Episode 38: Edited Volumes (how to edit, write, and publish them)

What for you should be a good edited volume?

Yeah.

Do you think? I mean-

I mean, where, where to begin?

And that's, that's a leading question, isn't it? Where does one begin? What is an edited volume and what should it do? That's a tough one, isn't it? I mean, I can answer that also.

Maybe I should start off-

No

... by saying-

No, let's make Alex answer.

You asked Alex.

Let's, let's let Alex give a go.

All right.

Okay.

Yeah, that was a bit confusing.

Um, yeah, what is an edited vol- got so many questions there.

But for me then, well, it obviously, it is a book with a number of chapters.

It addresses an overall theme.

There will be general questions that all the papers in some fashion address in this volume.

So rather than being a random collection of papers, they all hang together in a way that's very different from a journal, um, unless it's a s- you know, special journal issue, which then works as an edited volume.

And I think that's why they're difficult to do, r- really, really good ones, but when you succeed, they're absolutely excellent because w- you know, there's nothing better, isn't it, when you get a new edited volume, pick it up, and you realize that you're looking for one chapter, but then you think, "Oh, there's this one and there's this one and this one," and you learn so much about a particular thing.

So I actually really like edited volume even...

You know, some people, I don't know, just talk badly of them, but I think that's unfair.

We'll talk about that later.

Yeah.

We'll come to criticisms later.

What for you should be a good edited volume?

Yeah.

Do you think? I mean-

I mean, where, where to begin?

And that's, that's a leading question, isn't it? Where does one begin? What is an edited volume and what should it do? That's a tough one, isn't it? I mean, I can answer that also.

Maybe I should start off-

No

... by saying-

No, let's make Alex answer.

You asked Alex.

Let's, let's let Alex give a go.

All right.

Okay.

Yeah, that was a bit confusing.

Um, yeah, what is an edited vol- got so many questions there.

But for me then, well, it obviously, it is a book with a number of chapters.

It addresses an overall theme.

There will be general questions that all the papers in some fashion address in this volume.

So rather than being a random collection of papers, they all hang together in a way that's very different from a journal, um, unless it's a s- you know, special journal issue, which then works as an edited volume.

And I think that's why they're difficult to do, r- really, really good ones, but when you succeed, they're absolutely excellent because w- you know, there's nothing better, isn't it, when you get a new edited volume, pick it up, and you realize that you're looking for one chapter, but then you think, "Oh, there's this one and there's this one and this one," and you learn so much about a particular thing.

So I actually really like edited volume even...

You know, some people, I don't know, just talk badly of them, but I think that's unfair.

We'll talk about that later.

Yeah.

We'll come to criticisms later.