Society and Culture in South Asia

Society and Culture in South Asia

This Journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics

Please read the guidelines below then visit the Journal’s submission site https://peerreview.sagepub.com/scs to upload your manuscript. Please note that manuscripts not conforming to these guidelines may be returned. Remember you can log in to the submission site at any time to check on the progress of your paper through the peer review process.

Only manuscripts of sufficient quality that meet the aims and scope of Society and Culture in South Asia will be reviewed.

There are no fees payable to submit or publish in this Journal. Open Access options are available - see section 3.3 below.

As part of the submission process you will be required to warrant that you are submitting your original work, that you have the rights in the work, and that you have obtained and can supply all necessary permissions for the reproduction of any copyright works not owned by you, that you are submitting the work for first publication in the Journal and that it is not being considered for publication elsewhere and has not already been published elsewhere.

If you have any questions about publishing with SAGE, please visit the SAGE Journal Solutions Portal.

1. What do we publish?

1.1 Aims & Scope
1.2 Article types
1.3 Writing your paper

2. Editorial policies

2.1 Peer review policy
2.2 Authorship
2.3 Acknowledgements
2.4 Funding
2.5 Declaration of conflicting interests
2.6 Research data

3. Publishing Policies

3.1 Publication ethics
3.2 Contributor’s publishing agreement
3.3 Open access and author archiving

4. Preparing your manuscript

4.1 Formatting
4.2 Artwork, figures and other graphics
4.3 Supplemental material
4.4 Reference style

5. Submitting your manuscript

5.1 ORCID
5.2 Information required for completing your submission
5.3 Permissions

6. On acceptance and publication

6.1 SAGE Production
6.2 Online First publication
6.3 Access to your published article
6.4 Promoting your article

7. Further information

1. What do we publish?

1.1 Aims & scope

Before submitting your manuscript to Society and Culture in South Asia, please ensure you have read the Aims & Scope.

1.2 Article types

The types of manuscripts accepted for publication in Society and Culture in South Asia are:

• Articles
• Book Review
• Photo Essay
• Interview
• Review Article
• Opinion

Basic formatting of manuscripts

• Main essays may be of 7000 to 8000 words.
• The first page of all papers need to display the title of the submission along with the full name, institutional affiliations of the author(s) and contact details (complete postal and email addresses and telephone and mobile numbers).
• In addition, please indicate on this page the total word count, inclusive of footnotes and references. No other information should appear on this page.
• Please do not number this page.
• The second page of the paper needs to provide the complete title of the essay accompanied by a brief abstract (in 150–200 words). This condition does not apply to review articles less than 1000 words. No other information should be placed on this page. This page should be considered the first page of the submission, and should be paginated accordingly.
• All essays should be typed using the font Times New Roman point 12 double spaced. This condition also applies to the extended quotations and references as well.
• The main title should be in Times New Roman point 14 and in bold and centered.
• All subheadings should be bold and aligned to the left.
• All essays should have margins of 2 cms on all sides.
• Abbreviations (e.g., etc., i.e.) should only be used in parenthetical comments and not in the text itself. Within the text, they should be spelt out, for example, ‘et cetera’ and ‘that is’.
• Acronyms including those in common use should be spelled out at first occurrence, with the abbreviation following in parenthesis, for example World Trade Organization (WTO).
• The following conventions should be used when using hyphens, en dash, em dash:
  • Use hyphens (-) to create compound words and to break a word across lines
  • Use an en dash (–) for a range of numbers e.g. 75­–80
  • Use an em dash (—) to mark an explanatory element in a sentence.
• Italics should be used for non-English words, which are not found in a standard English dictionary or are otherwise uncommon. Translations of foreign words within parentheses are not to be italicised. Italics also should be used for book titles and journal names, and less frequently for emphasis.
• The following conventions are to be used when using capital letters:
  • In general, capital letters should only be used for place names, personal names and at the beginning of sentences.
  • In the main title, the first letter in all words should be a capital.
  • In subheadings including the reference section, only the first letter of the first word should be in capitals, and the remainder would be governed by convections already outlined.

• Use standard British spelling throughout (eg., ‘labour’ and not ‘labor’, ‘centre’ and not ‘center’, ‘organise’ and not ‘organize’). The following conventions should be adhered to as well: please use ‘thirteenth’ instead of ‘13th century’; use ‘1960s’ instead of ‘nineteen sixties’; spell out numbers from one to nine but from 10 and above, the usage should be numerical; in measurements, please use the following conventions: 5 kms, 20 l etc; please use thousands and millions instead of ‘lakhs’ and ‘crores’.

