探花直播 of Cambridge - publishing

Professor David Abulafia awarded Wolfson History Prize 2020

Anonymous — Tue, 16 Jun 2020 07:56:20 +0000

This year鈥檚 Wolfson History Prize has been awarded to David Abulafia, Emeritus Professor of Mediterranean History and Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, for his book 探花直播Boundless Sea: A Human History of the Oceans, published last autumn.

探花直播book traces the history of human movement, trade and communication around and across the world's greatest bodies of water, charting our relationship with the oceans from the time of the earliest seafaring societies to the maritime networks of today鈥檚 container ships.

探花直播award was announced on Monday night at the Wolfson Prize鈥檚 first virtual ceremony, which featured guest appearances from previous winners, including Professor Mary Beard from the 探花直播鈥檚 Faculty of Classics. 探花直播virtual winner announcement can be viewed below.

探花直播Chair of the Wolfson Prize judging panel, Professor David Cannadine, described the book as one of 鈥渄eep scholarship鈥� and said it was brilliantly written.

鈥� 探花直播Boundless Sea tackles a world encompassing subject: humanity鈥檚 constantly changing relationship with the seas that cover most of our planet and on which our very lives depend,鈥� Cannadine said. 聽聽

In 探花直播Boundless Sea, Abulafia follows merchants, explorers, pirates, cartographers and travellers in their quests for spices, gold, ivory, slaves, lands for settlement and knowledge of what lay beyond. It builds on Abulafia鈥檚 previous book 探花直播Great Sea, a human history of the Mediterranean.

探花直播Boundless Sea aims to go beyond 鈥淓urocentric鈥� approaches, examining the Atlantic waters before Columbus, and showing how lucrative trade routes were created that carried goods and ideas along the "Silk Route of the Sea"聽well before Europeans burst into the Indian Ocean around 1500.

鈥淲inning the Wolfson History Prize I see as a tribute to all of us who have been trying to communicate history to the public, writing in an accessible way without jargon, and making sure that people see the past as an essential part of our human experience,鈥� said Abulafia, a former Chair of Cambridge鈥檚 Faculty of History.

探花直播Wolfson History Prize is run and awarded by the Wolfson Foundation, an independent charity that awards grants in the fields of science, health, heritage, humanities, and the arts. 聽

Paul Ramsbottom, chief executive at the Wolfson Foundation, said that the Prize celebrates 鈥渢he importance to society of outstanding and accessible history writing鈥�.

鈥淒avid Abulafia鈥檚 book is magnificently ambitious, brilliantly examining the changing, extraordinary connections between the vast oceans and humanity,鈥� said Ramsbottom. 鈥淲hile broad in chronological sweep, this clearly has a strong contemporary resonance 鈥� as our relationship with the natural world (including the oceans) is under scrutiny as never before.鈥�

Professor David Abulafia is a maritime historian who has spent his career teaching and researching in the History Faculty at Cambridge 探花直播. He is the Papathomas Professorial Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, and a Fellow of the British Academy.

Abulafia wins for his epic history of humanity鈥檚 relationship with the world鈥檚 oceans, 探花直播Boundless Sea.

A remarkable book which through immense and impeccable research helps us to understand humanity鈥檚 relationship with the waters on which our future depends.

Wolfson History Prize judges

探花直播Holberg Prize

David Abulafia speaking at the Holberg Prize symposium.

探花直播text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright 漏探花直播 of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified.聽 All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways 鈥� as here, on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

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CUP opens access to support learning and research

ta385 — Wed, 15 Apr 2020 08:30:02 +0000

Higher education textbooks and reference works have been made freely available to students online through their universities, while coronavirus research has been placed into a free online collection, with new articles fast-tracked through the peer review and publishing process to join them.

Teachers, pupils and parents are also being given free online access to the Press鈥檚 schoolbooks, along with worksheets and instructional videos. Blogs are being constantly updated with new content to support those adjusting to teaching and learning remotely.

Peter Phillips, CUP鈥檚 Chief Executive, said: 鈥� 探花直播pandemic is disrupting normal life almost everywhere. It鈥檚 vital that we do what we can to minimise its effects on learning and research, but also to get world-class research on this virus into the hands of anyone who needs it.鈥�

Action has been taken across all three of the Press鈥檚 publishing groups.

Academic publishing has made more than 700 textbooks in HTML format available online to students through their university libraries. In addition, existing customers are being offered free access to key reference works on request to help them overcome the disruption caused by the global response to the pandemic.

