publishers’ side on this.
Sometimes it can actually be a bonus where the book is interdisciplinary or has broad coverage where a single author couldn’t be an expert in all the content. My colleague is publishing a book on climate change in history written by a historian and a climate scientist together – it’s a massive selling point because we can say our book has holistic coverage and the science is valid.
Something to bear in mind though is how to divide the work, and do you know you can definitely successfully work together over a couple of years? In terms of how you split the work is up to you – maybe you’d each write certain chapters and swap to read/edit the other ones, or you may have certain aspects of the book you’ll research individually, then write up together. Generally, there would be a lead author, though this isn’t essential. Saying all that, going above two co-authors can get tricky, so over this number, you’ll need to really consider if multi-authored is the right approach – an edited collection may then make more sense (a different author writing each chapter, with overall editors who commission individual chapters). Another consideration is that any royalties will be split between the primary authors/editors of the volume, and you will be equally responsible for the delivery of the book.
Louise Baird-Smith Commissioning Editor – Design and Photography
Bloomsbury Visual Arts
“Ask the Editor” is a Design Incubation series, where design academics, researchers, and practitioners pose their questions to editors of books, journals, conferences and other academic and design trade publishing organizations. If you would like your questions answered by publishing professionals, send your questions to Design Incubation via the “Ask the Editor” form on our website.
Question: How important is it that an author has written a book before? Does that improve their chances of you taking on their project and giving them a contract? –MR
Answer: While there is an element of reassurance if an author has already published a book before, everyone has to start somewhere and there will always need to be a ‘first book’ at some point.
Some big textbook lists/publishers may not sign unpublished authors as the bigger textbook projects have a higher risk factor than an academic monograph might do, but this isn’t the same across the board.
I’ve worked on subjects where academic scholarship was relatively new, so the pool of previously published authors was very small – getting new voices into the mix was really important to build up the high quality literature in the area.
Equally, if someone has written many books before, it doesn’t mean that they will necessarily be offered a contract for their next book.
Whether you have tons of experience as an author, or are brand new, the combination of the project itself and your experience in the area (as a researcher, practitioner or teacher, depending on the type of book) along with the feedback from the peer reviews is a more realistic predictor of whether a project would be approved. If in doubt, just drop the editor/publisher an email and see if it’s worth submitting a proposal.
Louise Baird-Smith Commissioning Editor – Design and Photography
Bloomsbury Visual Arts
“Ask the Editor” is a Design Incubation series, where design academics, researchers, and practitioners pose their questions to editors of books, journals, conferences and other academic and design trade publishing organizations. If you would like your questions answered by publishing professionals, send your questions to Design Incubation via the “Ask the Editor” form on our website.
We’re excited to announce our very own Robin Landa’s recent publication, the 6th Edition of Graphic Design Solutions, publisher Wadsworth. Congrat’s Robin on completing this 2 year project.
CC: My name is Catherine C, I’m the Assistant Editor for Design at Bloomsbury Visual Arts
LB: and I’m Louise Baird Smith, im the Commissioning Editor for Design and Photography books
LB: So this is a talk in collaboration with the Design Incubation team and Bloomsbury Publishing, just talking you through really how to start off with the book proposal, how to present it, and is it what we are looking for.
What is Your Book?
LB: So the first thing you want to establish is, what is the book? What sort of book is it?
Is it a going to be a research book—so you are looking at a quite high level specific academic scholarly work?
Or is it something that might be used by students and professionals in their day-to-day lives?
Or is it something like a text book, that would be used by a first year or above undergraduates.
Or is it going to be a big reference book which is covering the whole state of a specific topic or subject?
Once you establish what sort of book its going to be, you have to work out who it is for. So like these ones, this is what you would have for the students, books for the researchers, and books for academics.
You need to look at why they actually want that book? Is it something that is going to be aligning to their course, or is it going to be something that they need to pass exams, or is it looking at a new technology that they might be using in their work?
So those are the key considerations that you need to think about when you start looking at a book proposal. And then you’ll need to think about which publisher you’ll be looking to contact.
