Authors Guidelines

JOCAS website uses Dergipark UDS software. To upload an article on the website, registration is required. Once registered, you can send your article by clicking on the link Submit a Manuscript.

All the editorial and the double blind peer review process takes place on this web-based, password protected system which provides quicker access to publication review for authors, reviewers, and editors. You can follow the process of your manuscript through the User Dashboard.

For the double blind review submitted manuscripts must be in an anonymous form, no information about the author or institutions should be included in the submitted text. 

The manuscripts sent to the Journal should not have been published before or be under consideration for publication elsewhere. Conference papers can be considered for publication provided that this is made clear to JOCAS at the time of submission.

Double Blind Peer Review

All articles submitted to JOCAS for publication undergo rigorous double-blind peer review, whereby the identity of the reviewers and the authors are not disclosed to either party. Based on the initial editor screening, the manuscripts are sent to anonymous refereeing by two or three expert referees, and consequent revision by the article authors when required - all through the online system. The published article constitutes the final, definitive, and referable version of the submitted material.

Peer Review

All articles sent to JOCAS for publication is peer reviewed as explained below. The peer review is double blind, that is in all steps of the review the names of the referees and authors are kept hidden.

The articles that have passed the preliminary evaluation are sent to two referees. Referees can be either journals editorial and advisory board members or external, depending on their expertise. 

The main aim of peer review process at JOCAS is to establish whether;

            - a submitted article is original work which has not been previously published nor is under consideration by another journal, in part or whole;

            - the article meets all applicable standards of ethics;

            - the paper is relevant to JOCAS’ aims, scope, and readership;

            - a submitted article presents original research findings;

            - a submitted review article (or similar) offers a comprehensive critical review and evaluation of key literature sources for a given topic; and

            - the article is methodologically and technically sound.

Referees can accept, reject or ask the author(s) to make structural or core changes in the article. For an article to be accepted for publication, at least two referees should report positive decisions. If one referee gives positive, the other negative report, article is sent to a third referee.    

Journal of Caucasian Studies is an open access journal which means that all published content is freely available without charge to the users or institutions. All manuscripts published in this journal are free to access immediately from the date of publication. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of open access.

Copyright Notice

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

            1- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.

            2- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.

            3- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) after the publication, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work.

Cheklist

Please follow this checklist when submitting a finished manuscript to JOCAS.

1.   The work has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture or academic thesis) or is not being considered for publication elsewhere.

2.   When writing your article, make sure your paper follows the required MLA Referencing Guidelines.

3.    All articles are published in JOCAS with their abstracts in English and Turkish. Therefore, authors are asked to provide an abstract.

4.   For articles to be recorded by citation indexes, they need to be accompanied by up to five keywords. Abstract should be followed by five relevant keywords.

5.   Your text should be ordered as follows: title, abstract (max. 200 words), 5 suggested keywords, main text, acknowledgements, notes, references of cited works and appendices. To use subtitles like Introduction or Conclusion depends on the type of the work and the topic of study. The author(s) can choose to use subtitles to organise their work. Still there should always be a concluding paragraph to the article. Conclusion should be suitable to the aims and scopes of the research, it should clearly and shortly state concluding remarks without introducing any arguments that has not been discussed in the article.  

6.   JOCAS journal publishes articles in Turkish, English and Russian. Please note that if English is not your first language, you should have your text reviewed or edited by an English language editor before submitting it to JOCAS.

7.   Articles submitted should be free of any references to author(s) or institutions s/he is affiliated with. The author name should also be omitted from the manuscript for peer review. Also, please delete all personal information and identifying metadata from the file (such as the name of the author) before submission. 

8.   Sometimes, there may be problems with the online system. In case you do not receive a response from the editor within 7 days of submission that your work has been received and being reviewed for publication, please send an email to jocasdergi@gmail.com.  

FORMATTING GUIDELINES

The manuscripts should be in Word format (doc, docx), maximum 7500 words or 70 000 characters with spaces (about 20 pages).

While submitting a manuscript the following formatting is required: page size A4, side spacing 2,5 cm in the right, left, top and bottom margins, font size 12p, footnotes 10p, justified and single space; page number should be on the right bottom.

Direct quotes that are more than 3 lines should be separately given, with 1 cm indent on the left from the main text and using font size 10p.  

