It is one of the many paradoxes defining the crisis in Nigerian university system. Academics are expected to publish in high impact journals. It is only by doing so that each of them acquires the reckoning of being an authority in the area s/he teaches or dispenses knowledge.
To publish means there must be journals, meaning that it is no fun to run a university system that cannot take journals for granted. But that is high impact journals, not the stuff pushed out by departments in many Nigerian universities with content that are neither here nor there or have enjoyed the benefit of peer review scrutiny. That is the paradox under reference: the imperative of journals in a system where credible journals do not quite exist as they used to.
Of course, there are thousands of great journals across the world today but every journal is necessarily controlled by one powerful interest or another. This is not necessarily in an exclusionary sense of control but in terms of the values they subscribe to. Since quality, standard and excellence are contextual, the academic integrity that journals declare and insist upon can be problematic in certain ways.
If we take the discipline of Political Science, for instance, there must be very few Nigerian political scientists today who will have their way into International Security. Yet, that would most likely rank the number One journal in that discipline from the point of view of the status quo since International Organisation, the other journal that can be ranked Number One has got its own share of ‘dissident scholars’, that being where Richard Ashley wrecked Structural Realism with his “The Poverty of Neorealism” in 1984 before critical security studies came to undertake the mop up operation in the late 1990s.
And even when we shift to reflexivist Political Science, how many can penetrate Millennium: Journal of International Studies or the European Journal of International Relations which are the top guns? It is not to suggest that Nigerian political scientists are not brilliant. It is simply to say that they don’t speak the language of the analytical interests of the journals that lead the pack in contemporary scholarship, especially in the social sciences. Political Science in Nigeria is still dominated by rationalism and its methodological impulse. That is not bad in itself but much of Political Science has moved on.
Of course, it is true there is a powerful move to decolonise International Relations in particular but what, so far, is the space and time context for this? If meaning is contingent, then that is an even greater contradiction that the move is more concentrated outside the enclaves of the global subalterns, notwithstanding the profoundly emancipatory intent behind the move.
In other words, the crisis of journals is a major dimension of the larger educational crisis in Nigeria. It is debatable if it has received the kind of attention it ought to have received in the reform campaign of successive governments and those of leading fronts such as the Academic Staff Union of Universities, (ASUU). Unlike South Africa, there is none of the dominant journals today that is Nigerian in origin and flavour, be it International Studies Quarterly; Review of International Studies (BISA); Review of International Political Economy; Review of International Quarterly; World Politics; International Affairs; International Political Sociology; Alternatives; International Theory; Journal of International Relations and Development; Journal of Peace Research; Security Dialogue; Cooperation and Conflict; Survival; Foreign Affairs; Geopolitics; Political Science Quarterly; American Political Science Review; Journal of Strategic Studies; Third World Quarterly; World Development; Review of African Political Economy; Journal of Modern African Studies; South African Journal of International Affairs; Foreign Policy; Press/Politics; Black Studies; Global Economy; Global Governance; Peace, Conflict and Development and Australian Journal of International Affairs. There are many, many more.
To the extent that it is just not possible to be the giant of Africa without discursive power, Nigeria’s ‘no-show’ on the above list of dominant journals is an issue. It may not be an issue only to the extent that Nigeria is the sort of country it is: the most significant items in the toolkit of power are the least attended to.
This background provides the basis for the inestimable joy in sighting the Journal of Communication and Media Research on a recent COMMLIST posting. COMMLIST is a massive mailing list run by Prof Nico Carpentier, a leading figure in contemporary media scholarship. It is doubtful if any other journal edited and published from Nigeria in any of the disciplines in the Humanities Complex has appeared in any outlet of that spread across Europe, Asia, Latin America and certainly Africa and the North America since Farooq Kperogi of Kennesaw State University in the US also announced the publication of his Nigeria’s Digital Diaspora: Citizen Media, Democracy, and Participation on that platform.
Also promotional of Nigeria’s discursive power
Intervention stands to be corrected if it is not with the promotion of the Journal of Communication and Media Research on that platform that the Nigerian university system might not no longer be comparable to Sodom and Gomorrah in terms of failing to provide just one righteous guy to escape God’s wrath. Now, there is, at least, one journal of stature from Nigeria except if someone comes up with names of journals with higher exposure in the Humanities Complex in Nigeria. Until such information is available, there is every justification for Professor Mojaye Eserinune and his team behind the journal to be happy by exempting Nigeria from being a country where not a single journal of global mention can be found. Even if this were to be called an over-celebration of something that might not be that new, can there be too much of that appearance in the age of “the power of words in IRs” and also in international relations? No. Not with Newsweek framing Nigeria as Black China!
Now, what exactly is the promotion of the journal in COMMLIST? It runs like this:
We are pleased to inform you that the*/Journal of Communication and Media Research (JCMR)/* is now accepting and processing full papers for its Volume 12 Number 2 issue which will be published in October 2020.
The *Deadline *for all full-manuscript submissions for this issue is*Saturday, 28^th March 2020. */Consistency and regularity are our watchwords. This will be the 24^th regular issue (plus one special issue) of the journal since it started publication in 2009./ Our 23^rd regular issue, Vol. 12 No. 1 is already in press and will be released in April 2020.**
See detailed submission guidelines below.
Thank you.
