Call for Proposals: 



Proposals invited for a workshop at the Society for Cinema & Media 

Studies conference (Vancouver, 2006): Should academic research be freely 

available?



In the past 10 years, we've witnessed skyrocketing subscription prices 

for academic journals--causing college libraries and scholars to cut 

back on the titles they carry.



Simultaneously, we've witnessed the growth of an inexpensive 

distribution system: the Internet. Some e-journals have popped up in our 

field and many of them do not charge for access. Some, such as 

Postmodern Culture, began as a free service and then subsequently came 

to limit access to paying customers (in PMC's case, through Project Muse).



This workshop will explore the issues facing free scholarship:



    * How can a permanent archive be maintained?

    * How does one effectively index the research in free publications 

and archives?

    * What free software is available to facilitate these tasks?

    * What human resources are necessary to support free, peer-reviewed 

e-publication?

    * Does the price on a publication affect its prestige? Are free 

publications deemed unworthy by tenure-review committees?



Work towards freely available scholarship has already been begun by 

organizations such as the Public Knowledge Project and the Open Archives 

Initiative. Please see their Websites for more information. We hope to 

have a PKP representative attend this workshop as it is based at neaby 

Simon Fraser University.



If you're interested in pariticipating in this conversation, please contact:



Jeremy Butler



jbutler {at} ua.edu



Box 870152

University of Alabama

Tuscaloosa, AL 35487



http://www.cmstudies.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=626



-- 

Jeremy Butler



www.ScreenSite.org

www.TVCrit.com

www.AllThingsAcoustic.org



Professor - TCF Dept - U Alabama



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Screen-L is sponsored by the Telecommunication & Film Dept., the

University of Alabama: http://www.tcf.ua.edu