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Author Guidelines

Articles must be sent to the editor through the online submission system. No email submission will be accepted or acknowledged. Submissions are invited of original manuscripts, book reviews, and critical commentaries on any topic on west Africa.Unless solicited, all submissions should be original, previously unpublished in English, and not posted online. Authors must submit their title, keywords, abstracts, a brief biographical description, and paper in Microsoft Word or OpenOffice using the online submission system. All publication decisions will be made by blind review - make sure your name does not appear on any page of the paper. The author must prepare and submit a keyword list, bibliography/works cited, and take note of our copyright policy.

For Contributors
Please consult the AKP Stylesheet for Authors for citation, reference, and bibliographic guideline.

Guidelines for Contributors

1.    Contributors should strive as much as possible to refrain from using sexist, racist, and similar language that may suggest prejudice of any kind.

2.    There are many usages in writings about Africa generally that we believe need to be deployed with more circumspection if clarity and genuine illumination are to be achieved.  African Philosophy aims to provide in this regard.  Examples of such usages include but are not limited to the following:

• Referring to all of Africa as if it were one undifferentiated entity.
• Periodizing the history of all things African by subdividing them into “precolonial”, “colonial”, and “post-colonial”.  We are asking contributors to strive for greater precision and more respect for the complexity of all things African.
• Presenting culturally-specific ideas as if they are marked by unanimity in the culture in which they occur as in, for example, “The Yoruba believe …”
• Giving the reader the geographical coordinates of where any African people could be found: e.g., “The Yoruba are to be found in an area bounded by …”
• Nebulous references to “traditional society”, “traditional values”, “traditional culture”, and so on without any serious attempt to historicize what is being described and in what consists its traditionality.
• Intellectually meaningless ascriptions such as “Africa South of the Sahara”, “Black Africa”, “Sub-Saharan Africa”, should be discontinued.

3.    Formatting guidelines  [See below].

4.    No piece will be rejected on account of its not meeting all the above.  At the same time no piece will be published that does not strive to meet most of them.  The editor and the referees for submitted pieces will work with contributors to meet this challenge.

Courtesy Access for Contributors

Contributors whose papers are accepted and published will have one-month courtesy subscription to the issue to which they contributed, to the past issues of the journal to which they contributed, and to other ARC journals and databases within the Africa Resource Knowledge Project.

Recommended Guide Style For Submission

It is the author's responsibility to prepare his or her document for conversion by adhering to the following Word document style formatting. Failure to follow the direction will result in delay.

1. Use heading level one (H1) only for titles.
2. Use heading level two (H2) for the first level of heading used in the text as well as for endnotes, references/works and cited/bibliography.
3. Use heading levels 3 through 6 (H3 – H6) for abstracts and all other subsequent levels under H2.
4. Use paragraph tabs for basic paragraph text.
5. Use indent tab for all quotes and indented text.
6. Use title case for article titles.
7. All articles and editorials must have an abstract. If you do not have an abstract, use the first 3 sentences as one, or write one. Make sure there are no typographical, grammar, and spelling errors. Proofread it carefully. Never use N/A for abstracts.
8. All articles and topical issues must have an Author (First and Last Name). Email the website to get the information if one is not listed, use  “No listed Author.” Make sure to list the name of the organization or website in the organization box. For example, you can use Cable News Network (not CNN OR CNN.com). Always write out the name of the organization or website. Never use "N/A" for author's name (first, middle, last).
9. Always write the full link of the website. These include links to topical issues or other resources included in the issue. For example: http://www.africaknowledgeproject.org (always put "http://www" in front of links). Do not use the domain name only: africaknowledgeproject.org OR http://africaknowledgeproject.org.
10. All materials in an issue must have index information. All articles in an issue must always have keywords. When filling out the index for each submission, make sure you fill as much information as possible. This will increase the visibility of articles in search engines. Not all index fields will apply to your article or need to be filled. Keyword is a must.
11. You can upload supplementary file for each submission. Supplementary files include pictures, maps, or any instruments that would enhance reading the original article. To add supplementary file after you submitted your paper, visit your submission page and click on “Article Summary.”

West Africa Review does not have a preferred form for citation and referencing. The style is left up to the author but must conform to accepted publishing practices. The only requirement is that the author be consistent throughout the text.

Author Submissions Guidelines (Follow Carefully to Avoid Delay)

Papers submitted to any of ARC Knowledge Project Journals and Database must be divided into separate files to allow for faster processing. Authors with embedded figures and images in their papers must submit their figures, tables and images as supplementary files.