Choosing Your Publisher
CC: In terms of choosing a publisher, doing some research and just looking at websites is obviously a really good idea. You’ll want to look at a publisher who already publishes books in your area. And just checking websites is a really good way to.
LB: And different publishers might have different lists they work from, and so you might have one publisher, like Taschen, who do big beautiful books that might end up in museums. But you might have others who are like university presses, who wouldn’t necessarily have books that go into bookstores, but are very high level research. So having a look at the different focus they have is very important.
The Proposal
CC: When you get to the stage of wanting to put together/prepare a proposal, most publishers, definitely Bloomsbury, has a set book proposal document which we like authors to complete. You can find that on our website, and all academic contacts are listed on the website. So if you just get in touch, someone will be very happy to send you their document.
Its really good to give as much detail as possible and to stick (obviously) to the structure of their proposal document. So that’s just basically looking at things like—what your books is about, what is its coverage, what is the kind of structure. We ask for an annotated table of contents— that can be very really useful for us in terms of gauging what the book is going to be used for.
LM: That’s basically like how you would have an abstract for a journal—so just a really short description of each chapter.
CC: If you can give us some information about what is unique about your book, what is special about it, in what way is it better than competitive titles, who you think the potential readers will be.
And also see what your experience is, sometimes some authors submit CVs, alongside their proposal documents — which can be really helpful.
LM: Particularly if you teach in the area, or have done specific research already— that is really good for us to know.
And, depending on the publisher as well, they may ask for some sample material. Particularly on the certain textbook side, its really important for us to have a sample chapter, or a sample of a few pages from a chapter, so we can see the writing style, and the level that you write at. For academic books, it might be less important. But each publisher will work in a different way. Some will ask for the whole book, but the majority of publishers will want to see some sample material, and then they can work with you on that.
So the general process is, once you have put together this proposal document, it will go to me or one of my colleagues, who will send you feedback on whether it looks roughly appropriate for the list. If it aligns with the current books that we have got. It is not competing with something we already have? Is it filling a gap in our list, for a market that we can reach with our contacts?
If it is all looking good, and it is looking like a topic of interest, then we will send you feedback— it is a sort of collaboration between you and us making sure it is as strong as it can be at proposal stage. A lot of the development work happens up front, particularly with the more academic books. We want to make sure it is we are both clear on the process and what the actual project would be.
Then we, sort of, look at financial aspects as well at that point. If it is going to be a book based around gallery or archival material—that is obviously very expensive. So if it is a book that has a very small market that could mean financially it would not work for us. So these are the sorts of things we consider at that first, initial stage.
Once we are happy with it, then we will take it onto peer review, which CC will mention in a second. Occasionally it will not be the right book for us or if needs changes—it might not quite what you want to publish. So if it does not look like it would work for the first publisher you contact that does not mean it is not a good potential book and we would be happy to put in the direction of someone it might fit with better if it is not right for our list at that point.
Peer Review to Contract
CC: So if we think it is a project that might be interesting for us, we would send it up for peer review to academics who teach or research in the area, just to get some initial feedback of what they think of it. Obviously we can advise from a publishing perspective but it is really good to get expert advice from people working in that area. We do organize that anonymously, but you do see on the proposal document that we invite suggestions if there’s someone that would be particularly suitable to review a book. We are always very happy to hear your ideas.
LM: And it helps guide us where we send it to, and if we don’t need some specific thing.
CC: That is something that we organize. We aim to get peer review feedback completed in a month. Sometimes the process can take longer, We will return that feedback to you anonymously and then it would be…
LM: And then we discuss it through— both in terms of the editor and editor’s assistant—whomever is working with you on the project at that point. We chat through peer review and work out if its something that we need to do changes on, or if it is looking strong as it is. Occasionally there might be a second round of peer reviews if big changes need to be made. But we use that, like I said as guidance, we can look at it as a book project but actually from the academic side its really helpful to have that extra peer review level of assessment as well.
So if we decide at that point if the project can work for us both financially and in terms of adding something to the field that is new then we put together a proposal pack for our publishing committee—that is sales, marketing, and editorial colleagues—who will look at the project as a potential investment basically for the publisher. We’ll look at potential print run, costings, royalties, looking at the scope of the book, whether is it international coverage. And the marketing, where will be pushing the book to?
