Guidelines for Contributors


An Encyclopedia of Literature and Science

Greenwood Press
Editor, Pamela Gossin
405 Golden Oaks Dr.
Norman, OK 73072
psgossin@utdallas.edu
#405-360-2958

 

October 15, 1997

Greetings to all of our contributors, both old and new. Most of the material in this revised style sheet will be familiar to those of you who have been with the project since its first incarnation. Probably the most notable change is that the more compact format of this volume allows for fewer bibliographical items to be cited at the end of each entry (the number of these is keyed to the length of the entry as described below). If you have already sent in your entries, one of my editorial assistants or I will try to make any necessary minor changes (consulting you for advice on which works to cite, if necessary).

I have attempted to reach all of you by one means or another since mid-Spring when this new contract came into effect. There are still a handful of folks I have not been able to contact, perhaps owing to new addresses, research leaves etc.. When (if) you receive this, please get in touch with me through regular mail or E-mail as soon as possible so I can share more details with you about our new production schedule etc. You may also read more about the new format of this project in the June 1997 number of Decodings (the SLS newsletter).

The publisher will send out contract information directly to you when ALL of the entries have been assigned (for obvious administrative reasons). There are still 50-60 interesting, but unrelated (and virtually unclusterable) items needing writers that I hope to have assigned by the end of the year. In addition, a fair number of important entries have invitations that are still being mulled over by their recipients. When the taxonomy is firmly in place, all of the names and addresses of the contributors along with lists of their entries will be forwarded to Greenwood for the contract mailing.

I realize that participating in a large project like this can sometimes seem endless. With so many interdependent variables operating, it really helps when everyone meets their deadlines so everyone else can keep their promises and meet theirs. For most new contributors, the deadline for my receipt of your entries is FEBRUARY 15, 1998. Later dates are in effect for a few of you who have made special arrangements or who have taken on an especially large number of entries (with my eternal gratitude!).

For those of you who might like to see an example of the type of volume we are aiming for, I recommend Greenwood=s The Samuel Johnson Encyclopedia, by Pat Rogers. Similar ironies of form and genre are operating in our project too, I think. For those of you who have wondered along with me about the possibility of producing an electronic version of the volume in the future, Greenwood is in the process of researching the idea and exploring the feasibility of electronic publications. In the meantime I will be seeking permission to post the complete taxonomy and list of contributors (but not the content) early next year on my homepage: http://www.utdallas.edu/~psgossin.

Best wishes and sincere thanks to all of you who are making this such an exciting, living, encyclopedia!

 

Guidelines for Contributors

CONCEPTUALIZATION AND AUDIENCE

Although all subjects for encyclopedias present editorial challenges, "literature and science" presents more than most. As a relatively new field experiencing rapid growth, literature and science studies focus on the interaction of two of the most extensive and influential intellectual modes of expression and modes of knowledge production in human history. Although the volume aims to represent the concerns of literature and science in as many manifestations as possible, the editor and publisher acknowledge that it is impossible to refer to every topic, approach, or theme that has ever arisen or could be construed as relevant to "literature and science@ per se. The encyclopedia will attempt to order and allude to both major and minor, current and historical, classic and controversial topics, with the main focus on providing a starting point for further research and always keeping in mind that most readers will be "new" to the material in some way.

The mission of this encyclopedia, therefore, is to introduce newcomers to the breadth of literature and science studies and to provide a ready reference tool for information about allied areas for those already working in a specific area of literature and science. The primary audience is college and university students and their instructors in the humanities and sciences as well as others interested in interdisciplinary literature and science studies. The target publication date is 1999-2000.

 

FORM AND CONTENT

The book will be a single-volume reference work of 210,000 words, with approximately 650-700 articles of 50 to 2,500 words in length, organized in a conventional, easy-to-use A to Z format. These entries will supply introductory and up-to-date information about a wide-range of topics, themes, writers, scientists, their works, and theoretical approaches to literature and science studies. Only biographical information not readily available in standard sources, or directly related to the interdisciplinary contributions of individual figures, will be included. The focus will constantly be on detailing the literary relations of the scientific topics and the scientific relations of the literary entries.

The editor has attempted to incorporate every suggestion for topics received to date from members of the SLS community and other interested scholars. Items for final inclusion have been selected according to these criteria: a) whether any (and how many) scholars are currently working in the area; b) how long the topic has been important; how wide its influence has been; how likely it is to become or remain important; c) how representative or typical the topic is within Aliterature and science studies@; d) how many readers / users are likely to value the entry; e) how many other topics the item is related to, illustrates or explains; f) the availability of a qualified scholar to write the entry; and g) space considerations.

