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Writers Guidelines

MOJA Journal of Adult Education 01

MOJA JOURNAL of ADULT EDUCATION

WRITER’S GUIDELINES

Please read these guidelines carefully before submitting your article. If you have any questions concerning these guidelines, please contact the Editor-in-Chief at editor@mojaafrica.de

1. General information

THE JOURNAL

The MOJA Journal of Adult Education was launched in May 2022 following the establishment of the MOJA Digital Platform in April 2021. It is published once a year; each volume is dedicated to one major theme. The journal is published in English and French and distributed in Africa and internationally. The Journal is mainly online with a small print-run. The Journal is financed by the German Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development. It is free of charge and downloadable from the MOJA platform.

TARGET GROUPS

The main target groups are: adult education practitioners working at all levels of the adult education systems in Africa. We invite adult education practitioners who are concerned with teaching, organisation and administration; policy and opinion makers; researchers and specialists in Adult Education and in adjacent fields such as health education, citizenship education, agriculture and community development. In addition, the Journal aims to reach non-professional readers interested in issues related to Adult Education.

HOW TO SUBMIT ARTICLES

In each issue, a call for submissions for the next issue will be published. Before submission, topic and length have to be settled with the Editor-in-Chief. We prefer submissions via email; please send them to the Editor-in-Chief at editor@mojaafrica.de. Please save the article as a Word file, Open document file, or RTF file and attach it, along with your name, postal mailing address and phone number. We expect you to check all names, titles, dates and facts for accuracy before submitting your article. Unless otherwise indicated, we assume that your article has not been published elsewhere.

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS

June 1st of each year or as specified in the call.

2. What to submit

The length of a submission depends on the topic and the type of submission. It has to be defined in agreement with the Editor-in-Chief. Avoid overwriting. Please note that all texts have to be related to the main theme of the journal, if not otherwise agreed.

2a) Types of submission

  • Article: should be based on topical issues in adult education on the continent including new research and should contain analysis and argument (2500 words maximum).
  • Focus: examines an aspect of a chosen theme in greater detail (2500 words maximum).
  • Profile: looks in detail at an organisation, project or legislation, or a person. The focus could be on the role and contributions of the entity to the field of adult education on the continent (1000 words maximum).
  • Report-back: covers reports on meetings, conferences, workshops, etc. (1000-1500 words).
  • Review: provides a review of important books, reports or documentaries (1000-1500 words).
  • Interview: records a conversation amongst a group of people or a one-on-one interview in which the writer asks the interviewee/s questions on a subject of significance (1500 words).
  • Open Forum: is a vehicle for debate and argument, or pieces that deal with argument and difference of opinion on a subject/issue (2500 words maximum).
  • Perspective: is an adaptable format in which writers use a more personal reflective, narrative style about an issue (2500 words maximum).
  • Poetry: a poem that speaks to the adult education community.

More types of texts might be added in agreement with the Editor-in-Chief.

2b) Required elements for articles

The following elements have to be provided together with your submission.

  • Abstract: Please summarise the principal topics contained in your article and its main arguments in 80 - 100 words.
  • Contact info: Please include your professional postal address (including website if existing) and your email.
  • Portrait photo: Please attach a recent portrait photo of yourself in a resolution of 300 dpi in TIFF, EPS, or JPEG format (for details see notes for images below).
  • Biographical sketch: Please summarise your professional vita in 120 words and focus on describing your engagement in the field of Adult Education.

The elements listed above will be published with your article. Please note that the MOJA Journal of Adult Education reserves all rights for publishing for these elements, including your portrait photo (see Point 4) in connection with the publication of your article which you consent to.

2c) Optional elements for articles

The following elements are very welcome, but not a must.

  • Bibliographical references: Not all of our readers have access to major libraries and documentation centres, so we would ask you to be sparing in the use of references (for details please see notes for references below, Point 3b).
  • Further reading: If possible, add a small selection of tips for further reading and useful online-links.
  • Graphic material: We highly welcome accompanying graphic material. Please make sure that all graphic material you use is mentioned and explained in your article. Please indicate a clear title and the source. All graphics, tables, info-data have to be delivered separately and in an editable Word or Excel file. Make sure that all raw data is accessible. Also make sure the data and graphic material are not copyright protected and do not infringe any third party rights.
  • Images: Significant photographs (as well as illustrations, cartoons, and artwork) of high quality are welcome for inside editorial use. The final choice will be made by the Publisher. Digital photos should have a resolution of 300 dpi in the size they will be printed and should be delivered in TIFF, EPS, or JPEG formats. Do not embed images within the body of a text document. Please give information about the photograph/artwork, including a legend (what do we see?), and the name of the photographer/artist for credit. If you use images from a publicly available source, please make sure that the image’s source is mentioned. Only photographs with informed consent will be accepted into the journal. It is the responsibility of the author to record consent and to make it available if required. This does not include photographs that are in the public domain (still cite the source).

3. Editing advice

The following advice on language, style and references should help you to write your article. However, if you have no previous experience in writing articles, please do not feel discouraged by this advice. Before publishing, all texts will be edited by our Editor-in-Chief.