And hopefully at that point if all goes through then we’ll be able to offer a contract. That is the point at which you and your editor will discuss and agree what you are agreeing to and what the publishers are agreeing to. That is usually in terms of delivery time scales, what it is that each party are doing? For most publishers its a pretty standard template of what is covered, it usually includes things like proofreading, and who’s responsible for that, who is responsible for the indexing, and number of images and words.
LM: I don’t if know if you want to run over, quickly the time frame that are usually involved in each stage up to the contract?
CC: Yeah. definitely. So when you send us a proposal we will always acknowledge it and then aim to get our in-house editors feedback to you within a month. On from that, we aim to have peer review back to you within hopefully the maximum of 3 months. And then typically the full process—from us receiving the proposal to making revisions as necessary following the review to being able to offer a contract—would be hopefully about 6 months.
LB: That is the ideal. Sometimes its quicker, sometimes its slower. It sort of depends on the time of year and often the kind of revisions that are needed.
After Contract
So once you are offered a contract, once its signed, you usually have, it is usually about a year to a year-and-a-half to write the book, but obviously that is done in collaboration with you, if you are going up for tenure, or if you are having a sabbatical that might affect the time frame that you have to write the book. So we want to work with you to make sure you’ve got a date that is accurate that we don’t end up missing because that could be quite disasterous for our books. So that is done in collaboration with you, and during that process there are various points where you check-in with the editorial team in house. So you might be working with the development editor if you are working with one of the thick textbooks. So they will be working with you on individual chapters, and images, and things like that. So there is various stages throughout that process. That is before it gets peer reviewed, and taken through to the production process, which is when its copy edited, proofread, typeset, all the rest of that.
Bloomsbury Information
Some reasons to publish with Bloomsbury: we combine the best of an academic press in that we have 2 stages minimum of rigorous anonymous peer review.
And we combine that with the best parts of a trade publisher in that our books look really nice. This is especially relevant for Visual Arts publishing.
We really pride ourselves on having good relationships with authors. Its a much more personal relationship than perhaps some of the bigger publishers. You will have one editor who will work with you through the publishing process.
Final Points
That is a very quick run through of the publishing process, up to contract. After that point you just have to write the book. So pretty easy (laugh). So if you have any questions, our contact details will be available after this. Thanks!
Academic Publishing
Design Incubation/Bloomsbury
Louise Baird-Smith – Commissioning Editor for Design and Photography, Bloomsbury
louise.baird-smith@bloomsbury.com
Design Incubation is currently accepting applications for the January 2018 Fellowship and Workshop Sessions. The application deadline is September 1, 2017.
Application Process
Design Incubation welcomes online applications for the January 2018 Fellowship and Workshop Session. Applications are being accepted June 1, 2017–September 1, 2017.
Applicants are required to provide contact information, title/current rank, institutional affiliation, a CV, and a 200-word biography. Candidates also need to indicate for which of the 2 tracks they are applying. (see Fellowship Program Format.)
Preference will be given to full-time faculty currently employed by accredited colleges or universities. Adjuncts and independent scholars are also encouraged to apply.
There is no fee to apply for the Design Incubation Fellowship. However upon acceptance there is a $200 fee for the 3-day workshop and all Fellows must be available to participate in person at the Design Incubation Fellowship workshops. A formal letter of acceptance will be provided so attendees can apply for travel funds from their home institutions and pay the workshop fee to reserve their place.
FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM FORMAT
Design Incubation Fellows commit to working on a research project for six months. The Fellowship begins with a three-day workshop (see below) where participants learn about different modes of publishing and writing strategies. During the six months following the Workshop, Fellows pledge to continue to work on their projects during which time they receive feedback and group checkin’s. The 2018 Design Incubation Fellowship Workshop will take place at St. John’s University’s Manhattan Campus on January 11-13, 2018. All Fellows are required to participate in the Fellowship Workshop.
January 11–13, 2018. New York City. A three-day workshop facilitating academic writing and publishing for designers.
