Submissions

Author Guidelines

Author Guidelines.

Overview

Thank you for your interest in submitting an article for publication in HIMALAYA, the journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies.
HIMALAYA promotes scholarly understanding of, engagement with, and appreciation for this diverse region of the world. Truly interdisciplinary and transregional in scope, HIMALAYA is committed to covering all aspects of Himalayan Studies, including the natural and social sciences, humanities, and creative arts.
HIMALAYA publishes peer reviewed original research articles, short field reports, perspectives pieces, book and film reviews, reports on meetings and conferences, alongside literature and photo essays from the region. Please follow the guidelines outlined below when preparing your submission.

All authors must be members of ANHS. To find out how to join, visit the Association’s website: https://anhs-himalaya.org/membership.
 
Types of Submissions

Research Articles: original, previously unpublished contributions based on original research from all fields (up to 8,000 words, non-inclusive of title, abstract, notes, and references; 11,000 inclusive of all content). Please refer to this style guide for further information on how to prepare a research article for submission.

Research Reports: describe early research findings more briefly than a full Research Article to convey time-sensitive, early findings (up to 2,000 words).

Perspectives: original and topical contributions that take a particular stance or articulate a viewpoint that may be controversial (up to 6,000 words). Such contributions are differently evaluated, but still peer reviewed.

Conference Reports: detail the location, proceedings, and scope of conferences, symposia and workshops relating to some aspect of Himalayan studies (up to 1,500 words).

Literature: includes original poems, short stories, and excerpts of longer forms of literature (up to 5,000 words).

Artwork: includes original drawings, photographs, or other forms of art. Please submit high- resolution (> 300 dpi) versions of all images following the guidelines outlined below.

Reviews: includes book and film reviews (up to 1,200 words). Please refer to Book and Film review section of this document for more information.

Photo Essays: a thematically collated selection of photos that tell a story, highlight a theme or (maximum 15 photos; see below for further guidelines)

Other: Other forms of work that do not fit into one of the above categories may be suggegsted to the editors. 

General Requirements

- Material submitted to the journal must be in English.
- HIMALAYA follows The Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition); please use the Oxford comma.
- Spellings and usage should follow American spelling and conform to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary
- Authors must take full responsibility for the originality, content, and opinions expressed in their submission.
- Authors are required to obtain permission for the publication or reproduction of copyrighted material (including images) where appropriate and to offer proper acknowledgment. The author(s) must pay reproduction costs and all associated fees.
- Submitted material must be original, and not under consideration elsewhere. HIMALAYA does not publish materials that are already in print or online. Exceptions may be made for papers, or abstracts of papers, published in a language other than English, as well as excerpts of literature in discussion with the Editors, and on a case-by-case basis.
- Requests for custom formatting for Literature submissions may be accommodated, with approval by editors. Editors will review requests on a case-by-case basis.
- The editors reserve the right to make editorial changes to comply with style and grammar. No substantive changes will be made without the author’s approval.
 
Use of Non-English Words and Quotations

Diacritics:
- If diacritics are necessary, please use the Noto font family (https://fonts.google.com/noto)
- If using Asian languages, please use fonts of the Noto font family (https://fonts.google.com/noto).

Quotations: Include non-English sentences and quotations in single quotation marks (and do not italicize).

Translations:
- Translations of non-English words must be included in parentheses immediately following (or vice versa, but please be consistent throughout the submission) - example: ‘puja (worship)’ or ‘temple (Nep. mandir)’
- Unless they have been generally adopted into the English language (lama, guru ...), all non-English words should be italicized throughout the article.
- Do not pluralize non-English words with ‘s’ (e.g. correct is: dalit, not dalits).
- Include translations of foreign-language quotations either in a footnote or in brackets immediately following the quotation (without italics and without quotation marks).

Use of Nepali Language
- For submissions that use Nepali language terms, please provide the Ralph Lilley Turner dictionary transliteration in parentheses on first instance.
- For example, long vowels (e.g., “aa” as in ‘father’) take the diacritic ā
- Nasalized vowels in Roman type are often denoted with a tilde (˜) over the vowel, such as in “yahã”, the Nepali word for “here.”