Quotations, Footnotes, and Tables and Figures

• Use single quotation marks for quotations within a given paragraph, and if needed, please use italics within quotations for emphases. Spelling of words in quotations should not be changed.
• Place end quotation marks before comma or full stop.
• If a quotation exceeds 45 words, it should be separated from the main text with one line space above and below, and indented on the left and right margins by 1 cm.
• Tables and figures should be placed within the text and clearly identified as ‘Table 1’ or ‘Figure 1’ and accompanied by necessary directions within brackets when needed (eg., ‘see Table1/ see Figure 1’). Please provide appropriate captions.
• However, please note that the production processes might necessitate the placement of tables and figures separately at the end of the essay, which will be at the discretion of the Editor in Chief.· Footnotes should be used instead of endnotes, and should be numbered serially using standard figures (eg., 1, 2, 3). The font should be Calibri point 8. However, footnotes should be used only when absolutely necessary to elaborate an issue that is already made in the main text.

Book Reviews

• All book reviews should be 1000 words or less and must contain the name of the author and the title of the book reviewed, place of publication and name of publisher, year of publication, number of pages, ISBN number and price.

Review Essays

• Review essays should not exceed 2000 words. All conditions and stylistic conventions in this document apply to these essays.

Opinions/Debates

• Opinions and debates should not exceed 2000 words. All conditions and stylistic conventions in this document apply to these essays.

1.3 Writing your paper

The SAGE Author Gateway has some general advice and on how to get published, plus links to further resources. SAGE Author Services also offers authors a variety of ways to improve and enhance their article including English language editing, plagiarism detection, and video abstract and infographic preparation.

1.3.1 Make your article discoverable
For information and guidance on how to make your article more discoverable, visit our Gateway page on How to Help Readers Find Your Article Online.

Return to Top

2. Editorial policies

2.1 Peer review policy

The manuscripts submitted for publishing in Society and Culture in South Asia undergo first the editorial assessment to determine whether these are worthy of consideration for publication following which the manuscripts undergo double-blind peer review in which the identity of both the reviewer and author are always concealed from both parties.

2.2 Authorship

All parties who have made a substantive contribution to the article should be listed as authors. Principal authorship, authorship order, and other publication credits should be based on the relative scientific or professional contributions of the individuals involved, regardless of their status. A student is usually listed as principal author on any multiple-authored publication that substantially derives from the student’s dissertation or thesis.

If the named authors for a manuscript change at any point between submission and acceptance, an Authorship Change Form must be completed and digitally signed by all authors (including any added or removed) . An addition of an author is only permitted following feedback raised during peer review. Completed forms can be uploaded at Revision Submission stage or emailed to the Journal Editorial Office contact (listed on the journal’s manuscript submission guidelines). All requests will be moderated by the Editor and/or Sage staff.

Important: Changes to the author by-line by adding or deleting authors are NOT permitted following acceptance of a paper.

Please note that AI chatbots, for example ChatGPT, should not be listed as authors. For more information see the policy on Use of ChatGPT and generative AI tools.

Return to Top

2.3 Acknowledgements

All contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in an Acknowledgements section. Examples of those who might be acknowledged include a person who provided purely technical help, or a department chair who provided only general support.

Please supply any personal acknowledgements separately to the main text to facilitate anonymous peer review.

2.3.1 Writing assistance
Individuals who provided writing assistance, e.g. from a specialist communications company, do not qualify as authors and so should be included in the Acknowledgements section. Authors must disclose any writing assistance – including the individual’s name, company and level of input – and identify the entity that paid for this assistance. It is not necessary to disclose use of language polishing services.

2.4 Funding

Society and Culture in South Asia requires all authors to acknowledge their funding in a consistent fashion under a separate heading.  Please visit the Funding Acknowledgements page on the SAGE Journal Author Gateway to confirm the format of the acknowledgment text in the event of funding, or state that: This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

2.5 Declaration of conflicting interests

Society and Culture in South Asia encourages authors to include a declaration of any conflicting interests and recommends you review the good practice guidelines on the SAGE Journal Author Gateway.

2.6 Research data

The journal is committed to facilitating openness, transparency and reproducibility of research, and has the following research data sharing policy. For more information, including FAQs please visit the SAGE Research Data policy pages.

Subject to appropriate ethical and legal considerations, authors are encouraged to:

• share your research data in a relevant public data repository
• include a data availability statement linking to your data. If it is not possible to share your data, we encourage you to consider using the statement to explain why it cannot be shared.
• cite this data in your research

Return to Top

3. Publishing Policies

3.1 Publication ethics

SAGE is committed to upholding the integrity of the academic record. We encourage authors to refer to the Committee on Publication Ethics’ International Standards for Authors and view the Publication Ethics page on the SAGE Author Gateway

3.1.1 Plagiarism
Society and Culture in South Asia and SAGE take issues of copyright infringement, plagiarism or other breaches of best practice in publication very seriously. We seek to protect the rights of our authors and we always investigate claims of plagiarism or misuse of published articles. Equally, we seek to protect the reputation of the Journal against malpractice. Submitted articles may be checked with duplication-checking software. Where an article, for example, is found to have plagiarized other work or included third-party copyright material without permission or with insufficient acknowledgement, or where the authorship of the article is contested, we reserve the right to take action including, but not limited to: publishing an erratum or corrigendum (correction); retracting the article; taking up the matter with the head of department or dean of the author's institution and/or relevant academic bodies or societies; or taking appropriate legal action.