At the same time, there is free access to a growing collection of COVID-19 and coronavirus-related research on Cambridge Core 鈥� the online home of the Press鈥檚 academic books and journals. New research is being added all the time, with editorial processes adapted to ensure publication within 24 hours of receipt of the accepted manuscript, so the most-up-to-date information is shared as rapidly as possible. Press-published 鈥楪old鈥� Open Access journals are also waiving the normal Article Processing Charges for COVID-19 or coronavirus-related research up until June 2020, meaning there is no cost to the authors or their institutions.

探花直播Press has also joined more than 30 leading publishers in committing to making all of its COVID-19 and coronavirus-related publications, and the available data supporting them, immediately accessible in PubMed Central (PMC) and other public repositories.聽More information here.

ELT publishing group has launched a global campaign 鈥� Supporting Every Teacher 鈥� working with colleagues in Cambridge Assessment English to deliver free, online content to support teachers and learners. Begun in March, the campaign has already reached two million people, with resources on offer including free digital access to the popular Cambridge English Exam Boosters series, which support those preparing for English language examinations. Teachers can also find daily content on the Press鈥檚 English Language Teaching blog, 鈥榃orld of Better Learning鈥�, to ease the transition to home learning.

Education group are also providing support for primary and secondary teachers around the world.聽There is free access to more than 100 secondary school textbooks, specially-designed worksheet bundles for pupils aged five to 11 and Penpals handwriting videos for those aged three to six. Secondary school resources can be accessed through the Press鈥檚 digital education platform Cambridge Elevate. This includes material covering Cambridge IGCSE, Cambridge International AS & A Level as well as several UK GCSE and A Level texts. 探花直播Press is also rolling out free access to its interactive maths resources GCSE Mathematics Online in the UK and Cambridge Online Mathematics for Lower Secondary Checkpoint, IGCSE and A Level Mathematics, globally.

Further support is available from colleagues already in touch with schools around the world to provide assistance when moving to or using online and blended learning products.

More info about the Press鈥檚 response to COVID-19聽here.

Cambridge 探花直播 Press is providing free access to a huge range of books, research and learning materials for teachers, students and researchers impacted by聽COVID-19.

It鈥檚 vital that we do what we can to minimise the virus' effects on learning and research

Peter Phillips

Cambridge 探花直播 Press

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When is a book not a book?

amb206 — Mon, 10 Oct 2016 14:00:46 +0000

In his book Merchants of Culture, Professor John Thompson recounts a conversation with the head of media asset development at a large US publishing house. 探花直播topic is the impact and future of digital publishing.

His interviewee, anonymised as Steve, has come from the music industry, where he has seen the digital revolution disrupting traditional models. Tasked with shaping the future of a leading publishing house, Steve is struggling to convince his colleagues to think differently about books and to embrace the digital revolution. He says: 鈥淎 book is not a book. Books are categories. Books are types. Books are different styles of things.鈥�

Thompson is interested in the changing structure of the book publishing industry as the digital revolution transforms the processes and products of the publishing business in ways that are both visible and invisible to the consumer. 探花直播outcome of his present research will be a book that is due to be published in 2017, in which he will describe the volatile, contested environment responsible for delivering texts to millions of readers in an ever-increasing range of formats.

At the heart of Thompson鈥檚 conversation with Steve is a discussion about the thousands of files that are the publisher鈥檚 most valuable assets 鈥� literally its lifeblood. Having digitised its backlist of top sellers, the company holds an archive of 40,000 titles, a figure that is constantly expanding. How these files are archived, managed and protected so they can be delivered to readers in the most suitable formats is vital to the continuing health of the publishing house. 探花直播archiving process has been far from simple, requiring the retrieval of files from printers and opening up heated debates about copyright. And the sheer flexibility offered by digitisation introduces new challenges.

Steve explains that, while paper books are relatively simple to deliver (鈥測ou鈥檙e delivering tree鈥�), the delivery of digital goods is much more complicated. 鈥� 探花直播thing that people always hoped was the digital world would get simpler and it鈥檚 actually a whole lot more complicated because your end result isn鈥檛 the same. 探花直播end result is a database, the end result is a PDF, it鈥檚 an image-based PDF, it鈥檚 an XML file, it鈥檚 an ad-based, Google-search-engine toolset 鈥� we鈥檙e going to have many more properties digitally than we possibly could have physically. We have seven physical properties [for our books]鈥� and online we have hundreds of formats and types and styles.鈥�

Few of these challenges were foreseen in the feverish hype of the 1990s that the days of the book were numbered. Paper texts were clunky and old fashioned; digital versions were smart and sleek.

