Copyright by Maria Elena Gonzalez 2008
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Copyright by Maria Elena Gonzalez 2008 The Dissertation Committee for Maria Elena Gonzalez certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: “Crises” in Scholarly Communications: Insights from Forty Years of the Journal of Library History , 1966 – 2005 Committee: Patricia K. Galloway, Supervisor Donald G. Davis, Jr. Barbara Immroth Loriene Roy Emilio Zamora “Crises” in Scholarly Communications: Insights from Forty Years of the Journal of Library History , 1966 – 2005 by Maria Elena Gonzalez, B.A.; M.L.I.S. Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin May 2008 Dedication This dissertation is dedicated to past, present, and future contributors to the Journal of Library History, Philosophy, and Comparative Librarianship , and its subsequent incarnations, Libraries & Culture and Libraries & the Cultural Record Acknowledgements Unlike almost any other project I have undertaken to completion, this dissertation is the product of unplanned, unforeseen, and improbable circumstances. The choice of focus is a happy result of the catastrophic derailing of my original academic intentions. For the happy result, I must thank Bette Oliver and Hermina Anghelescu for creating an uproarious, visually rich, and most intellectually stimulating environment within the 191 square feet that once served as the editorial office for Libraries & Culture (Journal) . If it had not been for the lively intensity that radiated from that space, I never would have discovered that the quarters of a scholarly journal could be the nexus for such wide ranging discussions and deep questioning of academic traditions and the life of the mind. Once I settled in to enjoy the daily rhythm of the office, Don Davis graciously overlooked my trespassing and characteristically inveigled me to assume some responsibility for the Journal . Over the course of four years, he engaged me in a series of challenging tasks, most of which I did “for fun.” The most disconcerting task that he offered me was the taking apart of the editorial office, when it came time to pass the editorial leadership of the Journal to a new team. As I dismantled the editorial office, and later his own which Davis had occupied for 23 years, I discovered the materiality as well as the personal connections that had sustained the Journal for so long. When they came to grieve the passing of an era and v make their claims for this or that book, a jar of molasses, a lost umbrella, many friends of the Journal became my own. A cast of characters from the most near library world came by. Mark and Barbara Tucker, Michael Winship, Bob Dawson, Jon Aho, Rich Oram, Irene Owens, David Gracy and many others told stories and reminisced as they watched the parts of the once whole disappear into banker’s boxes and moving vans. For seeing the possibilities of turning this unfolding socio-cultural phenomenon into a believable dissertation, I am grateful to my Committee Chair, Pat Galloway. She literally leaped at the chance to work on this foolhardy project at that risky time in an academic life when she had not yet reached tenure. My cap is off to her and to the rest of my committee—Don Davis, Barbara Immroth, Loriene Roy, and Emilio Zamora— who went along with the madness. They remained steadfast in their belief that I would complete this dissertation that required two years to complete. During those years, which included the death of my mother, I shared the grief and enjoyed the understanding of many of my family members, especially from my cousin Hector Rodriguez, his wife Flor, and their children, Hector, Flor Jeanette, Chuck, and Suzanne. When the going got rough Flor’s brother, Jorge Alvarez, and my brother- in-law, Rick Gottlieb, provided unerring medical and legal advice, respectively. As I went through different research stages and the interviewing processes, I received wholehearted support and incomparable insights from Ronald Blazek, Fran Miksa, Wayne Wiegand, Bob Williams, and Martha Jane Zachert. All of them had already made tremendous contributions to the Journal from the very early days at Florida State University but did not fail to respond to my intrusive questions. vi Various scholarships from the School of Information and a prestigious Editorial Fellowship awarded by the UT Office of Graduate Studies at the University of Texas at Austin buoyed me through all the years of doubt that plague doctoral students. I thank the Gates Foundation for the unstinting financial support of my graduate studies without which I would have been in debt for many years. The financial support made it possible for me to work for ridiculous student wages and to serve the university and the community of Austin in many ways as a volunteer. Mary M. Case, now University Librarian at University of Illinois at Chicago, merits a special commendation for brilliantly defining the position and outlining the strategies of U.S. research librarians in challenging the practices of international commercial publishers that often