3.1.2 Prior publication
If material has been previously published it is not generally acceptable for publication in a SAGE journal. However, there are certain circumstances where previously published material can be considered for publication. Please refer to the guidance on the SAGE Author Gateway or if in doubt, contact the Editor at the address given below.

3.2 Contributor’s publishing agreement

Before publication, SAGE requires the author as the rights holder to sign a Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement. SAGE’s Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement is an exclusive licence agreement which means that the author retains copyright in the work but grants SAGE the sole and exclusive right and licence to publish for the full legal term of copyright. Exceptions may exist where an assignment of copyright is required or preferred by a proprietor other than SAGE. In this case copyright in the work will be assigned from the author to the society. For more information please visit the SAGE Author Gateway

3.3 Open access and author archiving

Society and Culture in South Asia offers optional open access publishing via the Sage Choice programme and Open Access agreements, where authors can publish open access either discounted or free of charge depending on the agreement with Sage. Find out if your institution is participating by visiting Open Access Agreements at Sage. For more information on Open Access publishing options at Sage please visit Sage Open Access. For information on funding body compliance, and depositing your article in repositories, please visit Sage’s Author Archiving and Re-Use Guidelines and Publishing Policies.

Return to Top

4. Preparing your manuscript for submission

4.1 Formatting

The preferred format for your manuscript is Word. LaTeX files are also accepted. A LaTex template is available on the Manuscript Submission Guidelines page of our Author Gateway.

4.2 Artwork, figures and other graphics

For guidance on the preparation of illustrations, pictures and graphs in electronic format, please visit SAGE’s Manuscript Submission Guidelines.

Figures supplied in colour will appear in colour online regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in colour in the printed version. For specifically requested colour reproduction in print, you will receive information regarding the costs from SAGE after receipt of your accepted article.

4.3 Supplemental material

This Journal is able to host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images etc) alongside the full-text of the article. For more information please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplemental files

4.4 Reference style

Society and Culture in South Asia adheres to the Chicago Manual of Style. View the guide here to ensure your manuscript conforms to this style.

References within the text

• References within the text should be placed in parentheses (eg., Gupta 2013: 145).
• If more than one publication by the same author is referred to, then the items should be presented in chronological order (eg., Marx 1952, 1957).
• To distinguish between different works by the same author in the same year, use the letters a, b, c etc in chronological order (eg., Smith 1995a, 1995b).
• For groups of citations, order alphabetically and not chronologically, using a semi-colon to separate names (eg., Ahmed 1987: 125; Sarkar 1987: 145; Wignaraja 1960: 62).
• Use ‘et al.’ when citing a work by more than two authors within the text, but list all the authors in the reference section.
• For quotations, please provide page numbers of the original source.
• All works cited in the text (including sources for tables, graphs, figures and maps) should be listed in the reference section at the very end of the essay.

