Washington University in St Louis joins OLH library consortium

We're extremely pleased to announce that Washington University in St. Louis has joined the Library Partnership Subsidy system that underwrites the Open Library of Humanities. Founded in 1853, Washington University’s mission is to discover and disseminate knowledge, and protect the freedom of inquiry through research, teaching, and learning.

The Open Library of Humanities is a unique publishing enterprise. Led by academics and initially funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the OLH is a gold open-access publisher with strong quality control mechanisms. It is also a gold open access publisher unlike any other. Rather than billing authors when their work is accepted, the OLH is designed to be a fair open-access proposition for the humanities. To facilitate this, the costs of our publishing are paid for, in advance, by a global library consortium so that authors can submit and never be charged. This model gives the best of all worlds: no fees for authors and no incentive for us to accept sub-par work.

Dr. Martin Paul Eve, one of the founders and academic project directors of the OLH, welcomed WUSTL: “I am thrilled that Washington University in St Louis has made a five-year contribution to support the Open Library of Humanities. The response to our call has already been enormous and, with universities like WUSTL involved, we will deliver a viable and fair transition to open access for the humanities disciplines.”

Trevor A Dawes, Associate University Librarian, added: “We are delighted to participate in the Open Library of Humanities as it will enable access to open, peer-reviewed content, as well as provide a vehicle for our faculty members and students to make their scholarship available to the broader academic community. I certainly look forward to seeing some of our scholars consider publishing through OLH.”

Libraries outside the US and UK interested in joining the OLH Library Partnership Subsidy model should contact Dr. Martin Paul Eve: martin.eve@openlibhums.org. UK-based libraries will shortly be able to join through Jisc Collections. US-based libraries can join through LYRASIS at https://lyrasis.openlibhums.org.