** For your protection, you will be required to visit the URL included in the confirmation email to activate your subscription. If you fail to do so, you will not have access to your account.

Abstract, Acknowledgments and Keywords

Please have your abstract, acknowledgments and keywords prepared and ready to input directly into the submission interface, either by typing them in or cut-and-paste. Do not include them in the body text of your manuscript.

Paper Body Text

• All papers must be in English.
• Write with precision, clarity, and economy.
• Use the active voice and first person whenever appropriate. If at all possible, avoid the use of parenthetical comments and italics or bold for emphasis.
• Africa Resource Knowledge Project discourages the use of quotation marks except for direct quotations, words defined by the author, and words used in unusual contexts.
• Short quotations should be embedded in the text and enclosed in double quotation marks (").
• Long quotations should be on a separate line, indented, but without quotation marks.
• Single quotation marks are to be used only for word; or a quotation that occurs within another quotation.
• Use American spellings (e.g., behavior, not behaviour) except for titles and articles in books and journals published in British/Commonwealth English.

Spacing, Fonts, and Page Numbering

Double-space all material (text, quotations, figure legends, tables, references, etc.). Use a 12-point font (preferably Times Roman).

Italicization

Please italicize title of books. Do not underline text. Italics should rarely be used for emphasis.

Endnotes

Limit endnotes only to materials that cannot be incorporated in the text.

Web Links

Authors may include links to other Internet resources in their article [(e.g., Africa Knowledge Project (http://www.africaknowledgeproject.org/)]. This is especially encouraged in the reference section. When inserting a reference to a webpage, please include “http://www” before the portion of the address.

Headings and Subheadings

The body text of the paper should be subdivided into different sections with appropriate headings. These headings must appear on a single line by themselves with title case. Please do not number headings or subheadings.

Bibliography and Citation

Before submitting your paper, check each referenced citation in the text against the bibliography to ensure they match exactly. Delete unused citations that are not cited in your paper.

Formatting References

All journal titles should be spelled out completely. In the titles of articles, the spellings of all words should agree exactly with that used in the original publication. Provide the publisher's name and location when you cite symposia or conference proceedings; distinguish between the conference date and the publication dates if both are given.

Supplementary Files

All tables, figures, text appendices, videos and audios may be uploaded as supplementary file during submission. You can submit as much supplementary files needed for your paper. You will be required to submit description for each file.

Images

Figures must be supplied as graphic files (in GIF, JPG, or PNG formats). For papers in review, images should be supplied at 72 dpi and no wider than 700 pixels (unless given explicit permission by the managing editor). Should your manuscript be accepted for publication, we will ask you to supply high resolution, print-quality versions of your images. All title and caption information are entered separately during the submission process and should not appear in the image file.

Authors and Professional Editing

All manuscripts must meet professional standards before submission to ARC. Poorly written quality essays with grammatical errors will not be sent out for peer reviews. All accepted papers must be professionally edited by contributors before they will be processed and prepared for publication. There are many online professional editing services that maintain rapid electronic submission and turn-around times. Quality editorial services in house, but at a cost. A list of other professional editors will be available on the site. Authors may use these services to improve their paper’s English and its overall quality. They should contact these editing services and pay them directly for their services. Those who prefer to use the services of editors in their cities can do so provided the edited work meets professional standards and journal editors’ approval. If you would like to add the firm of your favorite editor listed, please send it along.

Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

1. The submission has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration (or an explanation has been provided in Comments to the Editor).
2. The submission file is in Microsoft Word, RTF, or WordPerfect document file format.
3. Where available, URLs for the references have been provided.
4. The text is double-spaced; uses a 12-point font; employs italics, rather than underlining (except with URL addresses); and all illustrations, figures, and tables are placed within the text at the appropriate points, rather than at the end.
5. The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines, which is found in About the Journal.
6. If submitting to a peer-reviewed section of the journal, the instructions in Ensuring a Blind Review have been followed.
7. By submitting your work, you have transferred exclusive copyright to the journal and its publisher.

Copyright Notice

Completing Your Paper Submission

By clicking the check box below on this page during submission, you have conferred exclusive copyright option to Africa Resource Center, Inc. If you choose Option 2 or Option 3, you have to send the payment with your copyright agreement before review can start.

