About the Journal

Focus and Scope

Literatura: teoría, historia, crítica, LTHC, was created in 1997 by the Literature Department of the Universidad Nacional de Colombia to promote the critical rereading of classical and non-classical literary works and contribute to the formation of readers, researchers, critics and historians of literature. It is a biannual publication.

Its focus is disciplinary and the works it publishes are generally within the following areas:

Literary theory: texts for reflection about general literary concepts and issues and their relationship with other arts and cultural expressions, monographs on authors of literary theory, or interventions in current theoretical debates.
Literary history: texts with historical perspective on one or several literary works, on a moment or period of literature, or on the development of a genre or certain literary characteristics.
Literary criticism: critical, evaluative texts on one or several works. This area also includes discussions about the current state of literary criticism, of the relationship between criticism and creation, of the relationship between literary criticism and other arts, etc.

The journal publishes articles of research, reflection and review. There are also other texts such as notes, reviews and interviews dealing with conjunctural issues of the academic community of the area or which pose more general reflections on the discipline in the national, regional or international context. The translation section includes articles, essays and notes whose original language is not Spanish and which stand out because of their importance in the field of literary studies or the current discussions about literature.

Peer Review Process

All papers submitted to the journal will be submitted to a peer review process by external evaluators to the journal. The articles are evaluated through a “double blind” arbitration system, in which expert researchers on the field participate. Usually, each article is read by two or three reviewers, before deciding on its publication. The notes and translations are evaluated by two external referees or members of the editorial team and the evaluation format for these contemplates the same possibilities as the evaluation format for articles. The evaluation of the reviews or interviews will be carried out by a single evaluator, who can be one of the editors of the journal or an external evaluator. The works published in the special editions will not have any prerogative in their evaluation process; they will be managed under the same criteria as the miscellaneous edition.

Likewise, the works submitted by the editor or a collaborator who belongs to the journal's editorial team will be evaluated under equal conditions, according to the protocols determined to guarantee “blind” and independent arbitration.

The evaluation process for articles consists of two phases: the first is a preliminary evaluation in which it is verified that the text meets the criteria of originality, coherence, clarity in writing and corresponds to the thematic and editorial line of the journal. The preliminary evaluation has two possible results that are marked in the preliminary evaluation format: "approve for the full arbitration cycle" or "not viable for the evaluation process". The second evaluation phase corresponds to the “double blind” peer review system: the text is sent to two peer reviewers external of the journal and specialists in the corresponding subject, who will evaluate the conceptual soundness of the author's arguments, the coherence in the structure of the contents and sequence of the topics, the validity and relevance of the bibliographic support and the contribution that is perceived for the knowledge or research of Literary Studies. The possible results marked in “the peer evaluation format” are: “the article is publishable without modifications”, “the article is publishable with slight modifications”, “the article must undergo profound modifications and be re-evaluated” and "the article must be rejected". The approval of an article occurs when the result of the two peer reviews is "the article is publishable without modifications" or "the article is publishable with slight modifications"; when any of the evaluators indicates that "the article must undergo profound modifications and be re-evaluated", the corrections will be sent to the author and upon the return of the second version the text must be evaluated again. It is a reason for rejection that the two evaluations agree that "the article must be rejected" or that one evaluation indicates that "the article must undergo in-depth evaluations and be re-evaluated" and the other that "the article must be rejected". In cases of disparity in which one evaluator indicates that “the article is publishable without modifications” and another indicates that “the article must be rejected,” a third evaluator will be appointed and, depending on the result of this third evaluation, the editor-in-chief will make a decision over the text. The final decision on the texts rests with the magazine's editorial team, always taking into account the results of the peer reviews.

Open Access Policy

The journal is published in open access, in its online version, under a Creative Commons license of "attribution, non-commercial, no derivatives", (BY-NC-ND), through an Open Journal Systems platform at: www.literaturathc.unal.edu.co. Self-archiving is allowed, in the editor’s version, from personal webpages or from institutional or thematic open access repositories. However, we also suggest to link or to provide the doi (digital object identifier) to every work published in the journal. The journal can be considered as a “blue” publication, according to the Sherpa Romeo classification.

Conflict of interest

The journal will ensure that the different partners participate in the most independent manner possible so as not to affect the academic and editorial processes and their results. Authors and reviewers must disclose potential conflicts of interest that have and that can compromise the peer review or affect the quality of the contents that are published.