The mission of Design Incubation is to support and facilitate the development of research in the field of communication design. The organization works with academics and practitioners to create scholarly discourse and publications focused on creative projects, critical analysis, historical perspectives, technological advances and other topics relevant to design studies.
Applications accepted: June 1, 2017 – September 1, 2017. Visit the Fellowship Application page for details to apply.
2017 Design Incubation Fellowship
January 11 –13, 2018
St. John’s University’s Manhattan campus
PROGRAM AGENDA
The 2018 Design Incubation Fellowship Workshop will include sessions with Maggie Taft, Managing Editor of the journal Design and Culture as well as guest appearances by a number of authors and publishers. Aaris Sherin is director of the Design Incubation Fellowship program. Sherin is a Professor of Graphic Design at St. John’s University in New York and author of a number of books including her most recent titles Elaine Lustig Cohen: Modernism Reimagined and Sustainable Thinking: Ethical Approaches to Design and Design Management. (See below for schedule.)
Day 1
Thursday, January 11th
Introductions with Hosts
9:00am–12:30pm
Dan Wong, Co-founder of Design Incubation
Liz Deluna, Co-chair Design Incubation
Robin Landa, Co-Chair Design Incubation
Structuring Scholarship
Aaris Sherin
Director of Fellowships at Design Incubation
Robin Landa Distinguished Professor Kean University Author over twenty books including Nimble: Creative Thinking in the Digital Age
Elizabeth Guffey Professor State University of New York (SUNY) at Purchase Author of Posters: A Global Perspective, and Retro: The Culture of Revival Founding Editor of Design and Culture
Sharing Session / Wrap Up
3:00pm–5:00pm
Group Dinner (Optional)
6:00pm–8:00pm
Please note: This schedule is tentative and is subject to change.
2018 Senior Fellow
Maria Rogal Professor School of Art + Art History
Graphic Design Program & Affiliate Faculty
Center for Latin American Studies
University of Florida
2018 Fellows
Camila Afanador-Llach Assistant Professor Department of Visual Arts and Art History Florida Atlantic University
Denise Anderson Assistant Professor Robert Busch School of Design Michael Graves College Kean University
Liat Berdugo Assistant Professor University of San Francisco
Anne Berry Assistant Professor Cleveland State University
David Hardy Assistant Professor James Madison University
Jessica Jacobs Assistant Professor Columbia College Chicago
Cynthia Lawson Associate Professor Integrated Design The New School
Christine Lhowe Instructor Seton Hall University
Courtney Marchese Assistant Professor Quinnipiac University
Daniel McCafferty Assistant Professor University of Manitoba
Grace Moon Adjunct Professor CUNY Queens College
Sarah Rutherford Assistant Professor Cleveland State University
Misty Thomas-Trout Assistant Professor University of Dayton
Karen Zimmermann Professor University of Arizona
Local Lunch and Coffee Spots
Starbucks
13-25 Astor Pl, New York, NY 10003
Pret A Manger
1 Astor Pl, New York, NY 10003
Le Petite Parisien – Sandwiches / Baguettes
32 E 7th St
New York, NY 10003
Mamoun’s Falafel – Middle Eastern
30 St Marks Pl
New York, NY 10003
V-Spot – Vegan / with Gluten Free options
12 Saint Marks Pl
New York, NY 10003
Bluestone Lane (coffee shop)
51 Astor Pl, New York, NY 10003
(just downstairs in the same building as SJU)
Chopt Creative Salad Co.
51 Astor Pl, New York, NY 10003
(just downstairs in the same building as SJU)
Many tasty Ramen and Sushi places on St. Marks between 2nd and 3rd Ave.
Design Incubation is excited to announce a partnership with Bloomsbury Publishing for the Design Incubation Educators Awards.
Bloomsbury publishes books on various design education topics from academic research on the history and theory of the discipline through introductory textbooks to practical guides and manuals.
A webinar discussing design scholarship with an emphasis on the intersection of professional practice and writing.
A webinar discussing design scholarship with an emphasis on the intersection of professional practice and writing. Information about discipline specific journals and book publishers.
As design educators we are increasingly asked to do it all. We need to excel in the classroom, provide service to our institution, maintain a professional practice and publish and engage in design-related scholarship.
