Open Access

Peter Lang is a strong advocate for Open Access publication, with over 2,000 Open Access books to date and a strong commitment to continue offering relevant models. We are happy to support our authors in making their research available to the academic community in this way. We are convinced that to make Open Access work, we need to facilitate constructive communication between researchers, libraries, funding bodies, and publishers and to experiment with new approaches and business models.

Why choose Open Access?

• Accessibility – research becomes freely available digitally as soon as it is published, while the print version will also be made available for sale.
• Discoverability – studies have shown that Open Access publications gain more views, citations and downloads than publications with restricted access.
• Compliance – Open Access publication is increasingly required by funding bodies and a Creative Commons license allows authors to easily comply with funder requirements.

Why choose Peter Lang Open?

• Engagement – increased visibility means more possibilities for public engagement and collaboration.
• Rigour – all Open Access publications will benefit from the same rigorous peer review and editorial assessment process as non-OA titles.
• Support – Open Access authors receive the full benefit of our marketing and distribution services, including flyer creation, digital and conference promotion, and an individual product page on our site.

Explore our latest Open Access books by visiting our recent Open Access book list.

Open Access Models at Peter Lang

We offer both Gold and Green OA publishing options to our book authors with access to funding for Book Publishing Charges (BPCs). Read more about Funding Opportunities here. We are also supporting the transition to a sustainable Open Access landscape with new Open Access Initiatives.

Gold Open Access

Peter Lang offers authors and volume editors the option to publish their work Gold Open Access for a fee to be paid by funders. With Gold Open Access, your research will be freely available online for others to read, download, and share immediately upon publication and without an embargo period. Books are released under the agreed Creative Commons (CC) license and the copyright is assigned to the author.

Both your print and Open Access publication will benefit from our marketing, distribution, and data management services. The Open Access publication will be discoverable on the Peter Lang website, OAPEN, and national research repositories in collaboration with many research funders.

We calculate our Open Access fees individually based on the requested services. Our total fees for Gold Open Access start at €7,500 all in, with variations dependent on the project and region.

Green Open Access

We also offer our authors and volume editors the option to publish their work with Green Open Access. In this model, the book is published simultaneously as a print and eBook, and the eBook is released in Open Access after an embargo period. We are pleased to offer models and rates to fit the needs of authors in their respective national and research contexts. 

Please contact us directly (link to contact form) if you would like to discuss publishing your work in Open Access.

Our Repository Policy offers authors different solutions to archive and share their work. Access the full policy on our Repository Policy page.

Open Access Initiatives at Peter Lang

Greenlight from Peter Lang Open

We are pleased to announce our Open Access pilot project Greenlight in cooperation with Jisc.

Peter Lang is a strong advocate for Open Access publication, with over 2,000 Open Access books to date and a strong commitment to continue offering relevant Open Access models. We are convinced that to make Open Access work, we need to facilitate constructive communication between researchers, libraries, funding bodies and publishers and to experiment with new approaches and business models.

Greenlight is a collective purchase model that offers institutions the opportunity to grow their lists and support Open Access publication in the Humanities and the Sciences. The package offered includes important monographs by UK authors on medicine, technology, sexuality studies and environmental studies.

Participating institutions pay a one-off fee to receive perpetual unlimited multi-user access for the five titles in the package, planned for publication in the course of 2023.

• Tiered pricing structure based on Jisc Banding. The fee for large-tier institutions is £750 for the package, with discounts for small- and medium-tier institutions.
• The aim is to release titles Open Access at least one year after publication.
• If the funding target is not met, the number of titles published Open Access will be reduced, e.g. if 40% of the target is met, two books will be greenlighted for OA release.
• Total funding per collection will depend on the number and tiers of the pledging institutions.
• Guaranteed perpetual multi-user access to all titles in the package for pledging institutions, regardless of whether funding has been met.
• Pledging dates 1 September 2022 to 31 December 2023.
• Announcement of results in early 2024.

The Collection

Heather Alberro, Interspecies: Radical Reconfigurations of Human-Animal Relations in Ecotopia
Critically and imaginatively explores alternative ways of relating to our terrestrial counterparts, as increasingly called for by a growing chorus of mainstream and radical voices.

Polly Galis, Frank French Feminism: Sex, Sexuality and the Body in the Work of Ernaux, Huston and Arcan
Explores key French feminist authors’ representations of sex, sexuality and the body, focusing on the female body and women’s sexual development, identity, experience and desire.

Will Slocombe, Emergent Patterns: Artificial Intelligence and the Structural Imagination
Examines the ubiquity of representations of AI in contemporary media and culture, with a view towards analysing what these representations reveal about social hopes and fears.

Julia Sutton-Mattocks, Cures for Modernity: Medicine in Interwar Russian and Czech Literature and Cinema
Traces prevalent medical themes in interwar Russian and Czech literature and film, including the treatment of syphilis, nervous illness, childbirth and sexual reproduction.

Samantha Vanderslott, Pro-vax: Supporting Vaccines through Activism, Petitions and Trials
Shines a light on the untold stories of vaccine activism through media influence and policy change, and the trial participants who provide their bodies to test new vaccines, including a case study of the COVID-19 trials of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine.

For further information see the Jisc site: Peter Lang Open Greenlight OA Monograph Pilot 2022-2023 – Licence subscriptions manager

Emerging Scholars Competition

The Peter Lang Emerging Scholars Competition (previously known as the Young Scholars Competition) is an annual competition for early career researchers in selected fields. It has been held every year since 2011, in fields such as Black Studies, Irish Studies, Women’s Writing, Education, French Studies, and more.

In each competition, book proposals for monographs are invited from emerging scholars to be evaluated by a distinguished editorial board. Winners receive a contract for a fully funded book and the title of winner. Runners-up and other participants may also have opportunities to publish.

Beginning with the 2023 competition in Indigenous Studies, we have been proud to offer Open Access contracts for our winners, as part of our efforts to support a more equitable Open Access publishing environment. Visit our Queer Studies competition page.

Discovery Services and Archiving

Full-text content and metadata are hosted on our website and on OAPEN. Titles can be found via a variety of discovery services, including DOAB, EBSCO and ProQuest, with archiving by Portico. 

Metrics and Analytics

For Open Access titles, usage tracking is possible with Counter5-compliant usage statistics. We also provide free and straightforward access to MARC 21 records for all electronic content. We can offer information to authors about how many times their work has been downloaded.

Compliance

We are listed in SHERPA/RoMEO and SHERPA/FACT to make it easy for researchers to see if our books and journals comply with their funder’s Open Access policy. Our publications have been successfully supported by renowned funders like the Volkswagen Stiftung, FWF and SNSF. We are happy to discuss any specific requirements your funders and institutions might have.

Our Open Access Partners

Peter Lang is a partner of Knowledge Unlatched (KU) and regularly takes part in the KU Select pledging rounds, where a library consortium supports the release of both Gold and Green Open Access titles. Our books are available through their partner platform, the Open Research Library. Read more about the program here.

Peter Lang participated in the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) research study from 2014 to 2016 called the OAPEN-CH pilot project, which supported OA monograph publishing and studied data on usage, sales and costs.

Learn more about this project and its first results here.

Peter Lang also partnered with OGeSoMo, a project aimed at initiating more open access publications in the HSS, funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research in Germany. Read more about the project here.

Further information on our Open Access partners is available at these links:

Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB)

Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)

OAPEN

SAGW

Knowledge Unlatched

Funding Opportunities

Funding to publish your work Gold Open Access is available from a wide range of sources, and we are pleased to provide a list of relevant funding opportunities for your information below. Our international editorial team at Peter Lang can support you with this process.