Open Access Anthropology

While nodding in the direction of the AAA publication program of which I am a part, I have danced around the question of placing publisher produced PDFs (final, typeset versions of articles, etc.) in subject/institutional repositories and on personal websites on a number of occasions, most recently in a comment on SavageMinds related to articles made available for download on author websites. Up to this point, I have tried to evoke the existence of widespread confusion on this point without appearing to speak on behalf of anyone other than myself. I am still just a member of the AAA who happens to edit a AAA journal, but it strikes me that a bit more clarity might be useful. SHERPA/RoMEO’s interpretation of the AAA author agreement is not the same thing as an official AAA interpretation of the agreement, but it is perhaps worth noting that SHERPA/RoMEO’s understanding of AAA policy is clear and concise. For SHERPA/RoMEO, the AAA is “Green,” meaning that the AAA author agreement allows and author to archive a pre-print (that is, a pre-peer review version) and to then archive a post-print version (that is, the final author’s manuscript after peer-review but before the production steps undertaken by the publisher). In SHERPA/RoMEO’s understanding, posting/archiving of the final published PDF (“the publisher’s version”) is not allowed.

If this understanding is correct, then authors publishing under the standard AAA author agreement would not have the right to post the final published version of their papers on a personal website or in repositories. This would hold true for any image files that visually replicated the published version, regardless of format or the source of the file (scanning the paper oneself, obtaining the pdf file from AnthroSource, etc.).

According to the AAA entry in the SHERPA/RoMEO database, it is expected that pre-prints that are placed online must be replaced by the post-print upon publication. This means that authors seeking publication in a AAA journal would need to be cautious about placing early “working paper” versions of their articles online in repositories as (unlike author websites) such archives do not generally have provisions for removing content which has been made available therein. Placing a pre-peer review draft on an author website would pose little danger, as replacing it with the post-peer review version after publication would present little technical challenge (although it would, of course, mess with any existing weblinks and the author website route looses many of the stability, metadata and permanence benefits associated with robust repositories). The RoMEO database entry describes other conditions governing the posting of pre-prints and post-prints. I am not describing these here and I would urge authors to study their author agreements and the RoMEO database entry completely before posting their AAA related work online. Of course, related issues arise with most published works, thus the AAA case is just one of many of relevance to authors in our field. The RoMEO database provides guidance on hundreds of publishers.

While the AAA record in the SHERPA/RoMEO “Publisher copyright policies and self-archiving” database shows a “most recent update” date of February 15, 2008, it also makes reference to the University of California Press’ online content system “Caliber” (and AnthroSource) rather than to Wiley InterScience, the publisher-wide system by which AAA content is now made available by the AAA’s publishing partner Wiley-Blackwell (WB also now produces AnthroSource. The University of California Press is no longer involved in AAA publishing.). I mention this irregularity as a reminder that SHERPA/RoMEO or any similar system cannot, by its very nature, perfectly reflect the (often rapidly changing) details of every publisher’s circumstances and policies. It is a guide for the use of authors and repository managers, but it is not a substitute to knowing what a particular author agreements says and means in its specifics.

Those interested in the issue of posting/archiving publisher produced PDFs may find a new report by SHERPA/RoMEO of interest. A study of the 414 publishers tracked in the database found that 51 allow immediate use of the final published PDF on author websites and in repositories. Some additional publishers allow for use of the published file after embargo periods ranging between 6 months and 5 years Find out more about this analysis and see the publisher list here. (I first learned of this list thanks to Open Access News.) Most of the publishers listed are not prominent in anthropological publishing, but two are well-known to our field–Duke University Press (which publishes Public Culture and Ethnohistory among other titles) and the University of California Press (which, while no longer publishing the AAA journals, still publishes a number of relevant area studies, sociology and history journals).

Searching the RoMEO database for American Anthropological Association can get one to the database’s entry for the association. (See here.)

Tags: Author Websites · Author's Rights · Legal Issues · Openness · SHERPA "Green" · Self-ArchivingNo Comments