Watch the Webinar: Academic Publishing and a Quest for Diversity

An insightful webinar hosted by Research Information took place on November 29, focusing on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in academic publishing. Speakers included Tim Gillett, head of content at Europa Science (publisher of Research Information); Gita Manaktala, editorial director at MIT Press; Nicola Nugent, publishing manager for Quality and Ethics at Royal Society of Chemistry; and Ludovik Sebire, faculty librarian at University of the West of England.

Gillett facilitated the discussion, allowing each panelist to provide a short presentation about their role and what their organization is doing to increase DEI awareness. Manaktala’s presentation introduced The MIT Press Grant Program for Diverse Voices, a new initiative being awarded twice a year. Nugent’s presentation focused on gender bias in the sciences and the framework being developed at Royal Society of Chemistry to eliminate bias in journals. Sebire discussed decolonizing and diversifying library resources, with an introduction to the Inclusive Curriculum and Practice Toolkit.

After the presentations, questions were taken from the audience. One of these was what the biggest challenges are for DEI in academic publishing. Manaktala answered this question by reminding us that we need to get over our discomfort and talk about these issues in an open way, being able to see the quest for DEI as a structural matter rather than individual discrimination.

A recording of this webinar can be found here: https://event.webcasts.com/viewer/event.jsp?ei=1511337&tp_key=8ac31d5aeb