About this Network

H-Ideas is H-Net's Network on intellectual history.

I. The H-Ideas Network: Scope, Content, Purpose

H-Ideas is a network for scholarly collaboration on the history of ideas, broadly defined. It has a two-fold purpose: (1) to foster communication and debate among the international community of professional historians and scholars interested in intellectual history and the history of ideas, and (2) to serve as a network for information relevant to the varied professional interests of this community, including teaching methods, scholarly conferences, and publications.

H-Ideas encourages scholarly exchanges on all aspects of its subject, regardless of countries or periods involved. It is open to scholars, students, teachers, librarians, and all who want to participate in an academic discussion of the history of ideas and intellectual history. They may raise research questions, open scholarly dialogue, provide information about conferences and symposia, list new sources of information--whether online, print, or archival, report tables of contents of journals, discuss teaching materials, post job openings, and report non-commercial announcements of books, software, datasets, or cd-roms. H-Ideas also publishes commissioned book reviews. On its network, readers will find logs containing prior discussions, book reviews, and other matters of interest.

H-Ideas is a moderated network. The editors reserve the right to see that the network remains devoted to its mission. In addition to the more obvious requirements of readability, accuracy and collegiality, editors seek to ensure that all contributions follow the manner of scholarly exchange. Contributions should focus on ideas, issues or debates, and situate these in a historical or historiographical context. The editors reserve the right to keep the discussion on the subject, free from ad hominem attacks or other arguments that go beyond the limits of accepted professional discourse. Contributions or responses that in the editors' judgment fail to meet one or more of these criteria may be returned to the submitter for revision. The intention of such action is neither to censor nor prejudge any viewpoint, but to retain the professional and scholarly character of H-Ideas. Following Milton's lead, the editors understand that "a wise man, like a good refiner, can gather gold out of the drossiest volume" (_Areopagitica_).

H-Ideas is primarily intended for the development, dissemination and discussion of projects, issues and information in intellectual history and the history of ideas. It cannot and should not promote political causes, nor advocate on behalf of particular political interests, except where those impact directly on the professional or scholarly pursuits of our subscribers or on the future of the network itself. Therefore, H-Ideas will not post contributions which seek to promote specific political campaigns or particular political interests.

H-Ideas does not run advertisements. It welcomes information about new books, new journals, new sources, fellowship and scholarship opportunities, proposed conferences, and through H-NET job listings. But it will not run solicitations to purchase books, or to subscribe to journals, or to apply for admission to particular academic programs.

H-Ideas will post book reviews it has commissioned through the H-NET book review project, and it will encourage discussion of these once they appear. The editors will also, from time to time, post reviews forwarded from other lists if, in their judgment, these may be of interest to subscribers. H-Ideas will not, however, post unsolicited book reviews.

H-Ideas will post abstracts of articles appearing in scholarly journals or of papers presented at scholarly conferences, as well as items from other networks, if in the judgment of the editors these relate to subscribers' interests and are not of excessive length. Copyrighted materials will be posted with the express permission of the copyright holder.

H-Ideas will regularly post information about new networks or other resources on the Internet that might be of interest.

H-Ideas welcomes requests for information from subscribers for whom standard reference sources have proven inadequate, but it discourages-and may not run-inquiries easily answerable from such sources. It encourages potential authors of theses and dissertations, as well as articles and books, to use its facilities as a way of determining who else may be working on particular topics; but the moderators ask those responding to such inquiries to consider whether their reply will be of general interest to everyone on the network, or might better be sent directly to the subscriber making the inquiry.

H-Ideas is very much a "work in progress." Accordingly, the editors and the Editorial Board all strongly encourage suggestions from subscribers as to how the network might be improved.

II. Editors.

H-Ideas is edited by field experts approved by the network board and certified by H-Net’s Executive Council.  The editors serve two-year renewable terms and rotate their duties. Editors are listed in the Network Staff List linked from the network’s front page. The editors will solicit postings through the Commons, will approve new subscriptions, will handle routine inquiries, and manage submissions. Anyone with suggestions about what H-Ideas can and might do is invited to send in ideas by writing to the editorial address. The editors will solicit and post newsletter-type information (calls for conferences, for example, or listings of sessions at conventions.) Like all H-Net networks, H-Ideas is moderated to edit out material that, in the editors' opinion, is not germane to the network mission, involves technical matters (such as subscription management requests), is inflammatory, or violates evolving, yet common, standards of Internet etiquette. Please read section III below for details about ownership, style, formatting, and content of your messages. H-Net's procedure for resolving disputes over editorial practices is Article II, Section 2.02 of our council policies, located at:

http://www.h-net.org/about/policies.php

For a list of current editors, visit: https://networks.h-net.org/node/6873/staffpage

III. Communicating Through the Network.

A. Copyright notice. PLEASE READ CAREFULLY. H-Net considers all messages posted to its forums to be a form of publication. Unless otherwise arranged with H-Net, all contributions to H-Ideas are subject to H-Net’s Terms of Use and its policies concerning copyright and intellectual property, Art. III, Sec. 3.01-3.08 of the H-Net Council Policies. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of H-Net's terms of use. Users of the site verify that they are authorized by copyright holders to submit content to H-Net for publication according to those terms of use, including the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License linked here http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/. Unless otherwise indicated, reviews commissioned by H-Net and published under its imprint are subject to a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

A full copy of the H-Net Council Policies and Bylaws and other important information may be found at: http://www.h-net.org/about/.