Copyright

The full complement of copyright options is presented below. These are:

1. $0 per article if exclusive copyright is given to ARC. Contributors will always have access to their papers through their login registration. In addition, they will be given a one-month courtesy subscription to the issue to which they contributed, to the other issues of the journal to which they contributed, and to other ARC journals and databases. They can always download their own article for free. Furthermore, the title and abstract of the articles will always be open access, and will come up on search queries on a number of platforms--the journal site, africaresource.com, Google, RSS feeds, and other search engines, establishing to any independent professional reviewer that the article is actually in print.

2. $2,500 per article if a nonexclusive copyright is given to ARC (such a license will allow ARC to reproduce the article for its own projects such as edited books or anthologies). This fee enables ARC to recoup part of its production costs and to perpetually host the article. Contributors will have a one-month courtesy subscription to ARC journals. In addition, the title and abstract of the articles will come up on search queries on a number of platforms--the journal site, africaresource.com, Google, RSS feeds, and other search engines, establishing to any independent professional reviewer that the article is actually in print.

3. Open access option: a one-time payment of $4,500 per article if authors want their articles to be freely available under the Creative Common Attribution-Noncommercial license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/). With this license, authors retain ownership of their article, but anyone can download, reuse, reprint, distribute, and/or copy articles for non-commercial purposes, so long as the author and source are cited. No permission is required from the author or the publisher. These open access articles will be freely available on the journal website immediately after publication. All applicable fees are charged after an article is accepted for publication to ensure that monetary consideration does not determine the acceptance/rejection of an article and that acceptance is solely based on merit.

Copyright Copyright control has become crucial to the survival of ARC journals, given that it is the only way to grow the journals. Submission of article for review and possible publication cannot occur unless an author indicates that she/he gives ARC either exclusive copyright to an essay with no fee, or nonexclusive copyright with half the production fee of $2,500, or they agree to pay the full production fee of $4,500 for their works to be freely available. For those essays that ARC receives copyright control, an author will automatically receive permission to use the published article in her/his own book if approached. A percentage of permission fee will also be paid to the author after publication, technology, administrative, and overhead costs have been deducted. For those who opt to pay the $2,500 production cost of nonexclusive copyright articles or the $4,500 production cost for open access, if they fail to do so immediately upon being informed of the acceptance of their article, of if they try to withdraw their paper after being informed of its acceptance, the zero dollar production cost option will automatically apply and ARC will become the copyright holder.

ARC Publishing Agreement

By submitting this Publishing Agreement, you grant to Africa Resource Center, Inc., the sole and exclusive, irrevocable royalty-free, right to publish, reproduce, distribute, transmit, display, store, translate, perform, create derivative works from and otherwise use your Article or Contribution in any form, manner, format, platform, or medium, whether now known or hereafter developed, throughout the world and in any language, for the entire term of any such right and any renewal or extension thereof and to permit/sub-license to others any or all of the foregoing as well.

The rights of Africa Resource Center, Inc. include but are not limited to the following: (1) to publish the Article or Contribution in any media, whether paper or electronic; (2) to license abstracts, quotations, extracts, reprints, and/or translations of the Article or Contribution for publication; (3) to license reprints of the Article or Contribution to third persons; (4) to license others to create abstracts of the Article or Contribution and to index the Article or Contribution; (5) to license secondary publishers to reproduce the Article or Contribution in print, microfilm, or any computer-readable form, including electronic online databases; and (6) to license the Article or Contribution for document delivery.

You warrant and represent that:

1. Your Article or Contribution is original, and that you have not previously published, or agreed to publish, your Article or Contribution in whole or in part elsewhere.

2. The contents or facts of the Article or Contribution are true and accurate to the best of your knowledge.

3. None of the data or other contents have been fabricated, manipulated, falsified, or altered in any way that would misrepresent the actual findings.

4. All authors take responsibility for the accuracy and interpretations of the findings.

5. The Article or Contribution is free of plagiarism or other scientific misconduct.

6. The Article or Contribution does not, to the best of your knowledge, contain anything which is libelous, illegal, or infringes anyone's copyright or other rights.

7. If the Article or Contribution includes any materials owned by or regulated by a third party, you have gained permission of the owners of the copyright in all such materials to enable them to grant the rights contained herein.

8. You warrant and represent that you have the full right, power and authority to enter into this agreement on behalf of the authors.

9. This agreement shall remain in effect for the duration of the copyright and may not be revoked without the express written agreement of both parties.

10. This agreement shall be governed and construed, in accordance with the laws of the state of New York, USA, without resort to the conflicts of laws principles thereof.

11. The authors shall for all purposes be considered an independent contractor and nothing in this Agreement shall be deemed to place the parties in the relationship of employer-employee, principal-agent, partners or joint ventures.

