Editorial: Update to Lead Pipe submission guidelines

In Brief: Announcing an update to In the Library with the Lead Pipe’s submission guidelines.

We have received feedback about our submission process and have reexamined our framework questions. As a result, the Lead Pipe Editorial Board has revised the set of framework questions to better assist author(s) in developing their proposals and provide the board with a deeper understanding of the author’s proposal. We have edited out some parts of the framework questions that were superfluous and expanded on others.

There are two major changes to the process. The first is the inclusion of a two-part question that will result in an author’s positionality statement. Positionality is a term from the field of sociology in which the researcher reflects on their position in the world and how it shapes their research. This may be influenced by the researcher’s race, gender, geographic location, religious beliefs, etc.

Second, in relation to question four, in order to engage with a wide audience, authors should make an effort to minimize the use of jargon. More information will be included in our style guide in the coming weeks.

Here are the updated framework questions:

1. Briefly explain what specific event or experience led you to pursue this topic, what motivates you? How does your positionality or identity inform your relationship to this topic?

2. What are the 3 most important things to consider about your topic and why are they the most critical?

3. What problem is your article addressing and what actions do you want readers to take after reading it? What do you want your readers to remember after they finish reading your article?

4. How can Lead Pipe help you connect with your intended audience for this article? How is your topic meaningful to someone not in that target audience?

5. In what ways does your article build upon and/or contribute to the existing literature? Provide 3 sources. Depending upon your topic, these citations may be for research on which your article is based; examples of conversations to which you are adding reinforce issues that you’re raising in your article; articles to which yours is responding; conversations to which you are adding; etc.

6. If your article involves research on human subjects, have you secured proper permissions and approval to report on this data? Please indicate if your article includes images that require permissions to publish.

We hope these changes will make the submission process clearer and easier. If you have feedback or questions about these changes, please feel free to email the Board at any time at itlwtlp[at]gmail.com.