Promotion and information: evaluation in journal descriptions

Abstract

Evaluation, as the expression of a writer's attitudes, opinions and values, has become a key term in discourse studies in recent years and has proved to be a particularly fruitful way of analysing academic texts. But while studies have shown the importance of evaluation in research genres, its role in seemingly more promotional academic genres has been largely neglected. This paper examines the journal description (JD), a brief but ubiquitous feature of all journals, whether online or print. Situated at the academic-commercial interface, the JD provides information for prospective readers and authors while endorsing a particular view of the field and positioning the journal in the academic community. This brief missive, often no more than 150-300 words, is a general specification of how the editors wish to position the journal, providing information on its scope, aims and readership. It offers the editor's evaluation of both the journal and the field it helps construct, identifying the key features of the publication and the place it occupies in the disciplinary firmament. A part of every academic journal, this genre therefore has an importance beyond its brevity; assisting novice writers, experienced researchers, and disciplinary outsiders not only in making submissions and targeting research, but in understanding something about the field and the place of the journal within it. Drawing on a corpus of 200 JDs from journals in four contrasting disciplines and produced by the ten leading international academic publishers, I show how evaluation influences both lexical choices and rhetorical structure in this genre. The analysis contributes both to our understanding of a neglected academic genre and the evaluative resources of language.