About the Journal

Focus and Scope

HSSA publishes high-quality academic research in the history of science, with a focus on South Asia.

We take “South Asia” as an inclusive, non-political, socio-geographic term referring to the area from Afghanistan to Sri Lanka, from Pakistan to Bangladesh, and of course India. Research on the influences of South Asian cultures beyond these borders is also welcome, for example Nepalese or Tibetan influences on China, Sri Lankan influences on the Maldives, or Indian influences in South-East Asia.

We take “science” to be broadly conceived, and to include all forms of rigorous intellectual activity that adopt at least to some extent a quantitative and empirical approach, as in the German “Die Wissenschaft,” that covers most forms of academic scholarship. Theoretical discussions of the meaning of “science” in the South Asian context are welcome. They should presuppose some familiarity with topics such as those raised in sources like Chadha, G. and Thomas, R., eds. Mapping Scientific Method: Disciplinary Narrations (2022), Grant, A History of Natural Philosophy (2007), Latour, Laboratory Life (1979), Staal, "Concepts of Science in Europe and Asia" (1993), Shapin, “Science and the Modern World” (2007, PDF), Netz, The Shaping of Deduction (2003, PDF of Netz review by Latour), Pollock, “The Languages of Science in Early-Modern India” (in Forms of Knowledge in Early Modern Asia, 2011), and similar reflective works that explore Global History, the interpretation of modernities, and the meaning of science in the pre-modern world.

Factual articles reporting discoveries, or interpretative revisions, are also welcome, as are editions and translations of science texts in the languages South Asia.

Principles

The journal adheres to the "Principles of Transparency and Best practice in Scholarly Publishing" published by the Committee on Publication Ethics. The sections below articulate these principles as applied to HSSA.

Peer Review Process

  • Articles submitted to HSSA are anonymized and sent to external peer-reviewers.
  • At the editors' discretion, submissions may be internally peer-reviewed by the editorial board.
  • Book reviews are peer-reviewed by members of the editorial board.
  • External reviewers are chosen from internationally-renowned scholars with minimum university qualification to the PhD level in a subject related to the history of science and/or South Asian studies, and a record of publication in their own right.

Publication Frequency

Individual submissions go through peer-review.  Accepted papers are copy-edited, typeset and published as soon as they are ready, being added to the "current" volume's Table of Contents.

Open Access Policy

This journal provides immediate, free gold open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public is the most effective way to support the growth of knowledge.  Articles published in this journal qualify as Free Cultural Works.

Here is a short presentation of these benefits:

Article Processing Charges

This journal does not charge authors an APC or any other submission fee.

Sponsors

Sources of Support

The Sayahna Foundation generously supported the launch of HSSA in 2013 and provided technical, administrative and financial assistance during its first three years.  The friendly enthusiasm of Radhakrishnan CV, Rajgopal CV and Krishna GS made this journal possible.

Since 2015, the journal has been supported through the services of the University of Alberta's Digital Initiatives program.

Since 2021, the journal has received support from the Coalition Publica and Érudit, Canadian organisaions that support academic open-access publishing.

Consortium of  South-Asia related, OA, non-APC journals

The FOASAS "Initiative for Fair Open Access Publishing in South Asian Studies" gathers information about journals that adhere to the general principles of fairness and openness in academic publishing.  Some journals whose editors have decided to collaborate explicitly include:

  • History of Science in South Asia (HSSA)
  • New Explorations in South Asia Research (NESAR)
  • Journal of Yoga Studies (JoYS)

Archiving

HSSA is archived from 2013 (v 1) onwards in the the PKP Preservation Network and the Scholars Portal Trusted Digital Repository.  Since 2021, Érudit has been archiving the journal's content in a third repository, Portico.

Journal History

HSSA was launched in 2013 with the support of the Sayahna Foundation, Trivandrum, Kerala, India, at http://hssa.sayahna.org.  In 2015 it moved to the eJournals platform at the University of Alberta.

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ISSN

ISSN 2369-775X