Plumwood Mountain: An Australian Journal of Ecopoetry and Ecopoetics is in a time of transition. After 7 years, Managing Editor Anne Elvey will be stepping down at the end of 2020. At the same time the Editorial Board intends to deepen its commitments to decentring or deemphasising the human in ecopoetics while holding this vision in a wider frame of cultural responsibility both in Australia and internationally. As part of our continuing affirmation of more-than-human agencies, of intersections between environmental activism and cultures of poetry, and of the complex entanglements of race, gender, sexuality, location and class in an emerging ecopoetics, the journal wants to expand its editorial board to reflect these commitments. As part of this development, the new Managing Editor has the option to find a new name for the journal.
Expressions of interest are called for a Managing Editor and Editorial Administration Team that would with an Editorial Board shape the future of the journal and undertake the tasks of bringing it to publication. These are voluntary positions.
Three kinds of Expression of Interest are invited:
- From an individual who would become managing editor and who would build an editorial administration team; or
- From a team of three or four who would take on the roles of managing editor and editorial administration team between them; or
- From an existing journal in the fields of environmental humanities or literature which would incorporate, as a significant component, an ecological poetry and poetics section/corner as a successor to Plumwood Mountain journal with a suitable dedicated editor.
The preference is for Indigenous leadership in the management and editorship of the journal, and diversity in the editorial administration teams and editorial boards that adds to existing diversities of representation on the board.
The incoming Managing Editor will be strongly encouraged and supported to explore funding opportunities to pay contributors to the journal and to cover administrative and management costs.
Requirements for Expression of Interest
Send no more than two A4 pages in total outlining your vision for the journal; a brief proposal for its editorial management and administration; a summary of your relevant publications and editing experience. Both established and emerging writers and editors are encouraged to apply.
Send your EOI by Wednesday 30 September 2020 to: info.plumwoodmountain@gmail.com
The following gives an outline of the kind of tasks the Managing Editor and Administration Team would undertake and some current information about the journal
Information
Currently Plumwood Mountain journal is managed on Boonwurrung Country. We honour the elders past, present and emerging, recognising their care for these lands, waters and skies, and that their sovereignty has never been ceded. We acknowledge all traditional custodians, and honour especially the Yuin nation, the custodians of the place known colonially as Plumwood Mountain in NSW.
Managing Editor and Administration Team Tasks
- In consultation with the Editorial Board, setting the direction of the journal
- Liaison with Guest Editors
- Developing protocols for ethical decision-making around publication of culturally-sensitive material
- Communication with Editorial Board
- Communication with contributors including administering payments and contributor agreements
- Submissions Management: receipt and administration of submissions; collation, anonymising and sending of submissions to the guest editor; with funding, an online submissions manager like Submittable could be used
- Upload, layout, copyediting, sending out of proofs, corrections after proofing, etc. for every issue of the journal
- Maintenance of the journal website (https://plumwoodmountain.com/)
- Administration and management of book reviews: receiving books for review; invitations to reviewers to review books; packaging and posting of books to reviewers; editing and upload, sending of proofs of book reviews to reviewers, corrections after proofing etc; sending book review links to publishers after publication
- Writing grant applications and reports
- Monitoring of two email accounts: Submissions (plumwoodmountain@gmail.com) and information (info.plumwoodmountain@gmail.com)
- Promotion through social media, currently one Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/PlumwoodMountainJournal) and Twitter account (@plmwdmountain)
- Paying guest editors and contributors via direct debit; overseeing the bank account and setting up a model of accountability within the new structure (currently immediate financial accountability is to Plumwood Inc)
- (negotiable) Liaising with EBSCO about putting journal content in their world literature database
Term of appointment: This is negotiable, but an initial term of three years would be welcomed.
Initially the appointment will be made by the current Editorial Board.
The Journal
Plumwood Mountain: An Australian Journal of Ecopoetry and Ecopoetics is in its seventh year of publication. The journal to date is published twice a year (Feb-Mar and Aug-Oct) with additional sets of book reviews occasionally published between issues. The journal publishes mostly poetry, around 25-40 poems per issue; occasional photo essays and creative essays. At present the journal no longer publishes scholarly essays, except if a specific guest editor asks for this as part of their call for submissions.
The journal has worked on a model of guest editors for the reading and selection of poetry.
- Of the 14 issues, Anne Elvey has acted as editor/guest editor for four issues (the first three including one that was to have been edited by the late Martin Harrison, and the August 2019 issue on ‘Intersecting Energies: Locations, Gender, Climate’)
- Of the other 10 guest editors, 6 have come from the editorial board: Bonny Cassidy (‘Ecological Agency and Empowerment’), Stuart Cooke (‘What are the Animals Saying?’), Tricia Dearborn, Michael Farrell (‘Poetry and Consumption’), Peter Minter (‘Decolonisation and Geopoethics’), Harriet Tarlo. Peter Minter and Stuart Cooke edited a commemorative issue for the late Martin Harrison.
- Two others are Australian poets: Jill Jones (‘The Everywhere of Things’) and John Charles Ryan (‘Plant Poetics’), and one international poet Jonathan Skinner (‘Writing in the Pause’, forthcoming Sep 2020).
The current Editorial Board comprises:
Franca Bellarsi
Peter Boyle
Bonny Cassidy
Stuart Cooke
Tricia Dearborn
Michael Farrell
Susan Hawthorne
Richard Kerridge
Freya Mathews
Peter Minter
Kate Rigby
Harriet Tarlo
Mark Tredinnick (term concludes August 2020)
The late Martin Harrison was a member of the inaugural editorial board.
At this time the journal is published by Plumwood Incorporated, whose primary work is the care of Plumwood Mountain, the place. The search for a new managing editor also includes the option of a shift of publisher should this be appropriate to the new situation.
For further information about the journal, visit the website: http://plumwoodmountain.com
Or email, Anne Elvey, Managing Editor: info.plumwoodmountain@gmail.com