B. Contributions: The tone and content of H-Ideas depends directly on subscribers. The editors want to encourage lively, informal, productive discussion and exchange of information. To that end, we ask that contributions be considerate of the needs of a busy audience of scholars, many of whom must pay for their access to the internet. A number of excellent guides to online behavior and style are available on the internet and we invite you consult them.

-- ALL CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE NETWORK MUST BE SIGNED. If your profile on the H-Net Commons is not filled out with a valid name and affiliation the editors will delay posting until authorship and email address are confirmed.

-- CONTENT: Editors retain the right to review material for its pertinence, tone, style, and relevance to the network's mission. Ad hominems, unattributed quotations or innuendo, private messages forwarded for posting without permission, or messages that violate the norms of civility and professional courtesy will be rejected. Persistent violators can be removed as subscribers to the network.  H-Net permanently archives its content on the H-Net Commons.  Do not submit material that you consider to be of a private nature or that you would not want available to future readers.

-- STYLE: the default editorial style for discussion postings is that of a letter to the editor. Your remarks can be crafted to suit the tone of an existing discussion thread, but in any case they should address the editor and not make direct personal references to others, except where you are replying directly to a simple query (e.g., "you can find this information in Webster's Third International Dictionary."). Avoid excessive quotation of messages you refer or reply to.

-- FORMAT: While you can submit your posts to the Commons using various fonts, styles and formatting these may be edited by the editor for uniformity and readability.

IV. Technical Information.

When you subscribe to the Commons, H-Net will send you a confirmation message containing important information about managing your subscription. For online help with your subscription see http://networks.h-net.org/help-desk, especially the “Getting Started” section. These guides will help you modify your notifications, unsubscribe from the network, change the e-mail address associated with your profile, and use your “My H-Net” page effectively. If you still have questions after reading the guides please email help@mail.h-net.msu.edu.

V. The H-Ideas Network Site

The H-Ideas network site contains the following required information and services:

- The archives of the H-Ideas network discussions and other uploaded content

- The network's official documents: its about page, lists of board members and editors, contact information, and other founding and information documents.

- Hypertext links to resources in our subject: teaching materials, research archives, other networks.

VI. Advisory Board.

H-Ideas's daily activities are managed by the editors. Its long-term policies are developed by the advisory board. If you are interested in serving on the board, please contact the current editor. Board members referee incoming articles, reviews, and teaching materials; establish basic subscription restrictions and policy; advise the editors on disputes among editors and subscribers; monitor the network and make active contributions to discussion; and serve as the subscribers' voice in H-Net affairs. You are encouraged to contact any or all of the editorial board members with ideas and concerns about H-Ideas.

For a list of the current advisory board, visit: https://networks.h-net.org/node/6873/staffpage

VII. Our Parent Organization: H-Net

H-Net is an international consortium of scholars in the humanities and social sciences that creates and coordinates electronic networks, using a variety of media, and with a common objective of advancing humanities and social science teaching and research. H-Net was created to provide a positive, supportive, egalitarian environment for the friendly exchange of ideas and scholarly resources.

The goals of H-NET networks are to enable scholars to easily communicate current research and teaching interests; to discuss new approaches, methods and tools of analysis; to share information on electronic databases; and to test new ideas and share comments on the literature in their fields.

H-Net's Council Policies and Bylaws, along with a list of its officers and committees, is available at: http://www.h-net.org/about/

Among H-Net's many services are:

- Book and software reviews: timely, exhaustive, authoritative, professional, fast. Mailed through our lists and stored in searchable, printable, retrievable format on our site at http://www.h-net.org/reviews.

- Job guide postings: at regular intervals, H-Net offers employment information in a broad array of fields in the humanities and social sciences. https://www.h-net.org/jobs/home.php

- H-Net calendar: announcements of conferences, papers, and professional activities, archived and searchable at our web site. You can visit our site and sample these and other services, at: http://www.h-net.org/announce

CONTACTING H-NET FOR MORE INFORMATION:

http://www.h-net.org

E-mail: help@mail.h-net.msu.edu

Postal mail:
H-Net
506 East Circle Drive
141H Old Horticulture
East Lansing, MI 48824
Phone: (517) 432-5134
Fax: (517) 884-6994

 

Jesse Draper

Interim Director and Associate Director of Networks

Email: draperje@mail.h-net.org