*JOURNAL OF COMMUNICATION AND MEDIA RESEARCH*
*ISSN 2141 – 5277*
*ABOUT JCMR*
The /Journal of Communication and Media Research /is a research-based and peer-reviewed journal published twice-yearly in the months of April and October by the *Association of Media and Communication Researchers of Nigeria (CAC/IT/NO 111018).* The journal is addressed to the African and international academic community and it accepts articles from all scholars, irrespective of country or institution of affiliation.
The focus of the /Journal of Communication and Media Research /is research, with a bias for quantitative and qualitative studies that use any or a combination of the acceptable methods of research. These include Surveys, Content Analysis, and Experiments for quantitative studies; and Observation, Interviews/Focus Groups, and Documentary Analysis for qualitative studies. The journal seeks to contribute to the body of knowledge in the field of communication and media studies and welcomes articles in all areas of communication and the media including, but not limited to, mass communication, mass media channels, traditional communication, organizational communication, interpersonal communication, development communication, public relations, advertising, information communication technologies, the Internet and
computer-mediated communication.
*MANUSCRIPT SUBMISSION GUIDELINES*
l Manuscripts should not be longer than 8000 words – notes and references inclusive, and must have an *abstract* of not more than 200 words and *five key words*.
l The abstract should be *Informative.* That is, it should *clearly but briefly* state the following: background/rationale; problem/issues examined (including research questions); details of method(s) used (including sample and sampling technique); results/findings; conclusion; and implication(s)/relevance of the study.
l The title and author’s biographical details (name, university/department, address, position/title, telephone, e-mail) should be identified on the title page only. It is mandatory to supply telephone and email addresses.
l Author(s) names should be written in First name, Middle name, and Surname order (i.e. First name first, and Surname last). A brief bio of all authors, including areas of research interest) should be provided.
l Format: Font of body text should be Times New Roman Size 12. Alignment should be justified. Paragraphs should be indented with one tab (no block paragraphing). Line spacing should be 1.5 lines.
l Authors should be consistent in spelling – either American English or British English.
l Tables, Figures and Charts should be alluded to in the text while allusions to ‘notes’ should be indicated in superscript in the text.
Notes should be presented as endnotes (i.e., at the end of the article, just before the References).
l Data should be presented and discussed with words and not with illustrations such as tables, figures and charts.
l Tables, figures and charts should be used minimally and sparingly; they should be used only to serve as further points of reference. In which case, even if such tables, figures or charts are removed, the flow of discussion will not be affected.
l Data, including tables, figures and charts should be interpreted and discussed by the researcher to provide a unified interpretation. Once the contents of tables, figures and charts are fully discussed, there is really no need to present such table/figure/chart in the article again.
l There should be a maximum of *three *tables and/or figures and/or charts in a manuscript.
l Referencing should follow the APA style and all references should be listed, in strict alphabetical order, at the end of the article.
l et al. can be used in in-text citations but not in end references. In end references, the names of all authors must be stated.
l In in-text citations, et al. must not be used at the first mention of a work. The surnames of all authors and year of publication must be stated in the first instance of a citation.
l Manuscripts must be rich in references and literature citations. Except in rare circumstances, references and literature citations should not be above 15 years.
l Author(s) shall be responsible for securing any copyright waivers and permissions as may be needed to allow (re)publication of material in the article (text, illustrations, etc) that is the intellectual property of third parties.
l Author(s) may be required to supply the data upon which figures are based.
l Authors should be familiar with the standard and quality of articles published in the journal so as to minimize the chances of their manuscripts being rejected. Please endeavour to visit our website to access published articles.
*Submission*
l Manuscripts are to be submitted by email to
/jcmrjournal209@gmail.com<mailto:jcmrjournal209@gmail.com>/ (as Word
document attachment using Microsoft Office Word).
l Before submitting a manuscript, please read the guidelines carefully again and ensure that the paper conforms to them all as non-conformity may lead to outright rejection.
l All manuscripts received shall be sent to two or more assessors on a blind review format.
*Plagiarism Check*
l All manuscripts received shall be subjected to plagiarism check and the result must not be higher than the journal’s acceptable threshold. Any manuscript with a plagiarism check result that is higher than the acceptable threshold shall not be published even if it receives favourable assessments.**
*The last date for submission of full papers is Saturday, 28th March 2020.*
*ASSESSMENT*
All papers/manuscripts submitted must go through a rigorous process of
double-blind peer review. Our assessors are Professors or Readers of communication studies drawn from reputable universities in the United States of America, Canada, South Africa and Nigeria. Manuscripts are sent to them on a double-blind review format.
*AVAILABILITY*
The journal is available internationally on the Internet at www.jcmrjournal.com <http://www.jcmrjournal.com> and through subscription. In Nigeria, in addition to the international availability, it is also available at all leading bookshops especially at the University of Ibadan Bookshop, Ibadan, Nigeria.
*OUR WATCHWORDS*
Consistency and regularity are our watchwords. Since the journal started publication in 2009, we have consistently and regularly published and released each edition on schedule – in April and October of every year, making a total of 21 regular issues (plus one special issue) published so far.
*OUR VISION*
To be the foremost, scholarly, indexed, peer-reviewed and most-read journal emanating from Africa, portraying knowledge, intellect and learning to all humankind irrespective of gender, affiliation and nationality.
*OUR MISSION*
To portray the intellect, knowledge and potentials of Africans to the rest of the world; and also bring similar attributes of all humans all over the world to Africa; through every responsible media of communication; in a symbiotic and mutually beneficial relationship for the advancement of scholarship and development of the human race.
*OUR MOTTO
Taking Africa to the world, bringing the world to Africa