Use of Tibetan Language
- For submissions that use Tibetan language terms, please provide the Wylie transliteration in parentheses on first instance.
- If the term is a proper noun or name with a conventional English translation, please use the conventional English translation after first instance, e.g. ‘Palace of Lotus Light (pho brang parma ‘od).’
- If the term is culturally specific and warrants repeated use throughout the article instead of an English gloss, please provide both a phonetic transliteration followed by Wylie transliteration on first instance, and then use the phonetic transliteration in all future instances, e.g. ‘the king or chögyal (chos rgyal) of Sikkim transitioned from being a chögyal of a scenic Himalayan kingdom to…’

Please refer to the Tibetan and Himalayan Library’s online Tibetan phonetics converter http://www.thlib.org/reference/transliteration/phconverter.php to facilitate this process.
 

Research Articles, Reports, and Perspectives

Research Articles are no more thank 8,000 words, Research Reports around 2,000 words, and Perspectives pieces are no more than 6000 words. Submissions that exceed the upper word limits may not be accepted for final publication.

Abstracts of no more than 300 words should accompany each submission. Abstracts should ensure to include and briefly describe the purpose of the research, approach used, findings and conclusion.

Up to five keywords should be submitted for each article. Keywords should be unique and informative, while avoiding undefined abbreviations or acronyms.

Authors should also provide a brief autobiography of approximately 100 words and acknowledgements in 3rd person at the end of the paper. See the sample below.

Mark Turin (PhD, Linguistics, Leiden University, 2006) is an anthropologist and linguist. Before joining the University of British Columbia as Chair of the First Nations and Endangered Languages Program and Associate Professor of Anthropology, he was an Associate Research Scientist with the South Asian Studies Council at Yale University, and the Founding Program Director of the Yale Himalaya Initiative. Together with Sienna Craig, Turin edits HIMALAYA, the longest running, open access, interdisciplinary and peer-reviewed journal of Himalayan studies. His most recent book is A Grammar of Thangmi (Brill, 2012).

- Endnotes should be single-spaced and numbered consecutively using Arabic numerals throughout the text. They should be necessary and succinct. Endnote citation style must follow in-text citation style as described below.
- All submission should be single-spaced with 1-inch margins, non-justified.
- A list of references should follow the body of the text, single-spaced, and continue the pagination of the article. See References section for more detailed guidance.
- All pages should be numbered at the bottom of the page, including the first page.
- Submissions must be carefully checked for typographical and factual accuracy prior to submission, with special care taken in checking references and quotations, transcription, accents and spelling.

Conference Reports

- Conference Reports should not exceed 1,500 words.
- The report should highlight the location, dates, proceedings, and scope of the conference, symposium or workshop, and provide a link to any online materials or abstracts.
- The author’s full name and institutional affiliation should be provided at the bottom of the report.

Book and Film Reviews

- Please limit your review to no more than 1,200 words. 
- At the beginning of your review, please include the full details of the book you are reviewing:
Title: Subtitle. Author. Place: Publisher, year. Number of pages. ISBN. For example:
Himalayan People’s War: Nepal’s Maoist Rebellion. Michael Hutt (ed.). Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004. 336 pages. ISBN 9780253217424.
- Citations from the book you are reviewing should include page numbers. Example: (p. 33) or (pp. 146-149).
- Citations from or references to other works should be included in the text. Example: (Michael Hutt. 2004. Himalayan People’s War: Nepal’s Maoist Rebellion. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 34-45).
- Proofread your review carefully and double-check any use of romanization of foreign names and words and page references.
- Summarize the book and contextualize it within current scholarship, assessing its contribution; indicate the target audience of the book and whether the book successfully addresses this readership.
- Avoid extensive description of the book’s content; rather, evaluate the author’s thesis and how s/he develops it.
- If the book is an edited collection of essays, or chapters by different individuals, discuss and analyze the overall theme and content, focusing on specific chapters only when you find them particularly significant.
- At the end of your review, please include your full name (as you would like it to appear in print) and a 1-2 sentence bio, including your current institutional affiliation.

Photo Essays

- Photo essays are editorially reviewed, but do not go through an external peer review process.
- Photo essays include up to 15 photos, a 500-600 word Introduction (excluding title, author and bio), and then captions of no more than 400 words per image.
- Please see the previous HIMALAYA issues for examples and guidance for preparation

References
- It is the responsibility of the author(s) to ensure that references are correct. HIMALAYA follows The Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition), author-date format for references & in-text citations 
- References should be listed at the end of the paper under the subheading ‘References’:
- Please list citations alphabetically by author’s last name, giving the complete unabbreviated source citation.
- Please do not number entries or separate by reference types (i.e. books then journals).