With the internal structure of the taxonomy, the encyclopedia=s topics have been selected and ordered according to a "fractal" model, branching out from lengthy survey articles down to shorter contextualizations, thematic, topical studies and ready reference entries. Utilizing the volume=s cross-referencing and indexing systems, readers will be able to work their way "up" or "down" the scale of topics from specific to general or vice versa, traveling, for example, from a chronological survey of literature and medicine, to entries on individual physician-writers, literary representations of particular diseases or illness narratives.

 

CONTRIBUTORS= INFORMATION

Contributors have been selected according to their professional expertise and demonstrated activity (publications and public presentations) in literature and science studies and wide-ranging knowledge of and / or specialized work in particular areas pertaining to literature and science studies. Efforts have been made to make the selection process as democratic as possible, not only in insuring broad representation of a range of topics, interests, methodological perspectives, professional positions and disciplines (in the sciences as well as humanities) but in terms of the cultural background, national representation, gender, etc. of the contributors themselves. The project will have nearly 100 contributors from over 40 different academic and nonacademic specialties and a dozen different countries.

Contributors will receive credit at the end of their articles (probably by initials) and in a contributors' list at the end of the volume. Contributors have creative control over the content of their entries and may feel free to include discussion of controversies and contentions in their fields. However, please consider the long-term value of entries which provide description and guidance while avoiding grandstanding, backstabbing (and other temptations of competitive and combative academic life). Each contributor is responsible for the accuracy of his/her entries' factual information as well as the interpretative content of his/her articles.

Each contributor who is writing a cluster of entries will receive a copy of the published volume as compensation (unless other arrangements have been made with the editor herself). Each must sign a document warranting the originality of the entries he or she has written and assigning further copyrights to Greenwood, as is standard procedure for such reference works. Authors are asked to avoid the use of direct quotations, if at all possible (the editor is contractually obligated to pay any and all permission fees!). If you must quote, please make sure your "scholarly use" of primary and secondary works meets the standards of Afair use@ and will not require the payment of fees. If material from previously published sources is used, it must be properly cited in the text and in the list of works cited following the entry. In addition, the contributor must seek and attain the proper permission for such use and must send copies to the editor of his/her letter of inquiry seeking permission and the response received. [Please ask me to send you forms for this purpose if you anticipate needing to quote copyrighted material; but better yet -- just don=t!]

 

ENTRY FORMAT AND PREPARATION

Note: All stylistic, usage, and capitalization issues not covered below should conform to The MLA Style Handbook (fourth ed.). Spelling should conform to Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (tenth ed).

 

Each complete entry will consist of:

1. a cover sheet (see items to include in description below)
2. a properly prepared entry of the word length specified
3. a bibliography "for further reading"

1. COVER SHEET: Each entry must have a cover sheet. On a separate sheet of paper, make a double-spaced list of the following information in this order: Entry Title (underlined), Your Name (as you want it to appear), Your institutional affiliation (as you want it to appear), Your Address and phone numbers and E-mail address for the next TWO years; actual word count of the entry (excluding bibliography); alphabetical list of indexing terms and possible cross-references; list of special characters, if any.

2. ENTRY FORMAT: Entries should be prepared on a computer, in an IBM compatible format if at all possible. The word processing program should be WordPerfect 5.1 or better. Submit two hard copies (the original and one copy) of your entries on 8.5 x 11" white bond paper and one disk copy of each entry stored in separate WP files on a 3.5" floppy disk. Please adhere to the length specified. Entries substantially longer will be cut (the editor has to pay to have any word overages published and although she knows every word you write is golden, she is not made of gold!). If you feel a particular word count allotment is too great or too small, let the editor know (some small changes can sometimes be made). The bibliography and indexing terms list are not included in the word count of your entry and will not be subtracted from that total.

FOR READY REFERENCE ENTRIES 50-500 WORDS: Define literary topics in terms of their scientific relations and vice versa. Describe topics' relation to the interdisciplinary study of lit. and sci. Focus on high points of an individual's career, those aspects most relevant to lit. and sci. studies per se. Give 1 or 2 bibliographical sources as noted above. Except in unusual circumstances, limit the number of indexing terms to 5.

FOR THEMATIC, CONTEXTUAL AND SURVEY ENTRIES, 500-2500 WORDS: Provide basic historiographical and interpretative frameworks for your topic. Discuss the various relations of your topic to and within lit. and sci. studies (past and current). Introduce problems, challenges, late-breaking approaches to your topic. Summarize and relate prospects for future directions. Give the appropriate number of bibliographical sources, depending on the relative length of your entry. Please follow specs. for reference selection given below. Give up to 20 indexing terms, as needed.

