Scholarly Communication at Texas A&M

Our University community is home to many distinguished TAMU faculty members who have, over the years, written textbooks and other important monographs for academic and scholarly audiences. With the passage of time, some of these titles have gone out of print and are no longer readily available to potential readers. Certain that demand still exists for such works, their authors have reclaimed the rights once transferred to publishers. These authors are, in effect, ‘re-publishing’ their works via open access using today’s digital and Internet technologies. In this way, TAMU authors are extending the reach and impact of their works to serve new audiences worldwide.

One example of this open access republishing trend is the work of Dr. Ray M. Bowen, Professor and President Emeritus of Texas A&M. Thanks to Dr. Bowen’s efforts to reclaim the rights to his previously published works, three books previously sold under the imprint of Plenum Press have now been freely republished in the Texas A&M Digital Repository (Dr. Bowen’s digital collection is online at http://repository.tamu.edu/handle/1969.1/2500.) These titles now see wide usage from around the world.

If a TAMU author believes that demand exists for his or her out-of-print publication, s/he is encouraged to explore whether the rights to that work can revert back to the author. Historically, the standard language in book contracts required that authors transfer to the publisher the right to reproduce the work and the right to distribute copies of the work to the public. Such contracts also contained a reversion of rights clause by which the publisher’s rights terminated if/when the book went out of print.

Authors wishing to pursue a reversion of their rights need to check the original publishing contract, if available, to see if an appropriate clause was included. It may be necessary to write to the publisher’s rights and permissions department to clarify the procedure for reclaiming reverted rights.

Once rights have reverted to an author, s/he is invited to digitally republish the work via the Texas A&M Digital Repository. There is no cost to the author or the users for this service, and it provides an easy and effective way to extend the life of the work for many years to come.

Information about submitting works to the Texas A&M Digital Repository is available online or by contacting the Libraries’ Digital Services & Scholarly Communication Office at digital@library.tamu.edu.

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