Reference list

• References should be at the very end of the paper or review.
• In the reference section, all items should be listed in alphabetical order, giving the author’s surname first followed by initials. If more than one publication by the same author is listed, the items should be presented in chronological order; for different works by the same author in the same year, use the letters a, b, c, etc.
• When listing two or more works by the same author, repeat the author’s name for each entry.
• For multi-authored works, invert the name of the first author only (eg., Smith, W. and G. Jones).
• Books (single author): Caldeira, T. P. R. 2000. City of Walls: Crime, Segregation, and Citizenship in São Paulo. Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Books (multiple authors): Marcus, G and M.M.J. Fischer. 1986. Anthropology as Cultural Critique: An Experimental Moment in the Human Sciences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Book chapters: Donninger, C. 1986. ‘Is It Always Efficient to Be Nice? A Computer Simulation of Axelrod’s Computer Tournament,’ in A. Diekmann and P. Mitter (eds.,) Paradoxical Effects of Social Behavior. Heidelberg: Physica-Werlag, 123–34.
• Journal articles: Kapoor, Geetha. 1993. ‘When was Modernism in Indian/Third World Art?’ South Atlantic Quarterly, Vol. 92 (3):23-48.
  (The same general conventions can be adopted when presenting references for materials from newspapers or magazines).
• Books in other languages: Qidwai, B. A. 1980. Azadi ki Chhaon Mein [In Freedom’s Shadow]. Delhi: National Book Trust.
• Translations: de Certeau, M. 2002. The Practice of Everyday Life. Translated by Steven F. Rendall. Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Reference of an essay from a website or other internet source: Wickrema, A and P. Colenso. 2003, March. Respect for Diversity in Educational Publication - The Sri Lankan Experience. http://siteresources.worldbank.org/EDUCATION/Resources/278200-112170327455/1439264-1126807073059/PaperFinal.Pdf (Last accessed on 10 March 2012).
• Reference of an unpublished source with a date and an author: Subramaniam, S.K.N. 2003. Politics of Sacred Space in Hindu Kovils in Northern Sri Lanka: A Sociological Analysis. PhD dissertation submitted to the Department of Sociology. Jaffna: University of Jaffna.
• Reference of an unpublished source without a date but with and author: Islam, A. F. Date unavailable. Sufi Music in Northern India. Unpublished manuscript.
• Reference of a published source without a date: Samarasinghe, S.M. Date unavailable. Sinhala Verse Forms. Kandy: Sri Ram Press.
• Reference of sources where publication date, the press and the city of publication are missing: Samarasinghe, S.M. Date unavailable. Sinhala Verse Forms. Publication information unavailable.
• Reference of an audio track from a published source (eg., audio tapes and compact discs): Khann, Bismillah. 2011. ‘Raga Kedar.’ In, Instrumentalists of India. Mumbai: Sony Music.

Return to Top

5. Submitting your manuscript

Society and Culture in South Asia is hosted on SAGE Track SAGE, a web-based online submission and peer review system. Visit https://peerreview.sagepub.com/scs to login and submit your article online.

IMPORTANT: Please check whether you already have an account in the system before trying to create a new one. If you have reviewed or authored for the journal in the past year it is likely that you will have had an account created.

5.1 ORCID

As part of our commitment to ensuring an ethical, transparent and fair peer review process SAGE is a supporting member of ORCID, the Open Researcher and Contributor ID. ORCID provides a unique and persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from every other researcher, even those who share the same name, and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between researchers and their professional activities, ensuring that their work is recognized.

The collection of ORCID IDs from corresponding authors is now part of the submission process of this Journal. If you already have an ORCID ID you will be asked to associate that to your submission during the online submission process. We also strongly encourage all co-authors to link their ORCID ID to their accounts in our online peer review platforms. It takes seconds to do: click the link when prompted, sign into your ORCID account and our systems are automatically updated. Your ORCID ID will become part of your accepted publication’s metadata, making your work attributable to you and only you. Your ORCID ID is published with your article so that fellow researchers reading your work can link to your ORCID profile and from there link to your other publications.

If you do not already have an ORCID ID please follow this link to create one or visit our ORCID homepage to learn more.

5.2 Information required for completing your submission

You will be asked to provide contact details and academic affiliations for all co-authors via the submission system and identify who is to be the corresponding author. These details must match what appears on your manuscript. The affiliation listed in the manuscript should be the institution where the research was conducted. If an author has moved to a new institution since completing the research, the new affiliation can be included in a manuscript note at the end of the paper. At this stage please ensure you have included all the required statements and declarations and uploaded any additional supplementary files (including reporting guidelines where relevant).

5.3 Permissions

Please also ensure that you have obtained any necessary permission from copyright holders for reproducing any illustrations, tables, figures or lengthy quotations previously published elsewhere. For further information including guidance on fair dealing for criticism and review, please see the Copyright and Permissions page on the SAGE Author Gateway.

Return to Top

6. On acceptance and publication

6.1 SAGE Production

Your SAGE Production Editor will keep you informed as to your article’s progress throughout the production process. Proofs will be made available to the corresponding author via email, and corrections should be made directly or notified to us promptly. Authors are reminded to check their proofs carefully to confirm that all author information, including names, affiliations, sequence and contact details are correct, and that Funding and Conflict of Interest statements, if any, are accurate.

6.2 Online First publication

Online First allows final articles (completed and approved articles awaiting assignment to a future issue) to be published online prior to their inclusion in a journal issue, which significantly reduces the lead time between submission and publication. Visit the SAGE Journals help page for more details, including how to cite Online First articles.

6.3 Access to your published article

SAGE provides authors with online access to their final article.

6.4 Promoting your article

Publication is not the end of the process! You can help disseminate your paper and ensure it is as widely read and cited as possible. The SAGE Author Gateway has numerous resources to help you promote your work. Visit the Promote Your Article page on the Gateway for tips and advice.

Return to Top

7. Further information

Any correspondence, queries or additional requests for information on the manuscript submission process should be sent to the Society and Culture in South Asia editorial office as follows:

journal.sociology@soc.sau.ac.in