Advice on Getting Your Scholarly Articles Published

Don't get discouraged because your journal article is rejected, said Jay Black, editor of the Journal of Mass Media Ethics and professor of journalism ethics at the University of South Florida during a TAA Convention panel, "An Insider's Guide to Getting Your Scholarly Articles Published."

"Your correspondence with editors should be enough to let you know where to go with it next," he said. "Even worse is to shelve a 'revise and resubmit' request from an editor. The fact that they asked you to resubmit means that they see quality there and want to work with you."

Black said he has received his own journal articles for resubmit practically bleeding red ink. "I made it a point to fix every error and work with the editor to resubmit the article, " he said. "The editor is supposed to be nurturing scholars. I tend to think young scholars need more nurturing. If there's hope for a revision, we do that."

The ones that don't eventually make it are those that don't revise the areas that reviewers suggest, he said.

Black also recommended writing a cover letter in response to the revisions. The letter should tell which changes you made and why and which changes you declined to make and why. "Editors then recognize that you care and listen," he said. "It also shows that all the work done by the volunteer reviewers is being respected."

Black shared some additional advice for scholarly journal authors:

• Don't put all of your efforts into a long shot. Aim high, but wide. Write for a regional journal. You can impress a tenure committee with these types of journals as well. Review the reviewers. Send a review of the comments done by the reviewers of your work to tell what was really helpful.
• Humanize your manuscript by calling, e-mailing or writing the editor to ask whether they would be interested in the topic. "It's a lot easier to reject an anonymous person that it is to reject a human," he said.

Black's tip sheet from the convention: Click here to download the PDF.