It’s international Open Access week 22-28 Oct 2018 and Wits University Press’ Open Access Programme is well under way.
In accordance with Wits University’s commitment to Open Access and showcasing publicly financed research, Wits University Press is making some publications freely available for downloading.
Titles in subject fields ranging from African history, (These Oppressions Won’t Cease : An anthology of the political thought of the Cape Khoesan, 1777-1879 : A selection of source documentation in Dutch), film studies, (Gaze Regimes : Film and Feminisms in Africa) economic law (Competition Law and Economic Regulation : Addressing Market Power in Southern Africa) to psychology (Traumatic Stress in South Africa), urban geography and planning (Changing Space, Changing City : Johannesburg after apartheid – Open Access Selection) and other scholarly fields can now be downloaded for free by any researcher on the planet with an internet connection.
A full list of Wits Press OA (Open Access) titles can be seen here. The list includes monographs as well as multi-authored and edited volumes.
A report in July this year from one of our Open Access partners, Knowledge Unlatched, provided very interesting information on where in the world Wits Press’ books are downloaded. In Africa, scholars from Nigeria and South Africa are leading the way. Globally most downloads, according to this early report, were of The African National Congress and the Regeneration of Political Power and Remains of the Social : Desiring the Post-Apartheid
Wits University Press also partners with OAPEN and is the most recent and only African publisher to be invited to participate in Project MUSE’s new Open Access (OA) Books Program, launched in October 2018.
Andrew Joseph, Digital Publisher at Wits University Press, commented on the statistics reported:
In general there’s a steady increase in usage with the most downloads in Europe, Australia, Canada and the US; and interestingly not that much (yet) in the global south.
According to the Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB) by the end of 2017 there were already 10 000 books listed as Open Access.
Wits University Press will expand and develop this programme with further Open Access titles due in 2019.
For more information on Open Access titles contact Corina Van Der Spoel – Marketing Coordinator
Wits University Press
Tel: +27 11 717 8705/8700