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Author Guidelines

Structure | Permissions | Language & text | Figures & tables | References

Authors are invited to submit manuscripts that fall within the focus of the journal. Please follow the below guidelines, and contact the Managing Editor if you have any questions. Submissions should be made electronically through this website. Once submitted, the author can track the submission and communicate with the editors via the online journal management system.

JCMS is a rapid publication journal - once your article has passed peer review it will be published immediately, unlike traditional publishing models which can mean a wait of months or even years before publication.

Length

• Research articles: ca. 5000-8000 words
• Review papers: ca. 3000-5000 words
• Short reports: ca. 1000-3000 words

The journal encourages authors to make their research data openly available via an appropriate repository to aid replication and/or use of research material. Data can be linked to the journal publication and be fully citable. Please contact the editorial team if you would like more information.

JCMS is not currently accepting book or conference reviews.

AUTHOR WRITING GUIDE

Structure

Title page

To ensure blind peer review, please only list the title and abstract on the submitted manuscript file.

The names of all authors, affiliations, contact details, biography (optional) and the corresponding author details must be completed online as part of the submission process. All authors must fit within the journal's definition of an author, available here.

Author names should include a forename and a surname. Forenames cannot include only initials.

• J. Bloggs is not preferred. The full name, Joe Bloggs is required (this will enhance the 'findability' of your publication).

The affiliation should ideally include ‘Department, Institution, City, Country’. However only the Institution and Country are mandatory.

Abstract
Research articles and Short reports should be accompanied by an abstract, summarising the article content. To ensure that this is as concise as possible, please limit the abstract to two paragraphs and no more than 200 words.

A list of up to six key words may be placed below the abstract.

The Abstract and Keywords should also be added to the metadata when making the initial online submission.

Main text
The body of the submission should be structured in a logical and easy to follow manner. A clear introduction section should be given that allows non-specialists in the subject an understanding of the publication and a background of the issue(s) involved. Methods, results, discussion and conclusion sections may then follow to clearly detail the information and research being presented.

Up to three level headings may be present and must be clearly identifiable using different font sizes, bold or italics. We suggest using Headings 1, 2 and 3 in MS-Word’s ‘Style’ section.

Supplementary Files (optional)
Any supplementary/additional files that should link to the main publication must be listed, with a corresponding number, title and option description. Ideally the supplementary files are also cited in the main text.

e.g. Supplementary file 1: Appendix. Scientific data related to the experiments.

Note: additional files will not be typeset so they must be provided in their final form. They will be assigned a DOI and linked to from the publication.

Reproducibility
If data, structured methods or code used in the research project have been made openly available, a statement should be added to inform the reader how/where to access these files. This should include the repository location and the DOI linking to it. Read our reproducibility guide for more information on best practice and maximising the impact of your open data.

If data used in the research project has not been made available, a statement confirming this should be added, along with reasoning why.

The journal's data policy is available on the Editorial Policies page.

Ethics and consent (if applicable)
Research involving human subjects, human material, or human data, must have been performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. Where applicable, studies must have been approved by an appropriate ethics committee and the authors should include a statement within the article text detailing this approval, including the name of the ethics committee and reference number of the approval. The identity of the research subject(s) should be anonymised whenever possible. For research involving human subjects, informed consent to participate in the study must be obtained from participants (or their legal guardian) and added to this statement. If a study involving human subjects/tissue/data was exempt from requiring ethical approval, a confirmation statement from the relevant body should be included within the submission.

Experiments using animals must follow national standards of care. For further information, click here.

Acknowledgements (optional)
Any acknowledgements must be headed and in a separate paragraph, placed after the main text but before the reference list.

Competing interests
If any of the authors have any competing interests then these must be declared. A short paragraph should be placed before the references. Guidelines for competing interests can be found here.

References
All references cited within the submission must be listed at the end of the main text file.

Permissions

The author is responsible for obtaining all permissions required prior to submission of the manuscript. Permission and owner details should be mentioned for all third-party content included in the submission or used in the research.

If a method or tool is introduced in the study, including software, questionnaires, and scales, the license this is available under and any requirement for permission for use should be stated. If an existing method or tool is used in the research, it is the author's responsibility to check the license and obtain the necessary permissions. Statements confirming that permission was granted should be included in the Materials and Methods section.

Language & text

Capitalisation of titles

• Capitalise all nouns, pronouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs and subordinate conjunctions (i.e. as, because, although).
• Use lowercase for all articles, coordinate conjunctions and prepositions.

Examples:

• Saving Eighteenth-Century New Smyrnea: Public Archaeology in Action
• Front Yard, Back Yard: Lessons in Neighborhood Archaeology in an Urban Environment

Book reviews:

• If you are submitting a book review, the title should read: 'Review of xxx (Name of book)'.
• Then, as a subtitle, please the following information: name of author, publisher, extent, publication year, ISBN (13-digit). Additional information (if applicable): name of editor/photographer/translator, no. of b&w and colour illustrations.

