Academic journals are an integral element of how we share knowledge of new discoveries, practices, and ideas. But how do these journals get started, what kinds of difficulties do they face and why do we need new ones? In this month’s episode of Finally Friday, our guest speakers discuss their experiences in founding new academic journals.

Martina Revello Lami is an archaeologist and guest researcher at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands. Although mainly focussing on how human choice can be expressed in ceramic objects, Martina’s research has recently expanded to begin exploring the complex relationship between archaeology and society. This is a core aspect of the Ex Novo Journal of Archaeology, of which she is a Vice Director, Co-Founder and editor. Ex Novo is an open access and peer reviewed international journal founded in 2005 which encourages interdisciplinary research and encompasses prehistory to the modern period.

Luca Bartoni specialises in IT but has always been interested in History and Culture. He began his venture into living history in 2002 and is currently the president of Archeologia, Reenacment e Storia (AReS). As well as this, Luca is a Journal Manager of the digital journal Archeologie Sperimentali. Temi, Metodi, Ricerche, which published its first issue in 2020. Archeologie Sperimentali is the first journal in Italy focussing specifically on experimental archaeology and aims to strengthen methodological debate and multidisciplinary research in this area. 

Join us on Friday 6th August at 17:00 CET on the EXARC Discord server for a fascinating discussion about the world of academic publishing, how we can thrive in an increasingly online world, improve accessibility and what the future could look like. We look forward to seeing you there!

Follow this link to enter the server: https://discord.gg/MJTUwc8. Once you click, you are prompted to present yourself in 1, 2 sentences and then one of us will let you in.