Keeping archaeology safre from vampires, dung, and twisted animal bladders

Vampires:  I just had a journal insist that my co-authors and I tone down some of our wording in a paper. Jason Ur, Gary Feinman and I will publish a paper in the International Journal of Urban and Regional Research taking contemporary geographers and others to task for promoting the VERY incorrect opinion of Jane Jacobs that cities preceded agriculture in prehistory. I blogged about this some time ago, and I thought it was a settled issue (duh!). But then Peter Taylor published a paper in that journal touting Jacobs's ideas again. So we fired off a critique, which we are now revising for publication. But we were told to remove the vampire metaphor. Here is what we said:

We view the historical part of Jacobs’ “cities first” model as a vampire. It normally sleeps, out of public view, only to emerge periodically and wreak havoc among the unsuspecting. Then it quietly returns to obscurity, leaving people to wonder whether something so contrary to normal experience can really live on. We intend to put a stake through this vampire of a model and end its tortured life once and for all.

In fact, we had discussed this passage and decided to include it, even though the reviewers and editors would probably not like it. We even considered using a zombie metaphor, but vampires seemed more apt. Oh well, I guess the world of publishing on archaeology is now safe from vampires (and maybe zombies), at least for a while.
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Dung: The "manuring hypothesis" in Mediterranean archaeology explains the presence of sherds and other small artifacts in non-site locations as deriving from the use of animal dung as agricultural fertlizer. When farmers scooped up the dung, they would have also scooped up some sherds and such from domestic trash, which then ended up spread on fields, far from settlements. One of the major papers on this topic is Alcock et al (1994). One of the authors gave me a copy of the manuscript prior to publication, and I was very pleased to see that it began with a quote from a Monty Python skit: "Q: What's brown and sounds like a bell?  A: Dung!". (Note, this joke is from "The Visitors", NOT from the skit where John Cleese shows up with a bin full of dung.

"Dung, sir."

When the book came out, this quote had been removed from the chapter. I've always meant to ask the authors who was responsible for this, but never got around to it. One certainly wouldn't want to include scatological humor in a serious archaeological book! Standards must be maintained. Dung and vampires need not apply.
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To continue this serious scholarly discussion, I want to share two recent emails. It seems that as an Aztec specialist, all the odd-balls out there want Aztec information from me.

(1). I glanced at the subject line, and thought it said "Aztec demography." Great, we need more research on this topic. But when I opened the email, I realized that the subject line in fact read, "Aztec demonology."

Hello,

I found your email when I was researching professors who specialize in Aztec studies. I'm a screenwriter working on a horror script. If you're not too busy, I was wondering if there's anything you can tell me about Aztec demonology, or Aztec goddesses who protected women?

I don't know what "demonology" means, and I really don't want to know, so I replied in the negative.

(2) This week I got this email:

My name is XXXXXX; I am a researcher for XXXXXXXXX looking at alternative subcultures. I'm currently researching an interesting story on balloon fetishism, and I was hoping you could confirm the following tidbit of internet information regarding balloon animal origins: is it true that the Aztecs used to inflate animal bowels and then twist them into animal shapes for sacrificial offerings?

Give me a break! I don't claim to know every single primary source on the Aztecs in detail, so it is possible that I have missed this important feature of Aztec ritual behavior. But I think I would have heard something about this weird practice if it were indeed described in a reputable source. It would be an excellent example of weird ancient practices that gross-out undergraduates, always something to be noted.

Alcock, Susan E., John F. Cherry, and Jack L. Davis
    1994    Intensive Survey, Agricultural Practice, and the Classical Landscape of Greece. In Classical Greece: Ancient Histories and Modern Archaeologies, edited by Ian Morris, pp. 137-190. Cambridge University Press, New York.

PS - the IMDB has a nice list of quotes from Monty Python's Flying Circus.

Nova Scientific Publishers

For some strange reason, an old post on this blog about Nova Scientific Publishers has stayed active as a place for people to sound off about this commercial press. I'm not impressed with them, and it seems that most readers also have a negative opinion too.

My original post is: "Nova publishers: Legitimate or bogus?"  

I have decided to stop accepting comments to that post. Readers who want to sound off about Nova Publishers should see one of the groups started by Darren Pearce-Lazard; these are devoted to discussion about the press.

• A group on LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/groups?mostPopular=&gid=3425349
• A group on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=156132787738631

I will add the final two comments to my old entry (they have been waiting for a while), and then I will not accept any others. See Darren's sites for more information.

How to find a publisher for your book manuscript

It seems that I have had a bunch of requests lately for advice on finding a publisher for academic books in archaeology. In most cases these are young scholars, recent PhDs, and in many cases the book in question is or will be based on a dissertation.

My main advice is to buy and read Beth Luey’s book, Handbook for Academic Authors, Cambridge University Press. The 5^th edition just came out this year (2009), although I still have the 3^rd edition (oops, time to upgrade). This book is essential for academic authors, with all sorts of useful advice. Is your publisher offering a fair deal on royalties? Should I think about writing a textbook? How should I handle nasty reviews from a journal on my brilliant manuscript? What are the pitfalls of trying to publish my dissertation as a book?

My second piece of advice is to talk to your colleagues and mentors about your situation. They will know your work and have a good idea about publishing formats and venues.

Here are some suggestions, based on my own experiences and on Luey’s book.

(1) Think hard about whether your dissertation really needs to be published as a book. Maybe you are better off publishing several good journal articles (that’s what I did).

(2) Spend some time investigating publishers. Luey divides publishers into several groups. Of these, the most relevant for young scholars and rewritten dissertations are:

• University presses (generally the best bet for dissertations)
• Commercial scholarly publishers (there is wide variation here)
• Technical monograph series
• Vanity presses and other rip-off commercial presses. See Nova Publishers here, or perhaps VDM Verlag Dr. Mueller (thanks to Anastasia Tsaliki for this example). For a really, really bad rip-off publisher, see this post.
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(3) It is often a good idea to talk to an editor from one of the relevant presses, perhaps at a professional meeting or by email. This can give you an idea of what they might be looking for.

(4) Prepare a good prospectus for submission. Each press has slightly different requirements for a prospectus, but most have these components:

• A description of the book, including a table of contents
• Information on the target audience
• A list or discussion of possible competing titles
• Information on the current status of the manuscript and a projected timetable.
• A copy of your CV
• A writing sample
• 
  

If you want to see a less formal description of a book prospectus, see the “Series Description Document” on my web page for the book series, “Ancient Cities of the New World.” Prepare the prospectus in correct format for each relevant publisher, and send it off to as many publishers as you want. In our case, authors communicate with one of the series editors (me, Marilyn Masson, and John Janusek) and submit the prospectus to us. We often suggest some revisions to the author, and then if we think the proposed book is appropriate, we forward it, with our evaluation and recommendation to the press. In most cases, however, you will be submitting the prospectus directly to an acquisitions editor at the press.