BUCLD Proceedings info for contributors

BUCLD 37: Proceedings of the 37th annual
Boston University Conference on Language Development

Advance information | Letter to authors | Order form

Information for contributors
Submission deadline: January 25, 2013

The Proceedings of the 37th annual Boston University Conference on Language Development will be published in the spring by Cascadilla Press. All speakers and alternates are invited to contribute their papers to the proceedings. Posters are published in a separate proceedings supplement.

To publish your paper in the proceedings, you will need to upload a PDF file of your paper by January 25 along with an abstract for your paper and a scan of your signed publication rights form. Also mail your signed publication rights form (signed in ink on paper by ALL authors) by January 25 to the BUCLD office. Earlier is always better. The volume editors will check your paper's formatting and let you know what changes to make. Once you have a final PDF file of your paper, you'll need to mail a printout to the BUCLD office.

Our formatting requirements are at www.cascadilla.com/bucld-style.html along with complete instructions.

Upload your paper in PDF format and your abstract in text format at http://www.bu.edu/bucld/proceedings/submission/. The BUCLD office address is:

BUCLD
Attn: Proceedings
96 Cummington St., Room 244
Boston, MA 02215
USA
phone number for use on shipping documents when required: 617-353-3085
e-mail for the proceedings editors: langconf@bu.edu

Everyone who registered for the full 3 days of the conference will receive a free copy of the proceedings. All authors who contribute papers to the proceedings are entitled to a 20% discount on additional copies of the proceedings. Just mention on your order that you are a contributor to the volume. (This discount does not apply to shipping costs and cannot be combined with the prepublication discount.)

Copies of the proceedings will be available from Cascadilla Press in the spring. Thanks for your time, and if you have any questions, please contact langconf@bu.edu.

Yours,

Michael Bernstein
Cascadilla Press

Timeline

Step 1: Finish your paper, proofread it, and format it according to the style sheet below. Make a PDF file of your paper.
Step 2: Fill out and sign the publication rights form, and scan it in.
Step 3: Write a short abstract.
Step 4: Upload your paper, your abstract, and the scan of your rights form by January 25 (see link above). On or before that date, mail your signed publication rights form.
Step 5: Make formatting changes that the volume editors tell you about, and upload a corrected PDF file of your paper.
Step 6: Once your paper's formatting is approved by the volume editors, mail a printout of the final PDF file to the BUCLD office. Also mail the printout of your abstract.

Style Sheet

You should treat this style sheet like a checklist, and make sure you have followed every point before you upload your paper.

On our web site, there is a one-page example in Acrobat (pdf) format of how your paper should look. Please compare it to how your paper actually looks before you mail in your paper. Important: Don't use the "fit to page" option when printing the pdf file, or the page will print out at a reduced size. The text block should be 4.5 inches across at its widest point.

If you have any questions, please contact langconf@bu.edu, not Cascadilla Press.

Page limit

The general page limit is 13 pages, including appendices and references. The page limit for the keynote and plenary speakers is 30 pages, and the page limit for lunch symposium speakers is 20 pages. You aren't obliged to use all the allotted pages, of course.

We are allowing up to 4 extra pages this year for papers, at a cost of $40 per additional page. This gives authors an option for including some extra material without raising the cost of the proceedings. Payment for any extra pages must be sent with your paper, payable to Cascadilla Press as a check in US dollars drawn on a US bank.

Margins

For 8.5" x 11" page setup: left, right, and bottom margins must be 2 inches. The top margin must be 1.75 inches. No material may go beyond these margins under any circumstances. Please print out a page of your paper at 100% (not reduced) and measure the width of the text block. It should be 4.5 inches across. If it is not 4.5 inches across, then something is wrong.

For A4 page setup: margins must be 1.884 inches left and right, 1.75 inches on the top, and 2.693 inches on the bottom. No material may go beyond these margins under any circumstances. Please print out a page of your paper at 100% (not reduced) and measure the width of the text block. It should be 4.5 inches (114.3 mm) across. If it is not 4.5 (114.3 mm) inches across, then something is wrong.

Font

The font should be Times or Times New Roman 10-point throughout for text, examples, diagrams, etc. Footnotes and references should be 9-point. Note: Times is available for TeX; if you don't know how to get it, ask your local computer expert to help.

Superscripted and subscripted material can be 9-point.