 

GENERAL SPECS:

 

DO USE:

 

DO NOT USE:


3. QUOTATIONS, CITATIONS AND BIBLIOGRAPHY: Please avoid quotations if at all possible. The types of illustration, demonstration and argument that we all use in journal articles and essays are not appropriate for encyclopedia entries. It may seem awkward, but here you are the general authority and are encouraged to generalize without a supporting cast. Any (of the rare) quotations should be followed by the author's last name, a short title (if more than one work by the author will be in the bibliography) and the page number(s): (Jones, "Eternal Encyclopedia Projects" 985). If only a single bibliographic item by that author will be listed: (Jones 985). The complete citation should appear in the bibliography. If a work is not important enough to appear in the entry's bibliography, it is not important enough to quote directly.

The bibliography at entries= end should include (listed in order of priority): the most authoritative primary and secondary works that provide the best illustrations of historiographical or methodological approaches, events, interpretations or disputes mentioned in the text; the "standard" work (if not included among the most authoritative); the most dependable biography (if relevant); any separately published bibliography of primary and/or secondary sources or an extensive bibliography printed in a journal or book; important book-length studies in English; journal articles that supply information or approaches not found in the above books; works in languages other than English. Cite books preferentially to articles; but cite articles where salient material is not yet available in book form. Cite works in English preferentially; in other languages as warranted.

Use short form for publishers: Putnam (not G. P. Putnam's Sons), but Cambridge University Press, not CUP. Arrange bibliography alphabetically by author, as in the following:

Article in a journal:

Jones, Smythanne. "Eternal Encyclopedia Projects Linked to Early Editorial Demise." New and Old Literary History 84.3: 882-1002. [In lieu of vol. #, as pertinent use: March, 1984: / Spring, 1984: / 30 March, 1984: / 84 (1984):]

Article in an edited volume:

Jones, Smythanne. "Eternal Encyclopedia Projects Linked to Early Editorial Demise." New and Old Literary History. Ed. T. S. Wesson. Faraway, OK: Insanity Press, 1984. 882-1002.

Book:

Jones, Smythanne. The Eternal Encyclopedia and Other Tall Tales. Faraway, OK: Insanity Press, 1984.

 

INDEXING TERMS (key words): List all names, institutions and concepts that ought to appear in the index to the volume. This is not the same as all the names and concepts which appear in your entry. Not every name, concept or location mentioned in your entry is important enough to merit inclusion in the index. Use your best judgment. For instance, if a secondary figure, Professor Who of MIT is mentioned, index only her name and not MIT. If in the course of writing you feel that certain people, ideas etc. can not be adequately covered within the confines of your entry's heading, please suggest that a separate entry be created for them (and volunteer to write it!)

RESEARCH: On a separate piece of paper, please substantiate with citations any factual material which is in disagreement with standard sources (for ex, if you are aware through your research that dates given in another encyclopedia are incorrect).

 

SAMPLE COVER SHEET: (to be double-spaced; single-spaced here for space considerations)

 

William Powell Jones

 

Kathryn A. Neeley

Division of Technology, Culture, and Communication

University of Virginia

Thornton Hall

University of Virginia

Charlottesville, VA 22903

(804) 924-xxxx (o); 977-zzzz (h)

abcxyz@virginia.edu

 

110 words

 

indexing terms:

 

eighteenth-century poetry

Newton

rhetoric of science

science and imagination

science and religion

 

 

SAMPLE ENTRIES: (to be double-spaced; single-spaced here for space considerations)

Jones, William Powell (1901--1989). Author of The Rhetoric of Science: A Study of Scientific Ideas and Imagery in Eighteenth-Century English Poetry (1966), a comprehensive history of the influence of science on poetry. Jones traces the history of science as a stimulus to poetic imagination, beginning with the telescope and microscope, which were most influential in the first half of the century, and continuing with natural history, which took over as the dominant subject after 1760. As the scientific subjects shifted, Jones argues that the poetry itself became less sublime, but the theme of science as a way to perceive God as revealed in nature persisted, even among poets who rejected science as cold and mechanistic.

 

Vitruvius, Marcus Pollio (1st century BC). Roman architect and engineer and author of De architectura libri decem (Ten Books on Architecture), one of the most influential books surviving from classical antiquity and an important source for the history of art, science and technology. Vitruvius covers subjects ranging from construction techniques to acoustics, aesthetic theory and the education of architects. He gained much of his influence through two leading figures of the Italian Renaissance, Leone Battista Alberti (1404-1472) and Andrea Palladio (1518-1580), who promulgated the "Vitruvian aesthetic," the idea that the proportions of the universe and the human body furnish an aesthetic ideal that can be applied to the design of structures. A number of writers, including Ben Jonson, John Dryden and Alexander Pope, extended this aesthetic to poetry, so that architecture became a model for design for poems and orations as well as for buildings.

Johnson, A. W. Ben Jonson: Poetry and Architecture. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994.