Publications

Publications and Submissions

The annual peer-reviewed journal, MUSICultures (formerly the Canadian Journal for Traditional Music / La Revue de musique folklorique canadienne, 1996-2009; formerly the Canadian Folk Music Journal 1988-1996), includes scholarly articles pertaining to Canadian, global, and transnational musics.

In addition to our publications, the CSTM manages an archive of journals, programmes, recordings, books, and pamphlets pertaining to traditional music in Canada. The archive may be accessed at the Music Library of the University of Calgary.

The now-discontinued quarterly magazine, Canadian Folk Music, contains articles, notices, reviews, and commentary on all aspects of Canadian folk and traditional music. Production ceased in 2016 after 50 years of publication.

A one year’s subscription to both MUSICultures and archival access to Canadian Folk Music is included with membership to CSTM.

MUSICULTURES

MUSICultures is the scholarly journal of The Canadian Society for Traditional Music / La Société canadienne pour les traditions musicales. It is a refereed journal that is published digitally once a year under the auspices of the Society.

The Journal is available to all CSTM members here. Non-members may access all issues beyond the last three years. Back issues will continue to be added until a complete run of the journal is available.

The Journal publishes original articles in English and French on a wide range of topics in ethnomusicology, traditional music research, and popular music studies. The Journal welcomes articles on music in Canadian contexts as well as music in global and transnational contexts. The Journal also publishes reviews of books, and sound and visual recordings. Please contact the Editor about submitting reviews.

Authors who wish to have an article considered for publication should send an electronic copy to Gordon E. Smith, Editor.

The Review Editors are Louise Barrière (French), Rebekah Hutten (popular music), and Kate Alexander (ethnomusicology/traditional music). Although unsolicited reviews are not accepted, suggestions for items to review (including books, films, and websites) are. For guidelines on how to write an academic review, please consult Wendy Belcher’s Writing the Academic Book Review.

The MUSICultures Editorial Board is:

Line Grenier (Université de Montréal)
Monique Giroux (University of Lethbridge)
Hadi Milanloo (University of Toronto)
Jeff Packman (University of Toronto)
Daniel Akira Stadnicki (McGill University)
Aleysia Whitmore (University of Denver)

Recent Issues

Vol 50 (2023):
Special Issue: Anti-racist Pedagogies, eds. Meghan Forsyth and Marcia Ostashewski
“Open” Articles

Vol 49 (2022):
Special Issue: Musical Activism and Agency: Contestations and Confluences, eds. Anna Hoefnagels and Judith Klassen
“Open” Articles

Vol 48 (2021):
Special Issue: Queer Musicking/Musiquer/Musiqueer, eds. Craig Jennex and Charity Marsh

“Open” Articles

Submission Guidelines

1. The article text should be typed, double-spaced (including explanatory endnotes, quotations, song texts, Reference List, and captions for figures and illustrations) and submitted as an attached electronic file (Word format). Quotations longer than three lines should be separate and indented on the left side of the page. Articles in the Journal are normally between 6,500 and 8,500 words.

2. As each article is assessed by two anonymous referees, information identifying the author should appear only in the e-mail message to the Editor.

3. Please format your submission according to the journal’s style guide.

4. Authors should provide an abstract of the article (up to 100 words) as well as a biographical note (not more than 70 words), typed and double-spaced in separate files accompanying the article.

5. Musical Figures, Graphics, and Tables should be supplied in separate files with explicit indication of where they should be inserted in the article text. All Figures, Graphics, and Tables should carry complete captions, including full identification of the item and all necessary credits and acknowledgements. The author of the article is responsible for obtaining permissions for the use of copyrighted materials, as well as permissions of other materials, where appropriate.

Photographic Images (acceptable files are jpegs or tiffs). All photographic images should be at least 200 dpi (dots per inch) resolution at full print size, though 300dpi is best. For example, if you open your image in a photo-editing program and check the “image size” dialogue box, it will show the height and width dimensions in inches/centimetres and the dpi resolution. Because the journal generally prints images at full width, the width of the image should be greater than 5″ at 200-300 dpi. Many digital cameras take images at 72dpi but with much greater print dimensions. Most photo-editing programs will adjust these relative to one-another, so if you change the resolution to 300dpi, the height and width dimensions should change and show what size it will print at that resolution. When in doubt, if an image is 1MB or above in size, it is fine. Note that you cannot simply artificially enlarge an image whose resolution is too low to start.

Diagrams, Musical Notation, and Line Art (acceptable files are PDF and EPS files). All tables, graphs, text-based art, maps, and notation should be supplied in PDF or EPS format (what is called “vector” format) to preserve the clarity of the lines when printing. Exceptions to this are jpeg or tiff files that are supplied in 1200 dpi (dot per inch) resolution at full print size. Generally programs that are used to create diagrams, notation, maps, and other text and line art use vectors, and will have saving or export options in pdf and eps format.

Submission Process

A manuscript is assessed first by the Journal editor, who determines if it is of sufficient interest to proceed to the next step, which is to send the manuscript to two external referees. The referees write evaluations and recommendations, sometimes with suggestions for revisions. These assessments are sent to the editor who either rejects the manuscript, postpones a decision while suggesting revisions, or accepts the manuscript in its present state. The referees’ assessments and recommendations are forwarded anonymously to the manuscript’s author, along with the editor’s decisions.

The review process normally takes between four and five months.

Copyright Policy

The author retains copyright over the work.
The author grants the journal owner (The Canadian Society for Traditional Music / La Société canadienne pour les traditions musicales) an exclusive license to publish the work.
The author may post a pre-print or post-print version of the work (see definitions below) on a personal website for up to twelve months after the work is published in MUSICultures. After twelve months, the pre-print version must be replaced with the published version.
The author may deposit the published PDF of the work in a non-commercial online repository twelve months after the work is published in MUSICultures, or any time thereafter.
- Any such deposit must include a link to the work on the MUSICultures website, e.g., https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/MC/article/view/19996.

A pre-print is a work-in-progress—a contribution not yet accepted, or perhaps even submitted, to MUSICultures.

A post-print is the version of a contribution after peer review and acceptance by MUSICultures, with revisions completed.

The published version is the PDF file of a contribution as it appears in MUSICultures.

Please note that academia.edu and ResearchGate.com are both for-profit repositories; authors may not deposit the published PDF of the work in these repositories until after the journal’s embargo period.

For permission to reprint or translate material from MUSICultures, please contact Gordon E. Smith, General Editor of MUSICultures (musicultures@cstm-sctm.ca).

Indices

Tables of contents and full text articles (vol 1 1973-vol 29 2002)

CANADIAN FOLK MUSIC

A quarterly magazine, Canadian Folk Music, contains articles, notices, reviews, and commentary on all aspects of Canadian folk and traditional music: www.canfolkmusic.ca.