“Yet the Librarians Were Not Without a

Cunning Plan”

Growth fundamentalism & institutionalised distrust

• Ideology-critical throat-clearing• From the groves of academe to the grasslands of

Planet WoS• 1,000,000 articles per year• Second-order growth: citations

Sciences & Humanities

• Facts & bits of writing• Defiance & adaptation

The Flemish Government’s Special Research Fund (BOF)

• Divided between Antwerp, Brussels, Ghent & Leuven• 65% allocated for diploma’s, staff & sundry simple

quantifiables• 35% allocated for publication output

– 50% for ISI citations– 50% for actual publications

• 85% for ISI-listed work• 15% for other publications

• Share of non-ISI output in total budget: 2.65%• Share of ISI-output in total budget: 32.35%

What Is to Be Done?

• Hang down your head• Carry on regardless• Whistle in the dark

– Tune 1: VABB– Tune 2: OHP

Vlaams Academisch Bibliografisch Bestand

• Flemish Academic Bibliographic Index for the Human and Social Sciences

• Distribution of 2.65% of BOF-budget over 4 university associations

• Screening all non-ISI listed output– Journals: peer-reviewed– Books: recognised academic publishers

• Risks– Dismay– Disappointment– Demise

• (From RAE to REF)

Open Humanities Press

• Clogged-up publication channels• Taking control of the means of reproduction• Addressing credibility problem• Volunteer-editor-driven portal site for existing OA

journals

OHP Home

OHP Editorial Board

OHP Publication standards

OHP Journals

Leuven Library link to OHP

OHP Books

Waiting for the Librarians

It is recommended that you simply dig at random: perhaps at the very spot where you stand you will come upon scraps, shards, reminders of the dead. Also the air: the air is full of sighs and cries. These are never lost: if you listen carefully with a sympathetic ear, you can hear them echoing forever within the second sphere. The night is best: sometimes when you have difficulty in falling asleep it is because your ears have been reached by the cries of the dead which, like their writings, are open to many interpretations.

J.M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians