Summary: Statement in Support of University Presses
July 2019
- University presses are vital to the dissemination of scholarship on languages and literatures and to the scholarly accreditation process. The defunding of university presses puts great strain on humanities scholars who depend on presses for the publication and circulation of their work.
- University presses play a key role in establishing scholars’ credentials, developing careers, and challenging staid intellectual conventions.
- University press editors also track trends and support emerging areas of research.
- Additionally, with the availability of low-cost digital publications, misinformation is now often juxtaposed with scholarly sites. University presses are not driven to produce clickbait but are instead tasked with disseminating carefully researched and peer-reviewed material.
- University presses also enhance the reputation of their universities, not only when their works are used in teaching and research throughout the academy but also when their books and journals are found in libraries and bookstores and on websites read internationally.
- Finally, university presses innovate and experiment with new formats of publication. University presses and research libraries collaborate to facilitate scholarly communication, the lifeblood of every modern research university.
- With this in mind, we are deeply alarmed when well-endowed universities invoke fiscal austerity to threaten the continued existence of their presses.
- Presses are partners with their university administrators, faculty members, and libraries; though presses strive to bring in substantial revenue from book sales, they require financial support from their home institutions.
- University support of presses and libraries represents an investment in innovative research and creative work that is critical for the development of the humanities, just as university subsidies for laboratories and materials represent investments in the sciences.
- Our ethical values are shaped by scholarship in the humanities, which influences writers, teachers, artists, healthcare practitioners, scientists, journalists, lawmakers, politicians, religious leaders, and parents, among others.
- The MLA calls on university administrators to maintain, indeed to increase, their support for university presses as they seek to strengthen the value of the university in and for public life.