Scholarly Communication @ UH Manoa   Tags: author rights, creative commons, institutional repository, open access, scholarspace, uh manoa faculty senate resolution  

Currently there is an explosion of information about the changing model for the exchange of scholarly information. Because of the widespread adoption of digital technologies and an ever-increasing academic network, scholars are exploring new ways to exchange information for research, teaching, and learning.

The University of Hawaii at Manoa (UHM) Library aims to facilitate discussions about current trends in Scholarly Communication with our faculty and about how best to approach the sharing of scholarly work. The UHM Library would like to encourage the University community's active participation in creating a system that best serves the needs-and maximizes the impact-of scholarship and research at UHM.

Beth Tillinghast
betht@hawaii.edu
UHM Library
University of Hawaii at Manoa
2550 McCarthy Mall
Honolulu, HI 96816
808-956-6130

Kelly Aune, Chair & Professor, Department of Communicology 

Ross Christensen, Librarian, Business Humanities Social Sciences, UHM Library 

Dr. Gregg Geary, Interim University Librarian, UHM Library 

Sara Rutter, Librarian, Science Technology, UHM Library 

Beth Tillinghast, Librarian, Desktop Network Services 

Scholarly communication is the system scholars and researchers employ to create, distribute, use, and preserve their work.

Central to discussions about the scholarly communication system are concerns about the state of publishing in academia. Though technology has improved the availability of mechanisms for sharing new knowledge and has increased the potential audience for scholarly work, the cost of access and legal restrictions on sharing and other uses have actually decreased the readership of many scholarly publications. For the most part, a few commercial publishers dominate the market, especially for science and medical journals. Publishers charge high subscription fees that strain library acquisition budgets. This reduces libraries’ ability to purchase humanities monographs, discipline-focused journals, and crucial domain-specific databases. For many libraries, the current publishing/purchasing framework is economically unsustainable. For some time, librarians at institutions of higher education around the world have been leading the effort to improve the system of scholarly publishing by advocating for open access, educating faculty authors on intellectual property rights, and negotiating with publishers for more library-friendly subscription models.

As critical examinations of the economics of scholarly publishing continue, other scholarly communication issues are receiving increased attention. These include creating the cyberinfrastructure necessary for world-class research and scholarship, preservation and ongoing availability of digital materials, quality control, open access to and reuse of data and publications, funder publishing mandates, the acceptance of digital scholarship by tenure committees, and the increased adoption of online social networking tools.

Karla Hahn, director of the Association of Research Libraries' Office of Scholarly Communications, outlines the state of discussions about scholarly communication issues in her article "Talk about Talking About New Models of Scholarly Communication" in the Winter 2008 issue of the Journal of Electronic Publishing.

The Scholarly Communication Program at Columbia University brought together scholars to discuss changes in scholarly communication and the development in the Open Access movement. You can view The Harvard Open Access Intititatives below: