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How to list publications in conference volumes?

In most recent "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks:

In a recent post, it sounded like people were thinking that publications in conference volumes, where everyone who participated in the conference receives a block invitation to submit their paper for review, are functionally identical to invited publications. Is this true? Should publications in conference proceedings or books compiled from a conference be treated like invited publications on a CV, where you may sometimes want to indicate that they are invited? (Is this an example of academic "over-thinking" it?)

Good question, and I'm not sure–though I suspect there may be some overthinking here. In the case the OP describes, everyone who participates in the conference volume receives an invitation to submit a paper for review. But, presumably they already submitted something for the conference and had it accepted there. So, if the paper goes through further review after the conference (especially if the review process is legitimate and papers can be and are rejected), then it's not entirely clear to me how it is an "invited" publication (as opposed to simply a peer-reviewed article). 

What do readers think?

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5 responses to “How to list publications in conference volumes?”

  1. me

    I think this really depends on the details. For example, in philosophy of science, presenting at the PSA usually comes with an invitation to have your paper including in the PSA volume – which is published and distributed as part of the journal Philosophy of Science. It is a very respectable place to publish. And one is rightly proud to have their paper included. This sort of thing can be listed in your list of refereed publications -in fact, it was refereed first to get on the program, and then to get in the volume. Nonetheless, it is easier to get in a PSA issue than the regular journal (that is, the acceptance rates are higher). Also, the word limit is lower for the PSA papers, so they tend to be a little thinner. But not all conference volumes work this way. If it is a regional conference, for example, and all presented papers will be included in a volume (special issue or book), then it will not count for much. Indeed, I refereed such a volume once, noting that one paper (by a local) did not belong, given the theme. It was included in the volume, and then in a book review I read of the volume they raised the same question – why is this paper in here?

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  2. also curious

    I have a hunch that OP is referring to the conferences associated Oxford Studies in X, e.g. the Arizona Workshop in Normative Ethics conference that later publishes those papers in Oxford Studies in Normative Ethics.
    I’ve heard that you can list an accepted abstract as forthcoming, but I’m also uncertain and would like to hear other’s perspectives.

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  3. ttprof

    As I think is implied by ‘me’ above, I think it is more important to distinguish between peer-reviewed and non-peer reviewed works on your CV, rather than specifying invited versus not.
    Whether everyone was invited or not seems, to me, irrelevant (except in the regional case ‘me’ notes) – what matters is a) that it was published, and b) the level of scholarly scrutiny which was applied to that publication – ie, peer review.
    The only thing that I think should be indicated as refereed versus invited is a talk/lecture/etc. because someone asking you to give a talk can be less or more impressive (if it is a department colloquium at your friend’s institution vs. named lecture series, for example), but getting a coveted spot at a specialist conference over fifty or more folks indicates how other specialists see your research fitting into the present literature.

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  4. vaguely informed

    My impression of the Arizona Workshop in Normative Ethics (and MadMeta, though I know less about that one) is that while most papers presented are published in Oxford Studies, it’s far from unheard of that a presented paper is not published once the papers are refereed. So, publication is not quite a forgone conclusion, and I would hesitate to list an accepted abstract as a forthcoming paper.

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  5. Bill V.

    Examples of parenthetical remarks you can put before c.v. entries:
    (refereed abstract)
    (refereed conference paper)
    (conference proceedings; full paper refereed)
    (invited book chapter)
    (invited conference presentation, later rewritten and published in the proceedings)
    (refereed paper, co-written with X and Y; my contribution was z%)
    I.e., say what the thing is and you can’t go wrong. It is good practice to distinguish presentations from publications, and refereed from non-refereed within each, but you can do that with parenthetical remarks until you have a sufficient number of entries of each kind to create sub-sections. Many readers of cv’s will look askance at anything that could be construed as attempting to pull the wool over their eyes (e.g., listing submitted as if it were accepted, conferences as if they were publications, putting works in progress under publications, etc.).

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