Creation of an On-line Journal of Eastern and South-Eastern European Classicists

Members of the intersession group

• Prof. Willard McCarty
• Dr. Oleg Aurov
• Dr. Nevena Panova
• Dragana Dimitrievic
• Neven Jovanovic
• Dimitar Iliev

I. Preliminary statement

The intention for editing an on-line journal is closely connected to our wish that the Contextualizing Classics Project continue even after the three years of joint work and regular meetings of Participants and Resource Faculty. It is also linked with our desire to turn the team of the CC Project into the initial core of a wider regional network of scholars in the field of Classics and related disciplines. It also requires additional funding and possibly a side-project that will reach beyond the current CC activities. The aim of the Intersession Activity in the framework of CC will be mainly to conceive the journal, articulate and discuss the editorial principles, and build a team of people responsible for the development of the journal. A substantial part of the discussions will require the involvement also of the Resource persons (before the selection of an Editorial Board) and of Editorial Board members once they are selected. Therefore, our initial proposal contains only the general outlines of the idea, which can be further developed later.

II. Description of the journal structure: initial ideas

During the First Contact session at Gyoletchitsa some ideas were born that need to be developed further. The title of the journal may be in connexion with the title of the project. Thus, ‘Classics in Context’ was proposed, as well as some character or place names related to our regions.

The Editorial Board should consist of Ph.D. holders chosen among the CC team and representing as many countries as possible (ideally all). It should set the standards for the eligibilty of articles so as to maintain a high scholarly level representative for the region before the international academic public.

The articles submitted to the journal can initially comprise talks delivered at our First Contact Session, as well as other materials submitted by the CC Resource persons and Participants. However, it is highly desirable that the journal be further advertized among the faculty and particularly among the students of our home institutions. The journal should be regarded as a possibility to be heard and to communicate one’s research and teaching interests and results with a wide international academic public. This possibility is especially important for students, which will benefit not only from establishing innternational contacts, but by the mere experience of writing an electronic article and submitting it to an international jury. Students’ papers can be grouped under a special rubric, or distributed in all the rubrics.

Other elements of the journal could be news & announcements, book reviews and eventually other suggested features. One idea, particularly important for teaching, is to have a rubric that introduces course syllabi, learning inititiatives, and ideas and proposals for educational reforms.

The language of the journal is still a subject of discussion. One suggestion was for it to be only in English, given the main goal of it being internationally reachable. Another suggestion, however, was to make it bilingual (English and original language), so as to promote scholarly activity also in the native languages of our regions. Multi-linguality is an essential part of multi-culturality, the main value of our globalizing world.

The format of the articles should encourage, and, at the same time, explore, the best use of the new possibilities opened by publishing on the web: hyperlinks, comments and discussions, shaping a work in progress, almost unlimited space for illustrations and research material, various layout and typographical features unavailable or expensive in print.

III. Stages of work

1. Firstly, we need to manage some issues about our journal, such as:

• the Editorial Board; we may put an announcement on the site of the project and see who wishes to take part in it. Then our Intersession Activity team can discuss the applications with the Resource persons. Deadline for announcement: two week after the start of the site in the beginning of December. Deadline for selection of Editorial Board members: beginning of February 2006.
• conception of the editorial principles in discussion between the Intersession Activity team and the Editorial Board members; writing an editorial statement no later than mid-April 2006 and publishing it on the CC site.
• in the meanwhile, the IA team (possibly with some help by the EB) should discuss and organize the technical side: do we need another server and hosting for the journal, how to finance the hosting, the domain name and the elaborating of the site, who will be in charge with the maintainance of the site, how can we register it with its own ISSN, etc. A report on these issues should be made no later than mid-May 2006, and it should be publshed on the CC site and/or presented at the Second Contact Session.

2. Making the pilot issue of the journal:

• a call for papers published on the CC site and possibly on related sites at our home institutions at the beginning of May 2006.
• if necessary, writing a project to apply for additional funding, so as to create the design and the structure of the initial web-page; deadline: the same as previous.
• creating the pilot issue: some last details may be agreed upon when we meet and work together at the Second Contact Session in September 2006. A presentation of the pilot issue can be made at this Session, and the journal can be expected to really start on-line by the end of September 2006. For the time being, it can be hosted on the main server of the CC project.

3. Further work:

It can be agreed upon when we meet at the Second Contact Session. Some possible tasks for the second-year working cycle can be, for example, applying for the funding of our own hosting; advertizing the journal at our home institutions (some more funding for posters, etc., may be needed); recruiting contributors among students and faculty oustide our Project team, and so on.