[Lingtyp] European Commission on authorship transfer agreements

[Johanna NICHOLS]

Happy New Year to all!  I'm picking up the thread begun by Sebastian
Nordhoff a couple of weeks ago, concerning journal publication, ownership
of copyright, ownership of journal title, etc.  For some reason I can't
reply to that thread so I'm starting it up again with the same subject
header.  (The last posting was from Martin Haspelmath, on Dec. 22.)

The ALT Executive Committee (like the E.C. of every other professional
society in our field to my knowledge) has been discussing the status of the
journal and the future of publication.  Matters are not simple:  a small
society (like ALT) can't be assured of having the regular supply of
qualified volunteers to handle the entire publishing job smoothly by
ourselves (this includes maintaining the subscription list, mailing,
advertising, arranging publication deals to encourage libraries to
subscribe, taking in money and making payments, etc., etc.), so we need a
publisher -- that's what they're for.  Keep in mind that over the years De
Gruyter Mouton has also published the Mouton Grammar Library starting
decades ago when hardly any other publishers would do grammars, and it
continues to be the highest-prestige venue for grammar publishing
(including winners of our own grammar prizes).  They have also generously
donated books as prizes for our various prize winners.  They have a book
exhibit at all of our conferences, and at other major conferences they have
an exhibit prominently featuring LT, MGL grammars, and their typology
series.  And they got LT going decades ago when publishing in typology was
a minor and parlous undertaking.  All these things have contributed to the
LT brand, so we can't say we've created it singlehandedly.

In a few days you'll all get a ballot for new officers, including a new
Editor who will have the challenging task of succeeding Frans Plank, who is
stepping down at the end of 2016 after creating LT and turning it into an
excellent journal.  Other than my remarks at the Albuquerque ALT conference
last summer, we haven't made any policy decisions or initiated discussions
or polled the membership, since we'll want to have the new Editor (and for
that matter the new President and the other new officers) involved.

Concerning ownership of the journal and title and copyright, the 1997
agreement we signed with De Gruyter Mouton (then Mouton de Gruyter) says
nothing about these matters.  ALT has never signed ownership of the journal
or the title or the copyright over to anyone.  We assume we own them, but
we're not legal experts.

Johanna Nichols
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