NOTE: Tier 1 subheads should follow the same rule as the titles. For lower-level subheads, only capitalise first letter (plus proper nouns).

Language

Articles must be submitted in English. Authors are welcome to use American or British spellings and grammar as long as they are used consistently. Some of the key differences between English and American English include the following:

• Programme (UK) vs. Program (US)
• Labour (UK) vs. Labor (US)
• Centre (UK) vs. Center (US)
• Demobilise (UK) vs. Demobilize (US)
• 13 January 2011 (UK) vs. January 13, 2011 (US)

Please note that when referring to proper nouns and normal institutional titles, you should always use the official, original spelling. For instance, it is World Health Organization, not World Health Organisation.

Grammar

As with language, American or English spelling and grammar rules may be used as long as they are used consistently. For instance, you may use a serial comma (red, white, and blue) or not (red, white and blue).

Numbers

We are happy for authors to use either words or figures to represent large figures (i.e. one million or 1,000,000) as long as the usage is consistent within an article. For numbers between zero and twelve we would recommend using words rather than figures, except for when it is a part of a dataset or presented in a table.  

When referring to a percentage, please use the words ‘per cent’ rather than the symbol %, again except for when it is a part of a dataset or presented in a table.

Currencies

• Use £ for British Pound Sterling, € for Euro, e.g. £50, €100.
• Use US$, C$, NZ$, A$ to distinguish between the different dollar currencies.

Quotation marks

Please use single quotation marks except for quotes within another speech, in which case double quotation marks are used.

Acronyms and abbreviations

With abbreviations, the crucial goal is to ensure that the reader – particularly one who may not be fully familiar with the topic or context being addressed – is able to follow along. Spell out almost all acronyms on first use, indicating the acronym in parentheses immediately thereafter. Use the acronym for all subsequent references. You do not need to spell out abbreviations for US, UK, EU, UN and DC, as in Washington, DC.

Use of footnotes/endnotesPlease use endnotes rather than footnotes (which we will refer to as ‘Notes’ at the end of the article, before ‘References’). All notes should be kept to the bare minimum and only where crucial clarifying information needs to be conveyed. Avoid using endnotes for purposes of referencing; use in-text citations instead. 

Figures & tables

Figures

All figures must be cited within the main text, in consecutive order using Arabic numerals (e.g. Figure 1, Figure 2, etc.).

Each figure must have an accompanying descriptive title. This should clearly and concisely summarise the content and/or use of the figure image. A short additional figure legend is optional to offer a further description.

• Figure 1: 1685 map of London.
• Figure 1: 1685 map of London. Note the additional of St Paul’s Cathedral, absent from earlier maps.

Figure titles and legends should be placed as a list after the references.

The source of the image should be included, along with any relevant copyright information and a statement of authorisation (if needed).

• Figure 1: Firemen try to free workers buried under piles of concrete and metal girders. Photo: Claude-Michel Masson, reproduced with permission of the photographer.

If your figure file includes text then please present the font as Ariel, Helvetica, or Verdana. This will mean that it matches the typeset text.

NOTE: All figures must be uploaded separately as supplementary files during the submission process, if possible in colour and at a resolution of at least 300dpi. Each file should not be more than 20MB. Standard formats accepted are: JPG, TIFF, GIF, PNG, EPS. For line drawings, please provide the original vector file (e.g. .ai, or .eps).

Tables
Tables must be created using a word processor's table function, not tabbed text.

Tables should be included in the manuscript.

All tables must be cited within the main text, numbered with Arabic numerals in consecutive order (e.g. Table 1, Table 2, etc.).

Each table must have an accompanying title. This should clearly and concisely summarise the content and/or use of the table. A short additional table legend is optional to offer a further description of the table. The table title and legend should be placed underneath the table.

Tables should not include:

• Rotated text
• Colour to denote meaning (it will not display the same on all devices)
• Images
• Vertical or diagonal lines
• Multiple parts (e.g. ‘Table 1a’ and ‘Table 1b’). These should either be merged into one table, or separated into ‘Table 1’ and ‘Table 2’.

NOTE: If there are more columns than can fit on a single page, then the table will be placed horizontally on the page. If it still can't fit horizontally on a page, the table will be broken into two.

References

In-text citations 

Authors are strongly encouraged to use parenthetical citations according to the Chicago style (Adam 1984: 120ff.) For publications authored and published by organisations, use the short form of the organisation’s name or its acronym in lieu of the full name. For instance, do NOT do the following (International Committee of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies 2000); instead, you should write (ICRC 2000). Also, please do not include URLs (web addresses) in parenthetical citations.

References

References containing works cited within an article will be listed at the end of the article, in alphabetical order of authors’ surnames). All reading materials should be included in ‘References’ – even works which may not have been cited within an article but which the author wishes to share with the reader (for these, the author should provide additional information in endnotes explaining the relevance of the work). 

