Editorial

What it Means to be an International Journal

Lorie Kloda

Editor-in-Chief

Associate University Librarian, Planning and Community Relations

Concordia University

Montreal, Quebec, Canada

2015 Kloda. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons‐Attribution‐Noncommercial‐Share Alike License 4.0 International (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly attributed, not used for commercial purposes, and, if transformed, the resulting work is redistributed under the same or similar license to this one.

Welcome to the last issue of 2015, and the 40^th issue of Evidence Based Library and Information Practice (EBLIP)! It’s hard to believe it has been 10 years since the inaugural issue of the journal. Since then the journal has grown in many ways. EBLIP now has a larger Editorial Board with more Associate Editors, an Editorial Intern, and a Lead Copyeditor. The journal also now boasts a team of Editorial Advisors composed of past members of the Editorial Board, as well as a Writing Assistance Team. The content of EBLIP has also grown in scope. In addition to Commentaries, Articles, Evidence Summaries, Classics, and News/Announcements, it now also includes occasional Reviews, Using Evidence in Practice papers, and the Research in Practice column. Over the years, the journal has occasionally included a special Features section devoted to particular themes, such as public libraries, or on highlighting a recent conference or symposium, such as this issue’s Feature on the recent EBLIP8 Conference, held in Brisbane, Australia. Helen Partridge, the conference Chair, has written an editorial with an overview of both the conference and the Feature section.

The biennial EBLIP conference is held on different continents, and so far has travelled from the United Kingdom to the United States, Canada, Australia, and Sweden. The most recent conference welcomed delegates from 12 countries. Like the conference, the EBLIP journal is international in scope. But what does it mean to be a truly international journal? Members of the Editorial Board frequently discuss questions and issues related to this concept. For example, is our Editorial Board international enough? How do we include papers by authors who may not have proficiency in the English language? How do we make our journal accessible and interesting to those in non-English speaking regions? Moreover, how do we include perspectives of non-English countries that will engage our readers?

I don’t have perfect answers to all of the questions, but I think we have made some progress towards becoming increasingly international. In this issue, we not only have the EBLIP8 conference Feature, which includes submissions from all over, and from Australia in particular, but also two separate articles by Nigerian authors about research pertinent to those in that country. Daniel Abubakar’s paper on Internet access in university libraries demonstrates that seamless Internet connectivity in the university library cannot be taken for granted by some students. The article by Jerome Idiedgbeyan-ose and colleagues reports on the availability and quality of library services in two Nigerian rural communities. As the Editor-in-Chief, I am proud that the journal attracts submissions from all over, and that we are able to continue to publish high quality peer reviewed articles to the evidence base.

I also look forward to the next issue, which will include some extra content in honour of our 10^th anniversary. Whether you are a long time journal reader or relatively new to EBLIP, I hope you will continue to find the journal’s content relevant to your practice in the coming decade.