Publication frequency

Literatura: teoría, historia, crítica is published twice a year.

Publication costs

The journal has no commercial purposes and is supported with resources from the School of Human Sciences at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Bogotá. The entire publication process has no cost to the authors.

Ethical Issues

The journal has formulated a code of ethics for authors and reviewers which can be consulted in the final section of this document and complies with the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in terms of good publication practices and the resolution of possible conflicts.

Authors

To participate in the journal, authors must take into account the following considerations:

Guidelines and care of the texts. The journal has formal rules for presentation of work which the authors must read, understand and follow. The journal does not receive drafts of work but final versions carefully reviewed by the authors. Delivery of coherent texts, written with care, is a factor that is valued positively in the evaluation.

Exclusivity in the submission. Articles submitted to the journal must not have been submitted simultaneously to other journals. This would compromise the originality of the work and rights of publication. If at some point in the process, authors consider that they must submit their article to another journal, they should first consult with the editor to formalize their withdrawal.

Plagiarism. The use of texts of other authors by incorporation of complete sections in their own work, reproduction of fragments or paraphrase, without proper citation or the necessary permissions, is not acceptable.

"Self-plagiarism". The submission of texts that already have been published earlier, in their original language or other languages, fully or partially, is not acceptable. The contribution of a work to the field of literary studies must not be the same, or very similar, to that of other publications of the author.

Co-authorship. The publication of co-authored works is not a usual practice in literary studies. But, when this occurs, the crediting of authorship to those who have not had a real participation in writing should be avoided. An author is someone who has made a substantial contribution to the text, the design and development of research or discussion that motivates it, and who has been directly involved in writing drafts, corrections and revisions that led to the final version.

Diligence. Authors must comply with requirements arising from the peer review and publication process: corrections suggested by the peers, delivery of revised versions, responses to observations (style correction, diagrams, review of proofs), final approval. This must be done within the timeframe agreed to with the journal.

Contribution of the work. The purpose of publishing a work is, almost always, to establish a dialog with the readers. In the case of academic work those readers are, mostly, in the community of the area: professors, researchers, undergraduate and graduate students. The effectiveness of such dialogue depends on the coherence and strength of the arguments and the contribution proposed with respect to a horizon of viewpoints and texts. We invite authors to make their work a contribution to literary studies, to have critical positions, to generate stimulating dialogues, to raise or to resume discussions of interest to contemporary readers.

Reviewers

Suitability. The reviewers should only accept the reading of works on subjects that they know well. If, after receiving an article to read, the reviewer finds that, for some reason, it is not of his/her interest or knowledge; he/she must so inform the editor in order to reassign the work.

Independence. The peer review process of the journal is performed under a "double-blind" system to ensure, as far as possible, the independence and thoroughness of the opinions. If at some point in the reading of the work, the reviewer finds that there is some ethical impediment or conflict of interest that may affect his/her opinion, the editor must be so informed without delay.

Focus on concepts. Reviewers must address works from a formal, rigorous and coherent perspective. Superficial opinions, lacking in arguments, are not acceptable in approving or rejecting work. The results of the peer review process must be worthwhile for the author and the publisher. Authors must be able to revise, correct or validate their work, from the comments received. The editor must be able to make an argued decision about the publication or rejection of work based on the recommendations of the reviewers.

Diligence. Reviewers must agree on a reasonable timeframe with the journal, according to circumstances and availability of time. If, during the evaluation, compliance with the delivery time is unfeasible, the reviewer must inform the editor to rearrange the schedule initially agreed upon. The timely response to the authors also depends on the collaboration of the reviewers.

Follow-up. Reviewers should also seek to support the editor in verification of corrected versions of the work. The contribution of the reviewer to this process will allow the best possible version to reach the readers.

Substitution. The editorial team invites a reviewer to participate in the reading of an article after reviewing his/her academic training, background and experience in research and publications. It is not ethical for a reviewer, after accepting to read an article, to transfer the responsibility for the evaluation to a third party (e.g.co-researcher, graduate student, etc.).

Use of information. The work a reviewer receives is, mostly, unpublished and original. Any use or misappropriation of the topics treated, information or sections of text from the work received will be considered a very serious ethical misconduct.