Many new start-ups were launched, seeking to create new forms of the book that exploited the multimedia potential of new technologies. But, despite the hype, sales of e-books remained sluggish and many start-ups failed.

E-books finally began to take off in autumn 2007 when Amazon launched the Kindle, which allowed readers to download books and other content directly onto their devices. Sales of e-books soared: in 2010 one large publisher saw its e-book sales rise from 12% to 26% of its revenue over Christmas week.

Industry pundits had predicted that e-book sales would be driven by business books and by businessmen, but it didn鈥檛 work out like that 鈥� far from it. 鈥� 探花直播real areas of growth were commercial fiction and genre fiction 鈥� categories like sci-fi, mysteries and crime, romances and thrillers,鈥� says Thompson. 鈥淭his was a revolution being driven largely by women reading commercial and genre fiction on their Kindles.鈥�

Much has happened since Thompson鈥檚 interview with Steve took place in New York, but Thompson has maintained the many publishing contacts who give him first-hand access to the latest industry developments. He is now mid-way through an ambitious project to revisit publishers on both sides of the Atlantic in order to discover 鈥渨hat is happening while it鈥檚 happening鈥� in an industry that suddenly finds itself at the centre of a major disruptive transformation.

From 2008 to 2012, e-books grew from less than 1% of total US trade sales to over 20%; this was phenomenal growth in an industry where overall sales remain largely static. Many people working in the industry worried that publishing would go the same way as the music industry. But then something dramatic happened: the growth slowed and levelled off at around 22%, forming a classic S-curve. 鈥淲hen you dig beneath the surface, however, you see that the simple S-curve is misleading because it conceals a great deal of variation between different kinds of books. In the case of romance fiction, the growth begins to level off at around 60%, whereas many categories of nonfiction plateau at between 15% and 25%,鈥� says Thompson.

鈥淏y looking at what is happening inside the industry, we can see that some of the fears about the future of the publishing industry were misplaced. Many observers thought that developments in book publishing would follow those in the music sector but that hasn鈥檛 happened. There isn鈥檛 a single model that describes the impact of the digital revolution on the creative industries 鈥� there are multiple models, and the impact varies from industry to industry and sector to sector.鈥�

While no one can be sure how the pattern of e-book sales will develop in the future, the digital revolution has already had an enormous impact on the way the publishing industry works. In what Thompson calls 鈥渢he hidden revolution鈥�, the processes involved in taking a text through the supply chain, from author to reader, have been thoroughly transformed. Print-on-demand means that a book never goes out of print, and with the advent of self-publishing anyone can publish.

鈥淭his means that the numbers of books being published, and the number available, have risen dramatically. But how do readers get to know about what鈥檚 out there? New platforms have emerged to supplement the traditional model of the newspaper review,鈥� he says.

探花直播rise of Amazon has played a major part in these developments. 鈥淎mazon is part and parcel of the digital revolution. 探花直播company started in a garage as a classic internet start-up and its ascendancy took everyone by surprise,鈥� says Thompson. Publishers have benefited from Amazon鈥檚 growth but they now find themselves locked in a power struggle with the retail giant, who controls around 67% of all e-book sales in the USA and over 40% of all new book unit sales, print and digital.

Relations have become increasingly fraught, he says. Publishers have tried to retain control of pricing by selling e-books on an 鈥榓gency model鈥�, which allows them to fix the price, while Amazon has used its growing market share to try to extract better terms of trade from publishers. 探花直播struggle ebbs and flows and at times becomes vicious, as it did during the 2014 standoff between Amazon and Hachette (one of the Big Five US trade publishers).

Thompson is determined to get to grips with the fine detail of what goes on behind the scenes in the day-to-day publishing processes. 鈥淔ifteen years ago I knew little about trade publishing, but we can only understand how this industry works and how it鈥檚 changing by immersing ourselves in it and looking carefully at what happens when new technologies collide with the old world of the book.鈥�

探花直播e-book has made continued inroads into the publishing world but the printed book has defied predictions of its death. Research by Professor John Thompson focuses on the challenges facing the publishing industry as it embraces the opportunities afforded by the digital revolution.

By looking at what is happening inside the industry, we can see that some of the fears about the future of the publishing industry were misplaced.

