How HSS Scholarly Publishing Supports Social Justice: Bringing Together Social Sciences and Humanities

Sponsored by Palgrave Macmillan

Recorded on 08/08/2022
Posted in The Authority File

Episode 270

Scholarly publishing extends beyond disseminating research. Editorial and internal practices, community engagement, and spreading awareness for social issues all comprise a publisher’s mission and cultural influence. So how do publishers strike a balance between activism and critical research? Are those two goals really in opposition to each other? How can recognizing and responding to the current social climate and inequalities strengthen a publisher’s ultimate goal of advancing knowledge?

In this series, Felicity Plester, Editorial Director for Humanities, and Tamsine O’Riordan, Editorial Director for Social Science, both at Palgrave Macmillan, dig into how the publisher prioritizes social justice through publications and company initiatives. In particular, they share how the Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS) play a unique part in fostering interdisciplinary work and understanding the world around us. Further, Felicity and Tamsine discuss DEI policies at Palgrave Macmillan, the challenges of the peer review process, and the evolution of digital trends.

In this first episode, Felicity and Tamsine provide some background on their positions at Palgrave Macmillan and help situate HSS within the broader scholarly publishing ecosystem. In addition, they explore the role that publishers play in affecting change though research, innovation, and following or dictating trends. They also discuss Palgrave Macmillan’s merger with Springer Nature and how it has impacted workflows, output, and name recognition.

About the guests:

Felicity Plester headshot

Felicity Plester
Editorial Director for Humanities
Palgrave Macmillan

Felicity is Editorial Director for Humanities at Palgrave Macmillan with overall responsibility for the literature; film, culture and media studies; and theatre and performance studies scholarly books programmes.  She leads a team of seven Editors based in our London and New York offices, who publish high quality, cutting-edge research in a range of formats, including monographs, edited collections, scholarly Handbooks, major reference works, textbooks and Palgrave Pivots across these diverse subjects.  Prior to becoming Editorial Director, she headed up the film, culture and media studies team at Palgrave, but also has experience of commissioning into the literature and theatre lists.  Felicity joined Palgrave in 2010, having previously been Commissioning Editor for environment, development and public and social policy at Edward Elgar Publishing for five years.

Tamsine O’Riordan headshot

Tamsine O’Riordan
Editorial Director for Social Science
Palgrave Macmillan

Tamsine O’Riordan is Editorial Director for Social Science at Palgrave Macmillan, part of Springer Nature. In this role she leads a global team of 15 editors to respond and deliver cutting-edge and (inter)discipline-defining social science ideas and thought across a range of book types, as well as leading the Social Science Matters campaign. She has been with Palgrave since 2012 and before that built successful programmes for a variety of social science scholarly, trade and professional publishers over 20 years, working in the past for Practical Action, Earthscan and Zed Books.

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