3a) Language, style

  • Simple and clear writing: Our aim is to produce an accessible, easy-to-read product. Your article should attract the reader from the beginning. Avoid education and research jargon. Explain key technical terms. Most of our readers are already active in the field of Adult Education, but the journal reaches all kinds of readers. Thus no previous knowledge should be taken for granted. Write in a way that the interested non-professional reader can follow your arguments.
  • First person and active voice: Use the first person (“I” or “we”) if you describe what you, or you and your co-authors, did. Write in the active voice (“They did it”) instead of the passive voice (“It was done”) so that the reader knows who is responsible for the action.
  • Abbreviations: Use abbreviations sparingly. Give the full name of organisations, research instruments and so forth, the first time you mention them, place the abbreviation in parentheses immediately after. You can then use the abbreviation. Example: International Council of Adult Education (ICAE)
  • Gender Sensitivities: Avoid language that might be interpreted as discriminatory. Do not use “he” or “she” exclusively. Try to find neutral terms like “postal carrier” instead of “mailman”; or use the plural term like “trainers ... they” instead of “the trainer . . . he”.

3b) Citation, References, Endnotes (Word count is inclusive of the references)

Citations

Citations of other research works have to be included in the text in parentheses. Please mention the author (or periodical or corporate author), the year of publication and page numbers if necessary.

Examples: (Ledwith 2017: 173), (The New York Times 1997)

If a work has two authors, give both names. If a work has three or more authors, include all names in the first citation and then use “et al.” for following citations.

Example: (Nafukho, Amutabi and Otunga (2005)), following citations: (Nafukho et al. 2005).

For seven or more authors, use “et al.” also for the first citation.

For electronic resources use a regular citation if you can identify an author (human, periodical, or corporate). If not, give the web address in parentheses.

References

Please list all resources you have cited at the end of your work in alphabetical order (last name of a single author, a first author, an editor; or name of the periodical or a corporate author if there is no human author). Order resources by the same author chronologically (beginning with the earliest) and by small letters (2001a, 2001b) if more than one work has been published in the same year.

Please follow this general form: Last names, initials (Year): Title. Place of publishing: Name of publisher. Here are some examples for different types of resources:

Books:

Pizzoltato, N., & Holst, J. D (2016). Antonio Gramsci: A pedagogy to change the world. Switzerland: Springer.

OECD. (2018). Lifelong Learning for adults in South Africa: The role of Community Education and Training. Issues paper. Paris: OECD.

Nafukho, F.M., Amutabi, M.N., and Otunga, R.N. (2005). Foundations of Adult Education in Africa. Germany: UNESCO Institute for Education.

Article or chapter within an edited book:

Mayo, P. (2019). Paulo Freire and the debate about Lifelong Learning. In C.A. Torres. (Ed.). The Wiley Handbook of Paul Freire (pp. 535-550). New Jersey: Wiley Blackwell.

Articles from print or online magazines, journals or newspaper:

Harley, A. (2015). Post-Schooling People’s Education. Education as Change, 19(2), 58-81.

Klees, S. (2017). Beyond Neoliberalism: Reflections on Capitalism and Education, Policy Futures in Education. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1177/1478210317715814;

Rasmussen, P. (2012): Creative and innovative competence as a task for adult education. In: LLine, 4/2012. Retrieved from http://www.lline.fi/en.

Articles from websites:

Aslanian, C. (2006): Trends in adult learning: A 2006 snapshot. Retrieved March 12, 2008, from http://www.aslaniangroup.com/pdfs/trends-in-learning.pdf

Endnotes

Notes have to be collected at the end of the document (endnotes). Use endnotes sparingly and keep them short. Use endnotes if you want to give further explanations or supplementary information to the reader who wants to get deeper into the topic.

4. Publisher’s rights

The Publisher, MOJA, reserves the right to edit all submissions for style, structure, length, consistency and clarity. In addition, the final title of the published article, subheads, photographs and illustrations, will be chosen by the Publisher. We will send an edited version of the article back to you before publishing. You have the right to refuse permission for publishing your article if you do not agree with the revisions carried out. In this case, you have to indicate your refusal not later than one week after you receive the final version. Otherwise we will assume that you agree with publishing your article.

MOJA reserves all rights for publication (print, internet, electronic media) for all texts and images. These rights include the right to reproduce your work and the right to authorise others to reprint articles in the form in which they appeared in the journal and to authorise posting articles on websites in the form in which they appeared in the journal. It also includes the right to translate and to publish texts in other languages. The terms of the creative commons license Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0) shall apply in addition to these writer's guidelines with regard to the use of your article. See http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ for details of what this means.

Your personal data will be published with your article which you consent to. Apart from that, it will not be used for other purposes and it will not be passed on to third parties.

5. Choice of law and jurisdiction

These writer’s guidelines shall exclusively be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the Federal Republic of Germany. Each party shall exercise any right hereunder exclusively before the courts in Bonn, Germany.