Happy Open Access Week!

Last updated on: October 20, 2020 at 5:01 am by James F. McGrath

Happy Open Access Week! 2020-10-19T15:57:49-04:00 James F. McGrath

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It is the tenth Open Access Week and I didn’t want to let the occasion pass by without a mention. Open Access is a term that covers a wide array of models whereby the products of scholarly research are made available to the general public. If the term is new to you, here’s a very brief introduction to Open Access.

I have been working to make sure that as much of what I write is freely available to the extent that this is possible and makes sense. Publishing in traditional print form still seems the best avenue for certain kinds of writing. But I have no doubt that I could easily have written several books for a general audience instead of blog posts, and in theory could still turn some of my blogging into books. But I’ve been passionate about public scholarship, and that includes a lot more than just Open Access publishing for me personally.

As far as Open Access goes, there are entire journals now in that format, such as Currents in Theology and Mission. The most recent issue is 47:4 and is dedicated to the theme of “Exploring Message and Mysteries in Mark.” David Rhoads has contributed two articles, including one on the Syrophoenician woman. In it he writes, “Jesus is portrayed here as having a genuine change of mind. He begins the scene by assuming that the kingdom is for the Jews now and only later is it for the Gentiles. He ends the scene with a willingness for Gentiles to benefit significantly from the kingdom even now.” In die Skriflig is another Open Access periodical in biblical studies. The most recent issue included an article by Francois P. Viljoen, “The Matthean characterisation of Jesus by John the Baptist.”

Ancient World Online (AWOL) maintains lists of monographs, journals, language-learning resources, and much else that is freely available online. See for example: The Economics of Urbanism in the Roman East and also Archaeology, Heritage and Ethics in the Western Wall Plaza, Jerusalem: Darkness at the End of the Tunnel. Both are academic books that are available from the publisher. Bloomsbury also has Open Access books, such as Nerd Ecology: Defending the Earth with Unpopular Culture. They also have whole series on Biblical Studies and Classics that are open access as well. Harrassowitz also has Open Access books, such as The Reach of the Assyrian and Babylonian Empires: Case studies in Eastern and Western Peripheries. Also via AWOL take a look at the journals Scripta Classica Israelica and Patristica et Mediævalia, as well as the Patristic Text Archive. There are also linguistic resources such as the Comprehensive Coptic Lexicon and Coptic Dictionary Online, and collections of texts such as the Kyprianos Database of Ancient Ritual Texts.

I am working on an open textbook on the Bible and music, and also hope to announce the launch soon of AcademFic, a journal of fiction written by academics.

You can find a range of things that I myself have written on the Selected Works page maintained by the Butler University Libraries. Many universities encourage their faculty to publish open access and/or to share their publications when copyright permits in an institutional repository such as this one. Many universities put student work from honors theses through to doctoral dissertations in a similar or the same online repository. Other sites such as Academia.edu also have academic publications available, and sometimes things that are behind a paywall may be available to you through a library (including a public library).

If you appreciate the things I write I hope that you’ll follow my Selected Works page to stay up to date on my academic publications. And if you appreciate Open Access scholarship please you should follow me on Twitter and/or LinkedIn, where I regularly share links to the kinds of resources that I have gathered here in this blog post, as soon as I become aware of them. There’s a lot you’ve missed that I’ve shared if you haven’t connected with me on Twitter!

Happy Open Access Week to all my blog readers! It is a great time to be interested in the kinds of subjects I research and write about, or any other academic field for that matter. Information flows more freely than ever before, and a host of reliable sources are literally at your fingertips.

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