12. The authors cannot post the PDF of their article, generated by the journals or databases, on any public website, university website, repository, or any personal websites.

13. The purpose of this document is to transfer the copyright of your Article or Contribution and all portions thereof (whether in printed, electronic or any other form now known or hereafter developed to Africa Resource Center, Inc., the publisher. The completion and submission of this Publishing Agreement constitutes your acceptance of the terms of this Agreement.

Authors and Professional Editing

All manuscripts must meet professional standards before submission to ARC. Poorly written quality essays with grammatical errors will not be sent out for peer reviews. All accepted papers must be professionally edited by contributors before they will be processed and prepared for publication. There are many online professional editing services that maintain rapid electronic submission and turn-around times. Quality editorial services in house, but at a cost. A list of other professional editors will be available on the site. Authors may use these services to improve their paper’s English and its overall quality. They should contact these editing services and pay them directly for their services. Those who prefer to use the services of editors in their cities can do so provided the edited work meets professional standards and journal editors’ approval. If you would like to add the firm of your favorite editor listed, please send it along.

Privacy Statement

The Africa Resource Knowledge Project is committed to safeguarding the privacy of its members as well as visitors to its website, and adheres to the following policies regarding communications as well as the gathering and dissemination of personal information.

The ARC Knowledge Project is committed to the value of privacy. As you use our websites, you may be prompted to enter information when you

1. Create a user name and password
2. Use personalization features
3. Purchase a product
4. Sign up for notification
5. Participate in online forums or discussions
6. Provide feedback

The data collected online from an ARC Knowledge Project user is voluntary, although some services are only accessible by registering user details. Information collected may include your name, e-mail address, street address, job title, society membership, or other related demographic information. Except as described in the privacy policy, ARC Knowledge Project will endeavor to keep your information confidential. We focus on using the information as part of ARC Knowledge Project service to serve you and its mission to advance and disseminate knowledge on the global African Diaspora.

Cookies

The ARC Knowledge Project website uses cookies to enhance site navigation. Some pages may not function properly if a site visitor's Web browser is set to reject cookies.

Collecting Information on Members

By necessity, the ARC Knowledge Project collects contact information on its members, including, but not limited to, name, address, telephone numbers, fax number, and e-mail address. This information is requested on the membership forms. The ARC Knowledge Project does not use any technique to collect information on its members beyond that which they freely provide us.

Collecting Information on Website Visitors

The ARC Knowledge Project does not use any technique to collect information on its website visitors beyond that which they freely provide us. Please be aware, however, that when any website is visited, the Web browser provides information about the connection and browsing program. We sometimes read some of this information, especially on pages with occasional malfunctions that have not yet been fully diagnosed, to see if we can find ways to make the website more functional and reliable. The ARC Knowledge Project does not use cookies or any other technology to monitor which pages an individual visits on our website

Online Credit Card Transactions

As a convenience to members and advertisers, the ARC Knowledge Project accepts online credit card transactions. The credit card information provided by users at our site is processed by PayPal, the e-commerce provider with which the ARC Knowledge Project has contracted to process the secure electronic transactions. Credit card information is not saved on the ARC Knowledge Project website or in ARC Knowledge Project databases. After the payment is processed, we get a transaction code from PayPal, but we only have access to the first and last four digits of the credit card number. The payment information collected is not used for any purpose other than to process the single authorized and recurring payment.

Secure Websites

Credit card and other sensitive information should be submitted via the Internet only on a secure website. You can confirm that a site is secure by noting that the URL (Web address) begins with "https://" rather than just "http://" and by looking for the locked padlock at the bottom of the screen. (An unlocked padlock or an absent padlock indicates that the page is not secure.) Secure pages are necessary only when transmitting sensitive information, such as credit card numbers; you should not be concerned that ordinary pages are not secure.

Other Sites

The ARC Knowledge Project website contains links to other websites. The ARC Knowledge Project has no control over, and no responsibility for, the privacy practices or content of such websites.

Discussion Forums

Users who participate in ARC Knowledge Project online forums or discussions may have their messages or postings edited for size and/or content. Submissions to such forums explicitly grant such editorial rights to ARC Knowledge Project staff who reserve the right to remove inappropriate submissions. By participating in an online forum or discussion, you consent to our use or disclosure of any content you submit.

Disclaimer

Opinions herein are those of the authors solely and do not reflect the views of the Board of JENDA, and Africa Resource Center.

Notification of Changes

If we make material changes to our privacy policy, these changes will be posted to our privacy policy page. You should review this page regularly for updates.