All entries for Tuesday 02 August 2022

August 02, 2022

An Incomplete History of Exchanges

Writing about web page https://exchanges.warwick.ac.uk/index.php/exchanges/exchangeshistory

Last spring I gave a couple of conference papers on Exchanges and the experiences of our associate editors. Part of these talks included presenting a potted history of the journal, from day 1 to 'today', as a way of adding context and showing how we weren’t a fly-by-night title. At the time of writing, I was surprised to find no one had actually collated anything like this before, and so I spent an engaging/frustrating couple of days combing over the website, through past issues and into what email correspondence I had from the 'before times' to create it. At the time I thought, while I did make my slides public, that afterwards it might be a nice idea to add such a historical perspective onto the journal website.

Well, time has passed and more history has happened for Exchanges, and now we find ourselves on the cusp of entering our (eep) 10th birthday year in the coming months. So, given if you read my last entry, you'll be aware how things are slightly quieter than normal presently for Exchanges HQ, which providentially removes any excuse I have for not getting the information added to the journal site. Here's the direct link - although you'll also be able to find it from the About the Journalpages too.

https://exchanges.warwick.ac.uk/index.php/exchanges/exchangeshistory

The page is not, I hasten to add, intended to be a complete and critical analysis of the journal and its developmental journey: I'll save that one for an ephemeral future paper, book chapter or monograph that I may write one day (or more likely won't). What it does provide are some of the key beats and moments from the journal's almost ten-year history, and an idea of the some of the discussions behind the scenes too. All of which hopefully goes to show how from our humble beginnings we've managed to emerge into something a lot more interesting and - I would hope - useful to our readers, reviewers, editors and author contributors alike.

Naturally, as the moment strikes me, I'll update the history. There are quite a few developments going on ‘under the hood’ right now, that I’m not quite ready to talk about publicly. Not because they’re especially secret, but rather because we’re not quite ready to announce them to the world. Hence, the entry for 2022 is likely to get a lot more populated by the end of the year. Furthermore, should anyone have any additional nuggets of historical interest they'd like to add, let me know. I might have been the Chief Editor on the title now far longer than anyone else, but that doesn't mean my knowledge of what happened before my ascension to editorial prominence (hah!) is absolute! [1]

But in the meanwhile, have a look at our past, and maybe reflect on what it might mean for our future!

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[1] Apologies for the hyperbole, I am writing this entry on a swelteringly humid summer afternoon, and it’s likely impacting on my prose style.