The London Journal of Critical Thought Submission

The London Journal of Critical Thought (LJCT) is an open access and peer reviewed academic journal that creates an alternative space for emergent critical thought by publishing ‘collections’ of short pieces that emerge in conversation from participation in any academic event. These collections are distinct from more traditional collections sometimes found in journals or books by virtue of both the shorter length of individual pieces as well the emphasis placed on the relationship between the pieces and the academic event. Rather than individual stand alone articles each piece is a but rather a part of its particular collection informed by the conversations which emerged from the original event.

The LJCT originated publishing collections that derived from the London Conference in Critical Thought, but from 2023 is now open to collection submissions based on participation in any academic event.

Submissions

We are pleased to invite proposals for Collections based on participation in an academic event. A proposal would provide an introduction to the topic of conversation, indicate the event that the individual pieces emerged from, and abstracts for each of the individual pieces. For full details on the submission process, see below.

Collections

A collection would usually be composed of a set of three to four short pieces (including an introduction) usually based on presentations given at an academic event (such as a conference or workshop) but could also include a piece from someone who participated in some other capacity (as a discussant, for example.) Crucially, these should not be a set of disparate papers that may have been considered of high quality, or otherwise of general interest. Instead, the collection should reflect a conversation that resulted from the experience of participation in the event itself - reflecting the emergence of a conversation that the participants would like to bring forward through another medium (the LJCT).

Each individual contribution to the collection could be anywhere between 2000 and 4000 words and would be preceded in the journal by an introduction from the editor contextualising the emergent conversation (introductions should be no more than 2000 words, but can be much less). If a proposal is accepted the collection editor will co-edit the collection with the London Journal of Critical Thought editorial board and will be responsible for communications with their individual contributors As the individual elements of the submissions will be quite short it should not prevent contributors from developing full-length articles or chapters from the same themes that can be published elsewhere. We see contributing to London Journal of Critical Thought as an alternative type of publication that is not in competition with more traditional academic journals or collections in edited books.

Submitting a Proposal

Proposals should be sent to journal@londoncritical.org and should consist of:

  • Identification of the event from which the collection derives

  • A 500 word introduction to the collection written by the collection editor(s)

  • Abstracts for each of the papers to be included (250 words each)

It will be up to the individual(s) proposing the collection to contact those participants from the conference they would like to include within their proposed collection.

What we are looking for in a proposal

The proposal should not just be a rehash of the description of the associated academic event/call for papers from the stream (although its certainly no problem if there are similarities) but should specifically identify what has emerged as a ‘conversation’ in the context of participation at the conference and connect explicitly to the selection of papers proposed for inclusion.

Process

If the editorial board accepts a proposal, the collection will be co-edited by the individual(s) who have proposed it along with a member of the editorial board who will be assigned as a primary liaison. All elements of the collection will then undergo further peer review, and as such, no individual component can be confirmed for publication until the peer review process is complete.

Open Access

Articles published in LJCT will be given a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) licence as a default. If you think you might require a more restrictive open access licence - for instance if your submission includes third-party copyrighted materials - please discuss this with the editors.

LJCT does not require authors to pay an Article Processing Charge or any other publication charges.

LJCT supports authors in complying with funders’ open access requirements, including Plan S, UKRI and Wellcome Trust requirements. If you need to deposit your article in your institutional repository, the best way to explain it to your institution’s open access team is to tell them that the journal is fully open access with no APC.

Authors are permitted to:

deposit the submitted manuscript anywhere you like, with any licence of your choosing. LJCT does not reject submissions that have been previously shared as preprints.

deposit the accepted manuscript (the text as accepted, with any changes recommended in peer review made, but before our markup and logos are added) in an institutional repository or other repository immediately upon acceptance, and make it available upon publication with a CC-BY licence.

deposit the version of record (the published version with our markup and logos) in an institutional repository, other repository, and personal or other website immediately upon publication. The version deposited must have a CC-BY licence and link to the published version on the LJCT website.