Notes on References:
- Capitalize titles of works according to ‘headline style’ as opposed to sentence style.
- Use full names (last, first) for authors. If full names are not available, treat initials as a name and insert a space (for example, C. K.).
- For dates, use the format: day month year (12 May 2013).
- ‘ibid’ should not be italicized and should be followed by a colon (ibid: 37); ‘et al.’ and ‘cf.’ should be followed by only one period; ‘see’ should not be followed by a colon before a list of references.
- References should be ordered according to year of first publication.
- Always include the hundred’s digit in page listings (e.g. 329-341, and not 329-41).
- In the case of multiple publication dates, state the earlier year in parenthesis first: (1898) 2001.
- All film titles should be italicized. Sample References using Author-Date format:

Books with a Single Author:
Last, First. Year. Title: Subtitle. Location: Publisher.

Books with Two Authors:
Last, First and First Last. Year. Title: Subtitle. Location: Publisher.

Books with Multiple Authors:
Last, First, First Last and First Last. Year. Title: Subtitle. Location: Publisher.

Chapter or Article from a Book:
Last, First (of chapter author). Year. Title of Chapter. In Title of Book, edited by First Last, Pages. Location: Publisher.

Journal Article
Last, First. Year. Title of Article. Journal Name Volume(Issue): Pages.
e.g. Halliday, Scott. 2015. Title. Asian Survey 32(2): 2-10.

Journal Article with Multiple Authors:
Last, First, First Last, and First Last. Year. Title of Article. Journal Name Volume(Issue): Pages.

Newspaper Article
Last, First (of writer) (or name of paper if not available). Year. Title of Article. Name of Paper, day month. <URL> (accessed on day month year).
e.g., Nepali Times, 17 February.

Online Newspaper Article
Last, First (of writer, if known). Year. Title of Article. Name of Paper, Date. <URL> (accessed on day month year), e.g., (accessed on 07 April 2019).

In-text citations of articles appearing in the same issue
(Halliday 2019) and not (Halliday, this issue). In the bibliography it should appear as: Halliday, Scott. 2019. Title. HIMALAYA issue(volume).

Images and Illustrations

HIMALAYA is committed to publishing only high-quality art and image work, both in color, and black and white (grayscale). Most images that are found online or extracted from other documents (from Word, Excel, PowerPoint presentations, and the like) are not of sufficient quality to be reproduced in print.
We require that authors either hold copyright, or have secured copyright clearance, for all images that are submitted for consideration. The journal editorial staff do not have the time to source images or negotiate licenses on behalf of authors. We regret that we have no art budget and are therefore not able to pay reproduction rights to artists and photographers.

- Please follow the guidelines below when submitting images for consideration. The author must provide appropriately numbered captions that include: a title, short caption, date and credit or acknowledgement.

- The editors reserve the right to reject any or all images that are found to be of insufficient quality or do not ‘fit’ with the text, or violates another license or copyright. All images that are accepted for publication will be sent to a professional image processing house for color balancing and correction before publication.

- Format: It is best to submit all image files in TIFF format. While JPEG files appear smaller and easier to send, this is a compressed file format that can result in a loss of image quality. If you must submit JPEG files, please do not open, re-save, or manipulate them any more than is necessary. If your images are too large to send by email, please contact the editors for suggestions of free file transfer tools.
- File Size and Resolution: Continuous-Tone Images: If your original image contains multiple levels of gray tones, you should scan the original using the grayscale mode. If the image is in full color and is to be reproduced in color, it should be scanned using the CMYK mode.
- Scans from original art (photos, transparencies, and drawings) should be submitted with a minimum resolution of 300ppi (pixels per inch) at a size no smaller than that at which they are to be used.
- Previously printed materials (illustrations or photos from books, magazines, or newspapers) should be submitted with a minimum resolution of 600ppi at a size no smaller than that at which they are to be used.
Line Art (Bi-tonal Images): If the original image is a line drawing without gray tones (black and white line drawing or only shapes), then use the bitmap mode. These files should be submitted with a minimum resolution of 1200ppi at a size no smaller than that at which they are to be used.

