The article discusses the challenges faced by scientists who don’t speak English as their primary language in getting published in prestigious journals. Here’s a summary of the key points:
English Dominance: English has become the dominant language in global scientific communication, posing challenges for scholars from regions where English is not widely spoken.
Dilemma for Non-Native Speakers: Non-native English-speaking scholars face a dilemma between publishing in English for global visibility or publishing in their native language to reach local communities. However, publishing in English requires more time and effort for writing and revising papers.
Inclusive Policies in Journals: The study reviewed the policies of 736 journals in the biological sciences and found that the majority of them are making minimal efforts to overcome language barriers in academic publishing.
Examples of Inclusive Policies: Inclusive policies could include allowing papers to be published in multiple languages simultaneously, implementing machine translation tools, not rejecting manuscripts solely based on English quality, providing author guidelines in multiple languages, allowing non-English literature citations, offering English-language editing services, and educating reviewers and editors about language barriers.
Influences on Policy Adoption: Journals with higher impact factors tend to adopt less-inclusive policies, while those owned by scientific societies tend to adopt more inclusive policies. Open-access journals and journals with diverse editorial boards were not significantly more likely to adopt inclusive linguistic policies.
Importance of Linguistic Diversity: Overcoming language barriers in academic publishing is crucial for fostering knowledge sharing and addressing both regional and global issues effectively, such as health and conservation.
Future Directions: The article suggests various additional measures journals can take to support scientists from non-English speaking backgrounds, including utilizing artificial intelligence tools and renegotiating copyrights for translations.
In summary, the article highlights the need for greater inclusivity in academic publishing to support scientists from diverse linguistic backgrounds and enhance global knowledge sharing.