Peer Review Policy

Reviewing 

One of the members of the editorial team will contact two reviewers within one week after a decision has been made with respect to the suitability of the paper. They are asked to send in their review 6 weeks after they have accepted the invitation and have been sent the manuscript. In case they cannot accept the invitation, the member of the editorial team will find new suitable reviewers.

The reviewers are experts in the (sub-)domain of the paper which they are invited to evaluate. They are not part of the editorial team of the journal and they are asked to disclose any potential conflict of interest prior to the reviewing process.

The Annals of the University of Bucharest, Foreign Languages and Literatures is a double-blind peer-reviewed journal. The authors are required to secure the anonymity of the manuscript. There should be no author’s name or affiliation on the title page and no reference in the text which could reveal the identity of the author(s) so that the reviewers do not know who the author(s) of the paper is/are.  The reviewers will remain anonymous to the author(s). In case they identify the author(s) they are kindly asked to inform the editorial team. This, however, does not automatically qualify them as unsuitable reviewers.

The peer-reviewing policy ensures that manuscript evaluation is confidential and unbiased. Given the potential diversity of submissions, reviewers are not required to fill in a standardized form. However, it is required that the evaluation of the paper should focus on research integrity, clarity, methodology, coherence, validity, and originality.  The reviewer should ensure that arguments, analyses, statements which have been previously published or reported are accompanied by appropriate reference. Relevant work which the author has not cited should be identified. In case  reviewers notice a significant similarity between the manuscript and previously published studies  they are required to announce the editorial team.

The reviewer must offer polite and constructive suggestions, offer appropriate supporting arguments and clearly account for the final decision: (i) accept; (ii) accept with minor revisions; (iii) accept with major revisions; (iv) revise and resubmit.

Personal criticism of the author(s) is not acceptable. Information obtained through peer review should not be used and should be kept confidential.

If the reviewers give conflicting decisions, one of the members of the editorial board is invited to solve the conflict. In the unlikely case that one of the reviewers postpones sending in the review even after having been kindly reminded of the deadline on several occasions, one of the members of the editorial board will be asked to make a final decision on the basis of the manuscript and one review.

In case the evaluation decision is “accept with minor/major revisions” authors are asked to provide a roadmap letter in which they explain if and how they incorporated the reviewers’ suggestions into the revised version of the paper. The editors reserve the right to reject the revised paper if the author(s) has/have totally disregarded the reviewers’ recommendations.

Once an article has been accepted for publication the author(s) will be asked to format it according to the Guidelines of The Annals of the University of Bucharest. Foreign Languages and Literatures , available on the webpage.

In the case of book reviews, the editor-in-chief checks if it discusses work which matches the profile of the journal, if the author has not published it elsewhere and whether it is written in accordance with the review format of the journal. If the book review does not meet the focus and scope of the journal, the author is informed within two weeks. Since book reviews do not undergo a blind reviewing process, if a review is considered publishable, the editor-in-chief or another member of the editorial team will check it for plagiarism.  If the review is evaluated as publishable, a member of the editorial team will send the author suggestions, comments, etc. that might contribute to the improvement of the review.

Proposals for themed issues must be sent to the editorial assistant and, upon approval, the guest editor of the issue is invited to submit the collection of papers, which will be each subject to the same evaluation procedure for papers described above. Guest editors may make suggestions of possible reviewers but the editors reserve the right to have the final decision.