Title and author

Before the title at the top of the first page, type the following three lines in Times 10-point, single-spaced:

BUCLD 37 Proceedings
To be published in 2013 by Cascadilla Press
Rights forms signed by all authors

These three lines will be removed before publication, but we need these lines on your paper when you send it to us. Do not squeeze them into two lines; there must be three lines of text before your title.

Place your title at the top of the first page immediately after these three lines.

The title must be 12-point bold, centered.

Capitalize the first word and last word of the title and sub-title, and then capitalize all words except determiners, coordinating conjunctions, prepositions, and words cited as linguistic examples. For hyphenated compounds, capitalize the first element; also capitalize the second element unless the first element is a prefix or the second element is a determiner, conjunction, or preposition. Capitalize means making the first letter a capital letter. Do not put any words in your title in ALL CAPS (except for acronyms). Here's a correct example:

Seeing the Structure: How Adults Describe Grammar in a Visual Paradigm

After the title, skip a line, and list all authors on the following line. Author names should be 10-point bold, centered. Do not use an ampersand; spell out the word 'and'.

Author One
Author One and Author Two
Author One, Author Two, and Author Three

Skip two lines before the start of your text.

Author affiliation and contact information should be put in the first footnote.

Line spacing, indents, and justification

Text should be single-spaced.

Text, footnotes, and references should be fully justified.

Do not skip a line between paragraphs.

The first line of each paragraph should be indented 0.25 inch.

Examples

Examples should be in the same font and font size as the text of the paper. Use the following format for examples:

(1)  a. Example example.
        Gloss   gloss
        'Translation.'

Examples should not be indented.

Skip one line before and after examples.

Words from examples referred to in the text or in your title should be in italics.

Headings

Number your section headings, starting with 1.

You do not have to have a heading for the introduction to your paper, but if you do it should be numbered 1 (not 0).

Section headings must be left-justified.

Section numbers and headings must be 10-point bold, not underlined.

Skip one line before and after section headings.

Use the same format for headings and for subheadings, if you decide to use subheadings. Do not skip a line directly between a heading and a subheading. For example, if section 4 presents results for 3 experiments, you could write:

4. Results
4.1. Experiment 1

        In this experiment we found . . .

4.2. Experiment 2

        The results of the second experiment were not as . . .

4.3. Experiment 3

        We were startled to discover that . . .

Tables and figures

Tables and figures must be in their actual positions in the paper, not placed at the end or on separate pages. Do not use color in your tables and figures. Make sure that any text in your tables and figures is at a large enough font size to read easily. Tables and figures should be crisp when viewed on screen and when printed. If they are blurry when the text paragraphs are crisp, this indicates that their resolution is too low. Images should be at least 300 dpi at their final size.

Number tables and figures separately.

The label or title for a table should be before the table, left-justified, and bold. The label or caption for a figure should be after the figure, left-justified, and bold.

Footnotes

Footnotes should be used to comment on the content of your paper. Do not use footnotes for references.

Footnotes should be at the bottom of the relevant page. Do not use endnotes.

Footnotes should be in 9-point type, rather than the 10-point used in the text.

Do not skip lines between footnotes if you have more than one footnote on a page.

Footnotes should be single-spaced.

Use a * (an asterisk) for your first footnote for acknowledgments, author affiliation, and author contact info. Within the text, put the * in the text at the end of the first section heading and make the color of the * white so it won't print.

Appendices

If you have any appendices, they should come after all material except the references. The references should be the last item in the paper, not the appendices.

References

After your text and any appendices, skip one line and type References (in 10-point bold, left-justified).

Skip one line, and start the references. Do not skip lines between references.

References should be in 9-point type, rather than the 10-point used in the text.

References should be single-spaced.

Second and successive lines for each reference should be indented 0.25 inch. (This is called a hanging indent, and is backwards from how a regular paragraph is indented. Check your word processor's manual or online help for instructions on how to create a hanging indent.)

You may use any common format (LSA, MLA, APA, etc.) for the references, as long as you use that format for all of your references. If your preferred format requires first initials instead of full first names, we require one change to that format: You must include full first names for all authors and editors in your references unless they published the original work using only initials. For example, you must use "Chomsky, Noam" rather than "Chomsky, N."

Printing

Print your paper on a laser printer. Ink jet printouts and photocopies are not acceptable!

The printed copy must be single-sided.

Measure the margins on the printed pages. Margins sometimes change between the version on your screen and the printed version. Also make sure that all of your tables and figures are inside the margins.

