Specializes in the Social Sciences and Humanities and covers the complete spectrum from monographs to student textbooks. The Peter Lang Publishing Group has its headquarters in Berne and Pieterlen, Switzerland, with publishing offices strategically located in Berne, Brussels, Frankfurt am Main, New York, Oxford, Vienna and Warsaw.
Isn’t this considered to be a vanity press?
Yes, it is considered a “vanity press.” If I were a young scholar starting my career and hoping to get tenure, I would not send my book manuscript to Peter Lang. However, if I were desperate and needed to have it published at all because of the tenure clock, then I would.
Do keep in mind, however, that, at least in my experience teaching at “research one” universities, Peter Lang is looked down upon and may not get you tenure.
I’ve just seen that there books are getting reviewed by some pretty good journals, so I retract my previous uninformed comment.
It’s not a vanity press, but a publisher of last resort or dissertation outlet. There’s a bit of a difference. I would say try the Edwin Mellon Press or Ashgate before you head for Peter Lang. Mellon and Ashgate are a step or so above Peter Lang, though they are also seen as not quite the equivalents of university presses (because they do not review the whole book manuscript, but rather send out one chapter to a referee).
Ashgate is not on a par with Peter Lang and Edwin Mellon. Ashgate has top scholars in the field reviewing manuscripts for its New Hispanisms series.
PL has a tiered system. They are respected in Europe for some very good works by respected scholars – I know colleagues who wrote well-reviewed books with Lang. While, yes, they also publish revised dissertations. So, no, they aren’t Cambridge or Chicago but that hardly implies the whole-to-parts fallacy that every book from them is mediocre. I’ve also read plenty of junk from Ox and Cambridge.
A mí hay varias personas que me han dicho que hay que pagar para publicar. Otra cosa es que la editorial tenga una buena distribución y aparezca reseñada con frecuencia. Para profesores buscando “tenure”, convendría hacer más investigación antes de enviar el manuscrito para evitar posibles sorpresas desagradables…
Yes, you do have to pay to publish here; the figure varies from 1500 to 3000 euros. My impression of Peter Lang is that they publish anything. It would be perhaps suitable for an edited volume, but not anything significant.
Moreover, for early career scholars, it is career poison. It just does not impress on a resumé. You would be far better advised to even divide your work into journal articles than publish here.
Anonymous, any personal issues with Peter Lang? Incredibly good books, fresh research is published by them. They are open to new insights, true to their contracts and with a very good reputation for Humanities…No, I did not publish with them, but with Palgrave Macmillan. I wish I had done my homework before, since it took ages for my book to come out, the editing process tedious, and they really took their time to answer my queries. Colleagues of mine who published with PL made a much better choice…
A publication with Peter Lang would not work at most R1 institutions if you want to get tenured or promoted. At my institution, a book published with Peter Lang would be considered the same as not having a book at all. I’d consider Ashgate or Palgrave McMillan if you can’t place your book with a UP or a respectable (peer-reviewed) monograph series.
I am wondering why is the case that presses like Peter Lang don’t seem to have the same level of prestige as other commercial academic presses. Is there some objective reason, like the review process, other titles published there, or does it have to do more with perceptions over time?
Peter Lang has indeed published some very good books, but they are more exceptions than the rule. They publish a large amount of unrevised books that at best have a chapter or two peer-reviewed. Obviously, peer-review is a measure of quality, since any respectable press will expect that each book they publish is revised and commented upon by at least 2 scholars from the same field of research as the author. Peter Lang passes olympically and on top of that, you still have to pay to have your research published. There are so many good presses out there, and some others not as good but that will still get you through a decent peer-reviewing process that will, I promise, improve your manuscript, that there’s no reason to panic and go with them.