This journal uses the Harvard (author-date) system – see below for examples of how to format:

• Books:

Author, AA. Year. Title. Place of publication: Publisher.
Adam, DJ. 1984. Stakeholder analysis. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Silverman, DF. and Propp, KK. (eds.) 1990. The active interview. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

• Chapters within books:

Achebe, C. 1995. Colonialist Criticism. In: Ashcroft, B et al The Post Colonial Studies Reader. London: Routledge. pp. 57–61.

• Journal articles:

Author, A. Year. Title. Journal name, vol(issue): page. DOI
Martin, L. 2010. Bombs, bodies and biopolitics: Securitizing the subject at airport security. Social and Cultural Geography, 11(1): 17-34. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14649360903414585

NOTE: Please include DOIs for all journal articles where possible.

• Conference papers:

Author, A. Year. Title of chapter. In: Title of conference proceedings, location, date, pp. page.
Lynch, M. 2003. Dialogue in an age of terror. In: The Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Philadelphia, PA on 18 August 2003, pp. 4-7.

• Organisational publications/Grey literature:

Author group. Year. Title. Place of publication: Publisher
World Health Organization. 2010. The world health report – Health systems financing: the path to universal coverage. Geneva, Switzerland: WHO.

• Theses and dissertations:

Author, A. Year. Title. Unpublished thesis (PhD), institution.
Yudis, A. 2004. Failed responsibility of the media in the war on Iraq. Unpublished thesis (PhD), University of Manchester.

• Webpages / PDFs:

Author, A. Year. Title, date of publication. Available at URL [Last accessed date month year].
Pascual, Amb. C. 2005. Stabilization and Reconstruction: Building peace in a hostile environment. Prepared statement to Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, 16 June 2005. Available at http://2001-2009.state.gov/s/crs/rls/rm/48644.htm [Last accessed 14 August 2012].

• Newspaper articles [print]:

Author, A. Year. Title. Newspaper, date of publication, page.
Tate, P. 2007. Illicit organ trade increasing. The Jordan Times, 6 June, p. 3.

• Newspaper articles [online]:

Author, A. Year. Title. Newspaper, date of publication, [URL and last accessed date].
Patel, SS. 2005. Climate; In a Marsh, Sifting the Past And Seeing the Future. The New York Times, 6 November [online access at http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9800EEDF173EF935A35752C1A9639C8B63 last
accessed 28 April 2014].

Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

1. The submission has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration (or an explanation has been provided in Comments to the Editor).
2. Any third-party-owned materials used have been identified with appropriate credit lines, and permission obtained from the copyright holder for both the print and the online editions of the journal.
3. All authors have given permission to be listed on the submitted paper and satisfy the authorship guidelines.
4. The submission file is in OpenOffice, Microsoft Word, RTF, or WordPerfect document file format.
5. All DOIs for the references have been provided, when available.
6. Tables and figures are all cited in the text. Tables are included within the text document, whilst figure files are uploaded as supplementary files.
7. Figures/images have a resolution of at least 150dpi (300dpi or above preferred). Each file is no more than 20MB per file. The files are in one of the following formats: JPG, TIFF, GIF, PNG, EPS (to maximise quality, the original source file is preferred).
8. The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines, which is found in About the Journal. If submitting to a peer-reviewed section of the journal, this includes following the instructions to ensure blind peer review.

Copyright Notice

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms. If a submission is rejected or withdrawn prior to publication, all rights return to the author(s):

1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
3. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).

Submitting to the journal implicitly confirms that all named authors and rights holders have agreed to the above terms of publication. It is the submitting author's responsibility to ensure all authors and relevant institutional bodies have given their agreement at the point of submission.

Note: some institutions require authors to seek written approval in relation to the terms of publication. Should this be required, authors can request a separate licence agreement document from the editorial team (e.g. authors who are Crown employees).

Privacy Statement

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party. The full privacy policy can be viewed here.

Publication Fees

Articles accepted for publication will be asked to pay an Article Publication Charge (APC) to cover publication costs. This can normally be sourced from your funder or institution. This fee covers all publication costs (editorial processes; web hosting; indexing; marketing; archiving; DOI registration etc) and ensures that all of the content is fully open access. This approach maximises the potential readership of publications and allows the journal to be run in a sustainable way. Tax will be added to all fees charged, when applicable (includes VAT/Sales tax or any other applicable taxes).

Many institutions have funds available to support open access publications by their staff, therefore we ask that you contact the relevant body to cover the APC.

If you do not know about your institution’s policy on open access funding, please contact your departmental/faculty administrators and institution library, as funds may be available to you.

Several other foundations, institutes, societies and associations offer publication grants (not exclusive to Open Access) based on subject relevance. This list contains a number of sources that are relevant to material preservation and conservation.

If published, you will receive an APC request email along with information on how payment can be arranged.

Waiver Information

If you do not have funds available to pay the APC (eg because your institution/funder will not cover the fee) then we may be able to offer a discount or full waiver. Please ensure that you contact the editor as early as possible should you need to discuss waiver options or the APC in general. Editorial decisions are made independently from the ability to pay the APC.