Author Guidelines for Special Issues and Special Sections

Thank you for your interest in submitting a proposal for a special issue of HIMALAYA, the journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies. HIMALAYA promotes scholarly understanding of, engagement with, and appreciation for this diverse region of the world. HIMALAYA is an open-access, peer-reviewed scholarly journal committed to covering all aspects of Himalayan Studies, including the natural and social sciences, humanities, and creative arts. HIMALAYA publishes peer reviewed original research articles, short field reports, perspectives pieces, book and film reviews, reports on meetings and conferences, alongside literature and photo essays from the region. Please follow the guidelines outlined below when preparing your proposal.

Your submission should include the following: 

- Title of the proposed special issue

- Names, contact information, and affiliation of all guest editors. Please also include a brief description of previous editorial experience (if any) and a short bio (200 words) for each editor.

- 300-400 word abstract highlighting the intellectual theme(s) of the issue and outlining how it will contribute to the interdisciplinary mission of HIMALAYA. The abstract should also address the scope of the issue (i.e. which states / countries of the region will be covered, which disciplines will be represented, which time periods, etc.)

- A description of the methods that will be used to solicit papers for the issue (i.e. does it derive from a conference or workshop, is it by invitation only or is there an open Call for Papers; if the latter, how will this be disseminated), along with the number of articles expected and/or a list of contributors who have expressed early interest and/or already submitted abstracts.

- Timeline: when do you expect to have received all the contributions; is there an important deadline that you would like to work towards (tenure case, conference panel)?

In addition to scholarly articles, HIMALAYA is committed to diversifying the kinds of work contained in its pages. Please consider these goals as you prepare your proposal:

- Artwork: Each issue features original artwork in our “gallery sketchbook” format. The artwork may also be used for the cover design. We are open to all forms of art, including photography. Do you know of any artwork that might enrich your special issue? If so, please describe the relevance, context and source. HIMALAYA has no budget to pay for art reproductions, so all contributions must be gratis and given with consent of the artist.

- Photo Essays: We are expanding our online photo essays as a prominent feature of HIMALAYA. One or more of your authors may be interested to submit a series of photographs with an accompanying narrative

- Literature: In each issue, we aim to include two literature compositions related to or from the Himalayan region (literary nonfiction, fiction, poetry). Literature must be submitted in English (original or translation). While we have other sources for literature, we are open to suggestions from guest editors, particularly if a composition is related to the theme of the special issue.

Typical workflow for a special issue of HIMALAYA:

Within four weeks of receipt of the proposals, the Editors will confer and communicate their preliminary decision to you.

HIMALAYA is a peer-reviewed journal. The guest editors must ‘pre’-review all submissions before submitting them to HIMALAYA.

All research articles for special issues will be subjected to a double-blind review after initial review by special issue editors. Guest editors are requested to provide journal editors with a list of possible peer reviewers for the special issue, but the journal editors reserve the right to choose reviewers from outside of this list. Articles that do not pass the review process will not be published.

Guest editors are responsible for ensuring that all submissions comply with the journal’s Style Guide and must carefully check the grammar and syntax of all submissions. This should be done prior to submitting articles for blind peer review, and again at the proofing stage.

Please be advised that on account of the volume of submissions, special issues are usually published 12- 18 months after initial receipt of all articles for peer review.

All guest editors and authors must be members of ANHS. To find out how to join, visit the Association’s website: https://anhs-himalaya.org/membership.

Double-blind peer review guidelines

When preparing a manuscript for double-blind peer review, check these common places where manuscripts and submission files may reveal an author’s identity.

- Do not include names or affiliations anywhere in the manuscript or supplementary information.
- When referring to your own work in the manuscript, use neutral terminology. Replace phrases like “as we have shown before” with “as has been shown before” or similar.
- Remove any author names from the figures.
- Either include acknowledgements, author statement, your complete competing interests’ declaration and author name order in the cover letter or as separate submission files, but not in the manuscript. This information can be transferred after the completion of the peer review process. For published manuscripts, reviewers will be provided the full competing interests declaration at the time of acceptance.
- Remove any author information from all submitted files’ metadata. This information is often added automatically from the identity information on your computer and can be found in “properties” under the “file” menu in word processors and PDF readers. With Microsoft Office documents, author identification should also be removed from the properties for the file (see under File in Word), by clicking on the following, beginning with File on the main menu of the Microsoft application: File > Save As > Tools (or Options with a Mac) > Security > Remove personal information from file properties on save > Save. Identity of the author and contact details will only be included in the cover letter.
- Do not add names to any document included with your submission.