My first post to our editors’ blog, and Kai’s letting me start with a bang: I’m very happy to announce that Semantics and Pragmatics has now been officially accepted as an affiliated journal of the Linguistic Society of America as part of their eLanguage initiative.

Kai and I are really delighted about what we hope will be a mutually beneficial relationship with the LSA. They will be hosting the journal for us, and providing technical support, meaning that Kai and I can concentrate on getting top quality content into the journal. For the LSA this provides a way of actively supporting and disseminating leading-edge research specific to the fields of Semantics and Pragmatics, something that, because of its generalist nature, has not been possible in the journal Language. We hope that as a result the LSA will come to play a much more central role in our field than has been the case in recent years. (Why do I suggest that the LSA doesn’t currently play a central role in our field? More on that in a later blog.)

We were in discussion with the LSA for several weeks, and I’d like to publicly thank Dieter Stein (eLanguage editor in chief), Stephen Anderson (LSA president), and Gregory Ward (LSA Secretary-Treasurer, and our Pragmaticist mole in the LSA, but don’t let on that he’s on our side) for their enthusiasm and efforts on our behalf.

The LSA executive initially planned a restriction that eLanguage journal authors would have to be LSA members, as is the case for Language authors. But, and Kai and I think this is great, they’ve now decided to impose no such restriction. So Semantics and Pragmatics will truly be free: it will not only be free to read, but also free to write for. And, or course, we also plan to accept free advice from reviewers, advisory board members, and, well, anyone who wants to contact us.

How can you show your support for the LSA’s decision to accept our journal and make it truly free to anyone with an interest in our field? Suppose e.g. that you are a semanticist or pragmaticist who is not a member of the LSA but who wants to signal your support for an initiative which will impose no pressure at all on you to join the LSA. In that case, there’s no stronger way to communicate your opinion than by the ultra-Gricean move of joining the LSA. Please tell them we sent you!

Cheers,

David