Submission
Submission is tantamount to stating by the author the originality of his/her work.
All submissions should be made online through the OJS Panel. Authors (at least the primary or corresponding author in the case of multi-author texts) should use their account, if they have one, or register as a new user, then select the journal and submit the manuscript and related materials by following the instructions. In special cases, the Editorial team may decide to accept a submission via traditional e-mail communication.
IMPORTANT: We pride ourselves on our editorial processing of both text and images. Therefore, our submission guidelines are broader than most and we kindly request source material for processing in some cases.
For instructions, guidelines and submission standards, see Instructions for PAM contributors.
Preliminary Assessment
Manuscripts submitted to the Journal are evaluated on their academic merit and significant contribution to the field, assessing their scientific reliability and clarity of presentation. The Chief Editor makes decisions concerning matter relevance, consulting as needed with members of the Editorial Board and Advisory Committee.
All submissions are first evaluated by qualified English-language editors and approved for peer evaluation. Texts not up to standard are returned to authors for improvement with a detailed list of issues to address and an invitation to resubmit for another evaluation. At PAM we consider this pre-stage evaluation extremely important as we respect the time and effort that our reviewers put into evaluating papers for publication in the journal.
Review
Each submission is subjected to peer review (two independent Reviewers, double-blind; see reviewing procedures). In case of two conflicting assessments, a third review is solicited.
The Authors receive feedback in the form of the anonymous review files and are expected to provide a revised version of the manuscript addressing the issues indicated. If revisions are suggested by the reviewers, the editorial decision to accept the manuscript is made following assessment of the revised submission. The Editors retain the right to reject the submission if the revision is inadequate.
Editorial Revision
The Editors request and/or provide extensive editing, copyediting, and language revision to aid the Authors in meeting the journal’s goals of clarity of presentation and language. All manuscripts accepted by the Editors for further consideration undergo editorial and language editing. The process, developed by the journal in response to over a quarter of a century of experience in publishing academic texts in English frequently written by non-native English speakers, ensures language correctness in terms of grammar and style, as well as adherence to international standards of content structure for scientific academic texts in the humanities and social sciences.
The corrected manuscript with questions and suggestions from the Editors is sent back to the Authors for approval and discussion in two editing rounds.
The final decision regarding acceptance is always with the Editors.
Manuscript Acceptance and License Agreement
A manuscript is considered accepted for publication once it has passed review by the Editors and Editorial Board, been successfully peer-reviewed, and a publication agreement has been signed by all contributing authors.
The agreement will be sent to the corresponding author by e-mail following acceptance of the final draft (typically with the first proofs) and should be returned signed forthwith to pam.pcma@uw.edu.pl.
See a draft of the agreement:
Proofs
Following the review and editing stages, the final versions of the manuscript and images are sent to typesetting. At first proofs stage, a .pdf copy of the page proofs is sent to the author for checking and corrections. In the case of multi-author texts, the primary (or corresponding) author is responsible for making sure that all corrections are returned and (s)he accepts the proof. Changes at this stage should be limited to the correction of typographical and factual errors. The .pdf file with corrections (alternatively, a list of errors to be corrected) should be returned within 10 working days of receipt of the first proofs. Otherwise, it will be assumed that the proofs have been approved as is.
The second proofs are sent to the (corresponding) author if requested on return of the first proofs. At this stage, the corrections must be limited to critical ones. They are to be returned within 5 working days from receipt. Otherwise, it will be assumed that the proofs have been approved without further changes.
Publication and Distribution
Articles are published online in the “ahead-of-print” mode independently and assembled into a volume in December. The issue with its own Table of Contents is made available online on the journal’s website.
The paper version is printed once a year (following assembly of the online version in December). It has a limited distribution, mainly to academic libraries and research institutions, through a worldwide book exchange program run by the PCMA UW. Copies may be acquired from the publisher, University of Warsaw Press.
Articles are distributed free of charge, immediately upon publication of the annual volume of the journal. Articles from the current issue and back issues (starting from volume 24/1) are posted on the journal website www.pam-journal.pl. From volume 24 all articles receive DOI identification.
Journal content can also be downloaded freely from: www.pcma.uw.edu.pl/en/publications; www.ceeol.com; www.bazhum.muzhp.pl; DOAJ; Scopus.
Contributing authors receive a PDF copy of their contribution once it has been published. Authors are encouraged to disseminate their work, in the form of these files or as links to the website, for academic, non-commercial purposes (academic media, institutional repositories, and the like).
Manuscript Turnaround and Publication Schedule
The PAM journal is released annually in December. The annual volume always consists of the regular issue containing current submissions. Additionally, one or more special, thematic issues co-edited by guest editors are released as fascicles of the same volume. In some years, only the regular issue appears and no thematic issues are produced. Articles are first published online independently on a rolling “ahead-of-print” basis and are collected into issues in December, when the volume is made available online with its own Table of Contents on the journal’s website. A limited print run is released once a year after the online version is assembled.
Ideally, the publication process follows this schedule:
- 4 weeks from submission – decision to proceed with the reviewing process (involves formal acceptance, technical review, Q&A sessions with the relevant Editors).
- 4 to 8 weeks – reviewing stage including review and editorial processing, terminating in a comprehensive evaluation sent to Authors from the Chief Editor.
- 4 to 6 weeks – copyediting, language correction and bibliographic editing
- 8 weeks – layout, proofs, production, terminating in an “Ahead of print” presentation on the journal’s repository.
- Average manuscript turnaround time: 24 weeks.