A good way to check your margins on the printed version is to cut out a card 4.5 inches wide and 7.25 inches long (or 11.4 x 18.4 cm). Cover the text on your page with the card. If you can see text or figures past any edge of the card, you need to correct your margins to make them larger (and the text block narrower). If you can slide the card from side to side without revealing any text, you need to make your side margins smaller (and the text block wider).

Do not worry if some or all text blocks are a bit shorter than the card -- that is expected. If text blocks are longer than the card, then you need to increase your bottom margin to make the text block shorter.

Proofread your paper one more time. Remember that the paper you give us will be printed exactly as we receive it, including typos. We make occasional corrections when we notice a problem, but we do not proofread your paper.

When you mail your paper, include the separate abstract (see below for instructions).

If you have any questions, please contact langconf@bu.edu, not Cascadilla Press.

BUCLD Proceedings publication rights form

This completed form must have original signatures from all authors. We require signatures in ink on paper. No faxed or electronic signatures, no exceptions.

Paper title:

Author(s):

E-mail address for every author:

How to invert first author's name for references (as in "van Hout, Angeliek"):

How to alphabetize first author's last name (as in "Hout"):

The author(s) grant non-exclusive publication rights to Cascadilla Press for the above paper and all accompanying material. These publication rights include without limitation all forms of print and electronic publication. These publication rights may be further transferred or extended by Cascadilla Press to third parties in part or in whole. The author(s) warrant that this paper is the original work of the author(s), does not infringe any rights of others, and that the author(s) have the right to grant these publication rights. The author(s) also warrant that they have obtained written permission for any matter they have included by other authors where such permission is required by law. Copyright of this paper is retained by the author(s).

Signature(s) and date:

This form must be signed by all authors. Authors may sign separate copies of the form if that is more convenient.

Fill out this form and return it by January 25 to:
BUCLD
Attn: Proceedings
96 Cummington St., Room 244
Boston, MA 02215
USA

Future publication in a journal

We sometimes receive questions about whether authors can publish a proceedings paper and later publish a journal article that overlaps with that paper or expands on that paper. It is common and appropriate to publish a proceedings paper on a topic, continue to develop your research and ideas, and then publish a more developed journal article.

Here is a statement from the editors of Language Acquisition: "A paper overlapping with another previously published in conference proceedings can be considered for publication in Language Acquisition, provided that the submitted paper includes substantially more developed arguments, data or discussion."

Language explains in their Notes to Contributors: "If some of the results in a submitted paper have been published elsewhere, the paper you submit should build on those results and should develop the ideas and evidence along new lines or in greater depth."

You do not need to obtain permission from Cascadilla Press to republish any identical or further developed portions from a paper you published in the BUCLD Proceedings, because you retain the copyright to your paper. You should acknowledge the earlier publication appropriately, of course.

Instructions for abstracts

When you send us your paper, please also send us a one-paragraph abstract of your paper on a separate page. This is not for inclusion in the proceedings, but rather to make it easier for other people to find your paper. The abstract should be written in third person, rather than first person, and should not be more than 250 words. The abstract must be one single paragraph. Examples must be contained in the paragraph, not on separate lines. Do not use any phonetic characters, phonetic fonts, or other specialty fonts. Put "abstract" at the beginning, followed by the title and author. No formatting of any sort is required for the abstract.

Please also upload your abstract at: http://www.bu.edu/bucld/proceedings/submission/

Instructions for your PDF file

We need a PDF file of your paper before the printed copy. This does not replace the printed copy that you will have to mail in after your PDF file is approved, and we will only be able to accept PDF files (not Word, WordPerfect, TeX, or anything else).

It is very important that the PDF file be exactly what you want. The best way to ensure this is to create your PDF file, print out that PDF file for yourself, and check the PDF printout carefully to make sure that no fonts are missing or changed, no material goes beyond the margins, and your images all look correct.

When you generate the PDF file for your paper, make sure you embed ALL fonts. If you use a phonetic character font, you must embed that font or else the published book may contain arbitrary letters or symbols instead of the characters you intended.

After your PDF file is approved, you will have to mail a printout of that approved PDF file (not a printout of a different PDF file, and not a printout from Word or LaTeX). Check your printout very carefully before you mail it, because any problems in that printout are very likely to appear in the published book.

Information for contributors Submission deadline: January 25, 2013