How to Publish Your First Journal Article

ByMushtaq Bilal

Tips on how to make sure your first article does not get rejected.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, there used to be this institution called literary salons in Europe and Latin American.

These salons were run by aristocratic women and intellectuals gathered there to exchange ideas.

Imagine you went to such a literary salon in Paris or Buenos Aires. To contribute to the conversation going on in the salon, you would first have to listen to what others have said.

Without listening to others first, you wouldn't able to make a meaningful contribution.

An academic journal functions like a literary salon. Before you submit your work, you must familiarize yourself with the conversations that have been going on in your target journal.

How do you do that?

Start by reading your target journal's "aim and scope." Every journal publishes its aim and scope on its website. A journal's aim could be to publish latest research or to nurture undergraduate researchers.

The scope of a journal is the way it positions itself in a field. But reading the aim and scope of your target journal is not enough.

Every journal has a hidden curriculum. A hidden curriculum by definition is hidden. You won't be able to find it easily.

Hidden curriculum is a set of implicit preferences and biases of a journal's editors. So, how do you find a journal's hidden curriculum?

By reading the articles that the journal has published during the last 2 to 5 years. This will give you a decent idea about the kind of work the journal prefers to publish.

But familiarizing yourself with a journal's hidden curriculum is not enough either. You must engage with the scholarship the journal has published recently.

Say, you are working on a given topic X, and your target journal has published a few papers on X during the last 2-5 years. You must position your argument with relation to the work already published.

You don't have to agree with other people's work. But you must engage.

Before you submit your manuscript, email your target journal's managing or associate editor. Tell them a bit about your work (one to two lines only) and ask if your work would be a good fit for the journal.

If the editor declines for some reason, it will save you from a lot of grief. Repeat the above steps with another journal.

But if you are familiar with the aim and scope and the hidden curriculum of your target journal, chances are the editor will say yes.

Never submit your article before you have established a connection with an editor at your target journal.

Don't submit your paper right away if the editor agrees. Request a professor and a colleague for some tough-love feedback on your manuscript.

Some professors/teachers don't know how to give constructive feedback. Stay away from them.

Figuring out the right professor to seek feedback from will require a bit of detective work. Do that. Ask your professor/colleague to evaluate your paper's:
• Argument
• Evidence
• Structure
• Style

Don't get defensive when you receive feedback. Your work is important but still uncooked. Rewrite your paper in light of the feedback.

Submit the paper once you have rewritten it a couple times.

If you have followed all of the above steps, chances are your paper will be sent out for peer review.

Good luck!