The Beginning of a Marriage: Content Analysis of Official Announcements of University Press/Library Partnerships

Zhang, Mei

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/108781 Copy

Description

Title

The Beginning of a Marriage: Content Analysis of Official Announcements of University Press/Library Partnerships

Author(s)

Zhang, Mei

Issue Date

2020-10-13

Keyword(s)

• University presses
• Academic libraries
• Partnership
• Content analysis
• Scholarly publishing

Abstract

The Wayne State University Press reinstated fired leadership and switched its reporting from the Dean’s Office of University Libraries to the Office of the President in February 2020— it has been only several months after it joined the university library in fall 2019. This unsuccessful partnership between university press and library immediately sparked discussions within and outside the scholarly publishing community. People asked questions about the future of similar partnership between university presses and academic libraries, especially when more university presses are moving under libraries. This work-in-progress research examines the initial agreement between university press and library when the collaboration first started. This study is collecting official announcements of university press/library partnership in the U.S. in the past 10 years, and plan to conduct a structured content analysis of these announcements to address the following questions: 1). How did both parties define their partnership? 2). How did both parties explain the reasons for establishing partnership? 3). What were the two parties’ expectations on their partnership? This study will inform the academic library and university press communities about their initial purpose and expectations of such partnership, which would help them to reflect on the current status of existing collaborations and prevent the dissolution of such partnership. These reflections would play a critical role in improving the sustainability of scholarly publishing field. The findings will also encourage LIS educators to think about how we should depict and educate future librarians about the relationship between academic libraries and university presses.

Series/Report Name or Number

• Scholarly Communications
• Academic Libraries
• Publishing

Type of Resource

text

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/108781

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