Ethics and Malpractice Statement

SARE's Editorial Board is committed to meeting and upholding standards of ethical behaviour at all stages of the journal's publication process to avoid publication malpractice. We subscribe to the guidelines set up by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) with regard to the expectations of editors, peer-reviewers, and authors (as outlined below). Fairness, objectivity, and confidentiality from our reviewers and editors and honesty, originality, and fair dealing from our authors are the critical values that enable us to achieve our goal to publish original work of value in literary and cultural studies, in the best possible form and to the highest possible standards.

Editors' responsibilities:

  • To act in a balanced, objective and fair way while carrying out their expected duties, without discrimination on grounds of gender, sexual orientation, religious or political beliefs, ethnic or geographical origin of the authors.
  • To handle submissions for special issues in the same way as other submissions, so that articles are considered and accepted solely on their academic merit.
  • To adopt and follow reasonable procedures in the event of complaints of an ethical or conflict nature.
  • To gather evidence and to avoid spreading any allegations beyond those who need to know in the event of an investigation.
  • To give authors a reasonable opportunity to respond to any complaints. All complaints should be investigated no matter when the original publication was approved. Documentation associated with any such complaints should be retained.

Reviewers' responsibilities:

  • To contribute to the decision-making process, and to assist in improving the quality of the published paper by reviewing the manuscript objectively and in a timely manner.
  • To maintain the confidentiality of any information supplied by the editor or author. To not retain or copy the manuscript.
  • To alert the editor to any published or submitted content that is substantially similar to that under review.
  • To be aware of any potential conflicts of interest (financial, institutional, collaborative or other relationships between the reviewer and author) and to alert the editor to these, if necessary withdrawing their services for that manuscript.

Authors' responsibilities:

  • To carefully read SARE's Author Guidelines before submitting their manuscript.
  • To ensure that all names that appear as the manuscript's author or authors have significantly contributed to the research.
  • To confirm that the manuscript as submitted is not under consideration or accepted for publication elsewhere.
  • To confirm that all the work in the submitted manuscript is original and to acknowledge and cite content reproduced from other sources.
  • To obtain permission to reproduce any content from other sources. Any breach of copyright laws will result in rejection of the submitted material or its retraction after publication. 
  • To agree to any necessary originality checks that the manuscript may have to undergo during the evaluation or production process.
  • To declare any potential conflicts of interest (e.g. where the author has a competing interest (real or apparent) that could be considered or viewed as exerting an undue influence on his or her duties at any stage during the publication process).
  • To disclose any funding support.
  • To promptly notify the journal editor or publisher if a significant error in their publication is identified. To cooperate with the editor and publisher to publish an erratum, addendum, corrigendum notice, or to retract the paper, where this is deemed necessary.