The Journal’s page setup is in C5 Envelope [162x229] format. For this reason, any graphics and tables should be prepared accordingly. Publication of the paintings, photographs, graphics and tables in colour should be discussed with the editors. 

Times New Roman, Arial or Calibri fonts should be used. The words should not be divided at the end of the line. 

The first line of each paragraph should be intended 0.5cm.

The punctuation should be attached to the word before, and a single space should be placed after each punctuation mark.

REFERENCING GUIDELINES

JOCAS uses the MLA Referencing System. Therefore, the citations and references in the manuscripts should be organised according to this system.

MLA format follows the author-page method for the in-text citations. This means that the author’s last name and the page number(s) from which the quotation or paraphrase is taken must appear in the text, and a complete reference should appear on your References page. The author’s name may appear either in the sentence itself or in parentheses following the quotation or paraphrase, but the page number(s) should always appear in the parentheses, not in the text of your sentence. For example:

"Shami (129) in her research on Circassians in Jordan states that in a society where family is an all-important institution in structuring social relationships, it stands to reason that the people wish to place the researcher within the context of a family."

"A focus on women in the in-depth interviews might have enabled us to hear the voices of Circassian women, the most silent group in a silenced community (Alankuş 12)."

References

Article in a Journal:

Bal, Harun, Nese Algan ve Muge Manga. “Geçiş Ekonomilerinde Ekonomik Büyüme Farklılıkları”. Çukurova Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi 19.1 (2015): 123-142 .

Brubaker, Rogers. “The ‘Diaspora’ Diaspora.” Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol. 28.1 (2005): 1-19.

Vertovec, Steven. “Transnationalism and Identity”. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 27.4 (2001): 573-582

Book:

Besleney, Zeynel A. The Circassian Diaspora in Turkey: A Political History. Oxon: Routledge, 2014.

Cohen, Robin. Global Diasporas: An Introduction. Londra: Routledge. 2008.

Chapter in an Edited Book:

Alankuş, Sevda. “Geçmişten Geleceğe Çerkesler…” Geçmişten Geleceğe Çerkesler: Kültür, Kimlik ve Siyaset. Eds. Sevda Alankuş and Esra Oktay Arı. Ankara: KAFDAV, 2014, 9-62.

Shami, Seteney. “Studying Your Own: The Complexities of a Shared Culture,” Arab Women in the Field: Studying Your Own Society. Eds. Soraya Altorki and C. F. El-Solh. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press,1988. 115-138.

De Souza, Roger-Mark. “No Place Like Home: Returnee R&R (Retention and Rejection) in the Caribbean Homeland.” The Experience of Return Migration: Caribbean Perspectives. Eds. Robert B. Potter, Dennis Conway and Joan Phillips. Hants Ashgate Publishing Limited. 2005. 135-156.

Thesis:

Doğan, Setenay Nil. Formations of Diaspora Nationalism: The Case of Circassians in Turkey, Sabancı University, PhD thesis. 2009.

Proceeding/Conference Paper:

Düvell, Franck. “The Emergence of a New Global Migration Order: Towards a New Russian-Turkish Migration Systems?” 9th Turkmis Workshop -Towards New Migration Systems, Patterns and Policies in Eurasia: The Case of Turkey and the Russian Federation Konferansında sunum; University of Oxford, 25 November 2013. http://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/fileadmin/files/events/Events_2013/9_TurkMiS_The_Emergence_of_a_New_Global_Migration_Order_Towards_a_New_Russian_Turkish_Migration_Systems.pdf. 20 August 2016.

Internet Page:

Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, http://www.turkey.mid.ru/rus/cons_Memo_entering_ Turkey.html 30 August 2016.

Two works by the same author:

Tsuda, Takeyuki. Introduction: Diasporic Return and Migration Studies. Ed. Takeyuki Tsuda Diasporic Homecomings: Ethnic Return Migration in Comparative Perspective. Stanford, California: Standard, California: Stanford University Press, 2009a. 1-20.

____ Why Does the Diaspora Return Home? The Causes of Ethnic Return Migration. Ed. Takeyuki Tsuda  Diasporic Homecomings: Ethnic Return Migration in Comparative Perspective. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2009b. 21-43.