are found at the center of the crises in scholarly communications. When I met Mary, she was Director of the Office of Scholarly Communications for the Association of Research Libraries and courageous founder and defender of SPARC. Her scholarship challenged me to reach further back in time to understand the historical trajectory of ARL and of Reed Elsevier, the nominal nemesis. Likewise, I owe many thanks to Joanna Hitchcock, Director of the University of Texas Press, for pointing out that the issues of concern to a university press and to the humanities in particular differed from those of commercial publishers serving the sciences. Joanna indulged my many questions and directed my reading in the eloquent literature about university presses by their directors. I am in great debt to the librarians and archivists at the University of Texas at Austin, Florida State University, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who assisted my research by procuring and not discarding the tons of obscure materials necessary to produce a dissertation of this sort. vii Kudos to the Emerald Group administration for the courteous and prompt response and unequivocal permission for me to use all and any materials authored by me and published in Emerald journals. Much due appreciation goes to my cohorts who took time to compare notes on obscure points on method and expression, and especially to Sherre Paris, who spent her precious time telling me about the early training of photojournalists instead of writing her dissertation about it. I would like to mark high regards for my faithful colleagues Jeanne Drewes, Julie Arnott, and Tina Mason, who never chided me for temporarily putting aside my work in preservation to pursue this dissertation. During the writing of a dissertation inevitably very special people—the angels of doctoral students—arrive to provide support and sustenance. Two of my angels, Michael Hodges and Jeff Newberry, kept me alert with cakes concocted of nothing but love, butter, and sugar and protected my archival shrine at UT’s Collection Deposit Library. Marc Frazier, Kirby Sams, and the indefatigable crew at Hyde Park Gym not only kept my body and soul together but the hipbone connected to the ham bone, too. I will be forever grateful to the entire Metzger family, who faced life’s most harrowing turns with forbearance and aplomb, fiddling, singing and tap-dancing, especially Chela, who humored me through the darkest days of writing these pages. Addie the cat, at her most petulant, reminded me that doctoral students everywhere face obstacles and demands from friends and family much greater than I ever had to face—even when she wanted food at 4 o’clock in the morning. viii “Crises” in Scholarly Communications: Insights from Forty Years of the Journal of Library History , 1966 – 2005 Publication No._____________ Maria Elena Gonzalez, Ph.D. The University of Texas at Austin, 2008 Supervisor: Patricia K. Galloway The study examines the first forty years of a humanities journal, Libraries & Culture (hereafter Journal). Founded in 1966 as The Journal of Library History , its contributors shaped and reshaped the Journal according to the values, habits, and competencies that they brought to changing circumstances. Over a period of forty years marked by administrative, managerial, financial, editorial, and technical challenges, the editors transformed the Journal into an interdisciplinary and erudite publication distant from its earliest beginnings as a compendium of entertaining vignettes and didactic notes on the writing and uses of library history. This study considers salient points of transformation during the life of the Journal , highlighting issues associated with various crises in scholarly communications. Key issues confronted by the Journal include the now familiar dilemmas over journal pricing structures, subscription cancellations, bibliographic control, prestige surveys and ix citation rankings, pressures on authors to publish, peer-review, and modes of dissemination. Historical and sociological contexts frame the resolutions of these dilemmas that are treated chronologically as they erupted in the trajectory of the Journal . The historical investigation draws on archival sources, secondary sources, interviews, participant observation, and close reading of the publication to construct a narrative about the Journal in the context of 1) changing priorities in higher education; 2) challenges faced by university presses and scholarly publication in general; and 3) professional and disciplinary developments in librarianship. The characters, actions, and settings of the history are interpreted through a sociological lens, crafted from a beginner’s understanding of the work of Pierre Bourdieu. Bourdieu’s concepts of social field, multiple forms of capital, capital conversion, and habitus form the interpretive frame for the narrative. The choice of Bourdieu’s heuristic approach implies a broader interest in framing scholarly communications as value negotiations among sets of players in interdependent social fields.