Submission Guidelines
Southern Spaces combines innovative scholarship about real and imagined spaces and places of the American South with the tools of digital media. Realizing that few scholars are experts in website design, we are eager to work with authors, photographers and videographers in the process of producing image, sound, and video files for submissions. We are committed to assisting scholars at varying levels of technological proficiency.
If you are interested in submitting materials to Southern Spaces, please email the editor at seditor@emory.edu to set up an account on the site and then follow the instructions for submitting. A submission will not be considered if it has have been previously published or is concurrently under consideration by another journal or press. Copyright for essays published in Southern Spaces is retained by the authors. All images, video, and sound files associated with published submissions are securely archived by Emory University's Woodruff Library. If you choose to submit by post, we accept flash drives, DV tapes, CDs, or DVDs containing your manuscript, images, sound files, etc.
For more information about submissions, please select from the links below:
For questions or additional information, please contact:
Jesse P. Karlsberg, Managing Editor
Southern Spaces
Robert W. Woodruff Library
Emory University
540 Asbury Circle
Atlanta, Georgia 30322-2870
Articles are critical multimedia pieces exploring the real and imagined places of the US South, or making connections and comparisons between the US South, southern regions, and other areas of the world.
Photo essays are collections of original photography that explore real and imagined places of the US South, or make connections and comparisons between the South, southern regions, and other areas of the world. They include a short critical writing component.
Short videos focus on a particular space or place in the US South. They can range from thirty-second vignettes to fifteen-minute edited documentaries. They often include a short critical writing component.
Presentations include video clips, audio samples, images, and texts from exhibits, conference proceedings, campus events, lectures, interviews, and readings that concern the study of the US South.
Reviews are critical analyses of recently published books, films, music, events, and digital projects relating to real and imagined places of the US South, or making connections and comparisons between the US South, southern regions, and other areas of the world.
Featured Images are single photographs that capture a particular space or place in the US South. Submissions should include a title, place where the photograph was taken, and the year in which it was taken.
File Types: The text and/or framework of the submission file is formatted in ASCII, HTML, or Microsoft Word. If the submission file is in Microsoft Word, the author's name should be removed from the document's properties. All URL addresses in the text should be activated (e.g., <a href="http://sites/southernspaces.org" target="_blank">http://sites/southernspaces.org</a>).
Style Guide: Chicago Manual of Style, most recent edition. (If you are submitting from a scientific discipline, please contact the managing editor to discuss appropriate citation styles.)
Word Limit: Southern Spaces does not have a word limit.
Abstract: All submissions should contain a short abstract of no more than one hundred words.
Notes: Text portions of submissions should include citations as appropriate based on incorporated research. These citations should appear in full as a numerical sequential footnotes or endnotes in the text document.
Recommended Resources: All essay submissions should contain a recommended resources section at the end. This section should be divided by format into the following categories: Print Materials, Video/Audio, and Links. Print Materials include articles and books relevant to the piece. Video/Audio should contain any films related to the subject matter. Links include the titles of online resources, such as library collections and online articles or information pages, as well as their active urls.
Acknowledgements: If desired, these should appear at the end of the text before the Recommended Resources.
- All image, sound, and video files are submitted in separate files.
- The author either owns all submitted image, sound, and video files or has obtained permission from the copyright holder(s) to use all image, sound, and video files prior to submission.
- All submitted image, sound, and video files clearly indicate credits and provenance, adhering to the guidelines in the Chicago Manual of Style. (If you are submitting from a scientific discipline, please contact the managing editor to discuss appropriate citation styles.)
Image Files: All figures and images should be submitted in the largest, highest quality version possible for archiving purposes.
- Scanning from prints (grayscale or color)
Preferred: 600 dpi or higher, millions of colors (true color) - Scanning from negatives or slides (grayscale or color)
Minimum accepted: 2400 ppi or higher, millions of colors (true color) - Original digital photograph (grayscale or color)
Preferred: 600 ppi or higher, millions of colors (true color)
Sound Files: All sound files should be submitted in an editable format (such as .wav, .aif, .mp3, .mpeg, .au), preferably as digitized files copied to a mass storage medium (like CD-R) or emailed.
Video Files: All video files should be submitted in an uncompressed format (such as .avi or .mov), preferably as digitized video files copied to a mass storage medium (like DVD-R) or, alternatively, as clips archived onto a mini-DV tape with an accompanying list of names and corresponding time code numbers for all clips.
If you have any questions about media formats, please contact the managing editor.
Southern Spaces has adopted the following policies regarding usage.
South: Southern Spaces prefers writing that treats "the South" as an imagined geography that has had important political and historical consequences but that rarely exhibits cultural homogeneity. Discussions of "the South" on Southern Spaces should attempt to recognize the constructed nature of the South as well as regional and local variations within the South.
Region, regional: Southern Spaces prefers to reserve the terms region and regional for smaller geographical units within the area commonly understood as "the South." The nineteenth-century term for a large geographic division within the United States, "section," may be used to refer to the entire South. The easiest way to avoid "the region" or "regional" to refer to the South as a whole is to simply use "the South" or "southern" whenever possible.
Subregion, sub-region: Southern Spaces does not designate any part of the country as a subregion. Therefore, submissions should refrain from the use of this term.
African American, black: Southern Spaces prefers African American and/or black (lowercase "b") for both the noun and the adjective.
US, American: Southern Spaces prefers US rather than American for political and historical contexts.
Southern Spaces has adopted the following policies regarding capitalization, as designated in the Chicago Manual of Style.
South, southern, southerner: Southern Spaces capitalizes such references as "South" and "North" but does not capitalize such references as "southern" or "southerner" or "northern" or "northerner."
Civil rights movement: Southern Spaces does not capitalize "civil rights movement."
Copyright for contributions published in Southern Spaces is retained by the authors, with publication rights granted to the journal. Content is free to users. Any reproduction of original content/ from Southern Spaces must a) seek copyright from authors and b) acknowledge Southern Spaces as the site of original publication.
All Southern Spaces essays, photo essays, and short videos pass through a rigorous peer review. Our peer review process is designed to provide assurance to readers that all essays published in Southern Spaces have attained a high standard of excellence, as judged by researchers who have expert knowledge in the pertinent field.
Upon submission, each proposed Southern Spaces essay is screened for conformation to the journal's submission guidelines. After determining that the submission's format and content are appropriate for the journal, the proposed essay is then sent through a double-blind peer review by two reviewers selected by the editorial board. Names of reviewers will not be released to authors, nor will reviewers know the identities of authors whose work they review.
Reviewers are asked to evaluate the submission critically with respect to conformance to the journal's scope. Other factors considered include an examination of the work's significance, methods, academic rigor, responsiveness to the latest literature and debates, conclusions, references, and overall presentation (including the use of audio-visual and web-based materials when available and pertinent). Southern Spaces editors may forward questions from reviewers to the authors for clarification. After the initial review process has been completed, the editorial board will decide whether to accept, reject, or ask for revisions to the submission. If revisions are called for, authors may review shared comments and have the option of re-submitting or withdrawing their submission from consideration. The managing editor of Southern Spaces will keep all authors informed as to the status of their submissions throughout the process.
Submissions will be published individually at the time of their acceptance by the editorial board. Published items will not be affiliated with a volume or issue, but will be identified by date of publication.
