Office of Scholarly Communication and Technology

FAIN: OP-20216-84

American Council of Learned Societies Devoted to Humanistic Studies (New York, NY 10017-6706)
Herbert C. Morton (Project Director: May 1984 to October 1990)

To support the establishment of an Office of Scholarly Communication to ensure the participation of humanities scholars in decisions involving major technological changes in the system of scholarly communication.

The American Council of Learned Societies proposes to establish an Office on Scholarly Communication and Technology to ensure the participation of the scholarly community in the crucial decisions which major technological change requires be systemic decisions. The real danger is that the scholarly community will discover that a system of scholarly communication, designed to serve scholars, will prove to be administratively and technically feasible but not intellectually desirable.
The Office will have two major purposes: (1) to disseminate information effectively about major changes in the system and to ensure that the perspective of practicing scholars be brought to bear upon them; (2) to generate participation by scholars in choices which must be made both on individual campuses and through emerging national networks.
The President of ACLS has attended conferences held by research libraries, university presses, scholarly journals, technologists and others on the way in which technology is transforming the environment in which scholars do their work. The one constituency rarely present is the scholars themselves. Leaders in other sectors of the system of scholarly communication have strongly urged the ACLS itself to establish an Office on Scholarly Communication because, as the national organization for the advancement of humanistic scholarship in all fields of knowledge, it is best situated to involve scholars in the changes which affect the conditions of their own lives.
The ACLS plans to begin the work of the Office on Scholarly Communication and Technology on September 1, 1984.