Language and literature includes linguistics and a number of other fields, as well as author-specific journals and the like. The group includes 262 journals, which published a total of 6,243 articles in 2013 and 5,816 articles in 2014.
Grades
Grade | Journals | %J | Articles | %A | A/J |
A |
189 |
72% |
5,542 |
89% |
29 |
Free |
183 |
97% |
4,235 |
76% |
23 |
Pay |
6 |
3% |
1,307 |
24% |
218 |
B |
14 |
5% |
458 |
7% |
33 |
Free |
10 |
71% |
175 |
38% |
18 |
Pay |
4 |
29% |
283 |
62% |
71 |
D |
59 |
23% |
243 |
4% |
4 |
Free |
57 |
97% |
177 |
73% |
3 |
Pay |
1 |
2% |
9 |
4% |
9 |
Unk |
1 |
2% |
57 |
23% |
57 |
Table 14.1. Journals and articles by grade
Table 14.1 shows the number of journals and 2013 articles for each grade; free, pay and unknown numbers; and average articles per journal. Boldface percentages (grades) are percentages of the whole set; other percentages are percentages of the grade above. There are no A$ or C journals, but an unusually high percentage of D journals. Otherwise, as usual, the few pay journals publish many more articles per journal than the free ones—to an extreme in this case.
The large percentage of D journals breaks down into these subgroups: C (apparently ceased), 20 journals with a total of one article in 2013; D (dying), two journals with four articles; E (erratic), 13 journals with 124 articles; H (hiatus?), three journals with 45 articles; S (small), 21 journals with 69 articles. The overall picture is fairly clear: with 23% of the journals, D journals account for only 4% of the articles.
Article Volume (including all of 2014)
2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | |
Journals |
219 |
239 |
248 |
229 |
%Free |
95% |
95% |
96% |
96% |
Articles |
5,787 |
6,186 |
5,802 |
4,862 |
%Free |
71% |
74% |
76% |
77% |
Table 14.2. Journals and articles by date
Table 14.2 shows the number of free and APC-charging journals that actually published articles in each year, including all of 2014; how many articles those journals published; and what percentage were or were in free journals.
The single “unknown” journal did not publish in 2011 or 2012 and is omitted from the table. Journal numbers don’t add up because some journals—at least 14 in any given year—didn’t publish articles in each year.
The percentage of free journals is extremely high and fairly typical for the humanities; the percentage of free articles has declined over the years and is actually lower than average for humanities fields.
Is OA activity in language and literature declining? Possibly, but there’s some evidence that one journal (with very high article counts that were extrapolated from sample issues) may have been overcounted for 2013; that overcount would result in roughly equal article counts for 2012 through 2014. It does appear that, after the sharp jump in 2012, there has been very little growth and possibly some decline in activity, although annuals in this area frequently post articles very late, so there may still be some 2014 growth to come.
Looked at on a journal-by-journal basis, 115 journals published more articles in 2014 than in 2013; 37 published the same number; and 110 published fewer articles in 2014. For significant changes, 109 (42%) published at least 10% more articles; 53 (20%) published roughly the same number (including 13 that didn’t publish any articles in either year); and 100 published at least 10% fewer articles in 2014 (including 29 that have yet to publish any articles).
Journals | No-Fee % | Articles | No-Fee % | |
Prolific |
1 |
100% |
1,120 |
100% |
Large |
3 |
0% |
994 |
0% |
Medium |
9 |
56% |
741 |
35% |
Small |
90 |
96% |
2,134 |
92% |
Sparse |
159 |
99% |
1,254 |
99% |
Table 14.3. Journals by peak article volume
Table 14.3 shows the number of journals in each size category; 2013 articles for journals in that group; and what percentage is or is in no-fee journals. The single prolific journal may be a measuring error (it was well under 1,000 in both 2012 and 2014, although it’s definitely a large journal). The main message here is that almost all language and literature journals are small or sparse—95% of them, in fact.
Fees (APCs)
APC | Jour. | %Fee | %All | Art. | %Fee | %All |
High |
0 |
0 |
||||
Medium |
1 |
9% |
0% |
9 |
1% |
0% |
Low |
5 |
45% |
2% |
874 |
55% |
14% |
Nominal |
5 |
45% |
2% |
716 |
45% |
12% |
None |
250 |
96% |
4,587 |
74% |
Table 14.4. Journals and articles by fee range
Table 14.4 shows the number of journals in each fee range and the number of 2013 articles for those journals. The %Fee for journals for all OA journals is 25%; as should be obvious, what few of these journals charge fees have much lower fees. (In fact, there are only two journals charging more than $353.)
Oddly enough, there is a mild statistical correlation between APC level and number of articles published, but it’s a negative correlation (-0.34)—that is, as APCs go down the number of articles rises. I don’t think it’s a particularly meaningful correlation.
Starting Dates and the Gold Rush
Year | Total | Free% |
1960-69 |
4 |
100% |
1970-79 |
3 |
100% |
1980-89 |
6 |
83% |
1990-91 |
1 |
100% |
1992-93 |
3 |
100% |
1994-95 |
5 |
100% |
1996-97 |
9 |
100% |
1998-99 |
16 |
100% |
2000-01 |
16 |
94% |
2002-03 |
23 |
100% |
2004-05 |
28 |
96% |
2006-07 |
28 |
100% |
2008-09 |
51 |
100% |
2010-11 |
47 |
85% |
2012-13 |
22 |
91% |
Table 14.5. Starting dates for language & literature OA journals
Table 14.5 shows language & literature OA journals by starting date, including the percentage of journals started in a given date range that currently don’t charge APCs. For DOAJ journals as a whole, there’s a sense of a gold rush for new APC-charging journals between 2006 and 2011, and while there aren’t really enough APC-charging language & literature OA journals to constitute a “rush” of any sort, it’s true that seven of the eleven started in 2010-2011, part of the substantial growth in new OA journals from 2008 through 2011.
Figure 14.1 shows essentially the same information as Table 14.5 in graph form, with markers for pay journals so the two early instances appear. (None of these journals started before 1960, although one started in 1960.)
Figure 14.1. Language & literature journals by starting date
Table 14.6 (below) shows journals that published articles in 2013 by starting date, the number of articles published in 2013 and average articles per journal. To the extent that anything stands out, it’s the relatively high articles per journal in journals founded at the turn of the century, those founded in 2006-2007 and those that started in 2010-2011. None of these averages are particularly high for journals in general.
Year | Journals | Articles | Art/Jrnl |
1960-69 |
4 |
76 |
19 |
1970-79 |
3 |
55 |
18 |
1980-89 |
4 |
125 |
31 |
1990-91 |
1 |
5 |
5 |
1992-93 |
2 |
22 |
11 |
1994-95 |
4 |
68 |
17 |
1996-97 |
8 |
153 |
19 |
1998-99 |
16 |
256 |
16 |
2000-01 |
16 |
619 |
39 |
2002-03 |
21 |
311 |
15 |
2004-05 |
25 |
506 |
20 |
2006-07 |
24 |
1,392 |
58 |
2008-09 |
46 |
604 |
13 |
2010-11 |
44 |
1,533 |
35 |
2012-13 |
22 |
518 |
24 |
Table 14.6. Articles per journal by starting date
Definitions and notes
See The Open Access Landscape: 1. Background for definitions and notes
If you’re interested in a book-form version of this material (with an additional bonus graph added in each chapter), let me know, either in a comment or by email to waltcrawford at gmail dot com.