Romance Studies

Although access to digital publications is highly valued in Romance studies, open access is rather underrepresented there compared with other disciplines. Romance studies has a heterogeneous publication culture in which established models of publication and dissemination of research results play a central role. Printed journals continue to occupy a special place, and, besides journals, edited collections are an important form of publication. Publishers and independent journals as well as researchers and associations are increasingly breaking new ground in the form of open access publications and initiatives – to date, mainly in the journals area, but increasingly also in the area of monographs and edited collections. 

The topic of open access is becoming increasingly important in the publication culture in Romance studies, not least because of the positions and requirements of research funders. Small publishers are responsible for a substantial part of the publication output in Romance studies, and many of them now offer open access options. The information offerings and networking activities of the Specialised Information Service for Romance Studies (FID Romanistik) are also worthy of mention. Impetus has been forthcoming from the community through journal startups and a position paper on open access and research data (Schöch et al., 2017) produced by the Digital Romance Studies Working Group (AG Digitale Romanistik) of the German Association of Romance Philologists (Deutscher Romanistikverband). The topic is also gaining traction, especially among mid-level academics, through workshops organised by the German Association of Romance Philologists and through inter-disciplinary discussions and further education programmes at graduate schools.

Best-practice examples and reports of concrete experiences were presented at a workshop in 2017 in which publishers, editors, and researchers participated (Hornung & Trapp, 2018). A survey of German-speaking Romance philologists (Hornung et al., 2017) conducted in 2016 by the Specialised Information Service for Romance Studies (FID Romanistik) provided insights into the question of how open access is perceived in the discipline and what factors influence researchers when it comes to deciding whether to publish open or closed access. The survey found that the reputation of the publisher, the series, the journal, and the editors were decisive factors. Although respondents valued the high degree of dissemination and the findability of open access publications, these factors were not decisive. The survey results suggest that Impact Factors, which are of central importance in other disciplines, play hardly any role in Romance studies. A more recent survey conducted by the Specialised Information Service for Romance Studies (Schepers, 2024) suggests that awareness of open access has increased. Respondents formulated specific concerns and problems, such as the funding of open access monographs or possibilities of self-archiving works published with a publisher, while also pointing to a need for information about – and to barriers to – open access publishing.

As of April 2024, the Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB) listed 171 entries under the search term Romance languages and 193 entries under Romance literature; in addition, there are the titles in the individual Romance disciplines, for example Catalan language (45 entries as of April 2024). The online library and publication platform OAPEN listed 804 titles under Romance languages and 121 titles under Romance literature as of April 2024.
Overall, offerings in the area of monographic OA publications in Romance studies tend to be isolated and heterogeneous. However, the presence of the format is increasing. Yet, none of the above-mentioned platforms fully cover the broad spectrum. Examples in the area of freely available monographs and collections, which are usually published open access and in print at the same time ("dual publishing"), include:

• the supplements to the journal Romanische Studien;
• the series Imágenes de la diversidad funcional. Literatura, artes escénicas, visuales y virtuales, which has been published with Peter Lang since 2018;
• the series Aula, which has been published by de Gruyter since 2020;
• the offerings of the hybrid-publishing university presses, which developed open access models at an early stage;
• the French platform OpenEdition Books 
• the series Open Romance Linguistics published by Language Science Press;
• the humanities publication series published by Open Humanities Press and Open Book Publishers;
• individual titles published by diverse publishers with a Romance programme, including AVM, de Gruyter, Peter Lang, transcript and Vervuert.

The panorama of these publications is extremely heterogeneous. It largely comprises new titles. In addition, there are titles that are made freely available after a certain period of time or that appear in open access as a new edition or a translation, as in the case of Joachim Küpper’s classic work Discursive "Renovatio" in Lope de Vega and Calderón. With Knowledge Unlatched, there have also been some – albeit unsuccessful – initial initiatives to "unlatch" commercial publications in partnership with several specialised publishers. As the DFG has declared open access the priority publication mode for the projects it funds, and other research funders have already made the provision of open access mandatory, a strengthening of the open access monograph in Romance studies is to be expected. However, the additional costs for free access to a monograph that arise at most traditional publishers are an obstacle to this. Extensive funding programmes do not exist at present. In individual cases, the costs may be covered by the monograph funds that have been established at many scientific institutions, by the DFG, or by foundations. In the case of third-party-funded projects, the easiest way is to include applications for the reimbursement of open access costs in the project proposal. University presses can play a complementary role, as can the offerings of non-conventional publishers listed in the overview.

There are other useful offerings both with a specifically Romance studies orientation and with a transdisciplinary orientation. The local libraries offer their publication and advisory services to researchers at the respective institutions. Graduate schools are also increasingly arranging advisory and training offerings. The Specialised Information Service for Romance Studies (FID Romanistik) offers a discipline-specific information and advisory service. Via the project website, basic information is presented on open access, especially on legal issues. When doing so, concrete application scenarios from publishing practice in Romance studies are discussed – for example, regarding open access publishing and self-archiving, the role of translations, and publishers and repositories in different countries. Personal advice is also offered. The Romanistik-Blog features information on current topics, legal issues, funding conditions, as well as specific offerings and projects.
The online archives JSTOR and Project MUSE now also provide open access content relevant to Romance studies.