Professor John Thompson

探花直播District

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New era in publishing for women鈥檚 health

amb94 — Tue, 23 Jul 2013 11:03:28 +0000

In a move that will benefit women鈥檚 lives in the UK and around the world, Cambridge will take over publication of the RCOG鈥檚 current medical book titles. Cambridge and the RCOG will also begin working in partnership to expand the list to offer a wider range of learning to all healthcare professionals in women鈥檚 health.

探花直播list, which will be published under joint RCOG鈥揅ambridge branding, will build on Cambridge鈥檚 existing strength in reproductive medicine and maternal-fetal medicine and expand their offering to trainees in obstetrics and gynaecology.聽聽

探花直播venture will also help the RCOG to pursue its mission to improve the lives of women in developing countries. 探花直播RCOG has long provided expertise to medical professionals in the UK and Commonwealth countries and is keen to extend its reach to help doctors, midwives and nurses around the world. Cambridge offers RCOG the perfect launch-pad for making medical publishing available to students and professionals globally.

RCOG President, Dr Tony Falconer, said: 鈥淲e look forward to working in partnership with Cambridge 探花直播 Press as they expand their obstetrics and gynaecology list to cater to everyone caring for women and to achieve cross-over into other specialties, such as general practice and mental health.

鈥淭his also ties in with the RCOG鈥檚 international objectives. Cambridge鈥檚 reach is truly global, making them the ideal partner to support our ambition to bring excellent learning and support to our international community, some of them working in difficult conditions.

鈥� 探花直播end goal for us both is very simple 鈥� to combine the RCOG鈥檚 expertise in medicine and Cambridge鈥檚 expertise in publishing to raise the standard of care for women all over the world.鈥�

For Cambridge the long-term aim is to become the publisher of choice in the arena of women鈥檚 health generally, offering top-quality learning materials that become fundamental to practitioners at all levels.
Cambridge 探花直播 Press Chief Executive, Peter Phillips, commented: 鈥淲e are excited about the huge opportunities that our partnership with the RCOG makes possible through our joint commitment to excellence in medical publishing.鈥�

探花直播RCOG is the UK鈥檚 main training and professional body for obstetrics and gynaecology with over 12,000 members and fellows. 探花直播RCOG鈥檚 Global Health Unit works to help lower mother and child death rates in under-resourced countries.

Cambridge 探花直播 Press is the publishing business of the 探花直播 of Cambridge, its purpose is to further the 探花直播's objective of advancing knowledge, education, learning, and research.

A step-change in publishing in women鈥檚 health is under way with the announcement that the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) is to sell its prestigious publishing list to Cambridge 探花直播 Press.

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探花直播future of books

bjb42 — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 00:00:00 +0000

For centuries, books have played a central role in education, the spread of knowledge and the cultivation of literary and scholarly debate. With its origins dating back to the 15th century, the publishing of books is the oldest of the media industries and one which has continued to flourish despite the profusion of other media forms. However, over the last 30鈥�40 years, the industry has gone through a process of turbulent change stemming from forces that are partly commercial, partly technological. Thanks to these developments, it bears little resemblance today to the industry that existed in the 1960s and before.

Despite these changes and despite the continuing importance of books in contemporary culture, there has been very little systematic research on the modern book publishing industry. Historians have studied the book trade and the impact of books in earlier centuries, but the modern publishing business has been largely neglected by researchers.

It was partly to fill this gap in our knowledge that I began in 1999 to study the changing structure of the industry in Britain and the United States. 探花直播research, spanning a decade, was funded by two grants from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). While the first phase of the research focused on academic publishing, the second phase, begun in 2005, was concerned with mainstream trade publishing 鈥� the world of general interest books, aimed at the wider public and sold through high-street bookstores, supermarkets and the internet. This is the sector of publishing that produces bestsellers like Dan Brown鈥檚 探花直播Da Vinci Code鈥� books that are widely reviewed in the press, prominently displayed in bookstores and, in some cases, turned into films.

What makes a bestseller? Why do some books take off and become runaway successes while thousands of others vanish without a trace? What are the changes that have swept through the industry and how have they affected the nature of what gets published and what succeeds? What impact have these changes had on the character of our literary culture, and what impact are they likely to have in the years to come?

Three key developments

To address these and other questions I immersed myself in the world of trade publishing in Britain and the USA. I interviewed senior managers, editors and other staff at all of the large trade publishing groups in London and New York, as well as many staff working in small and medium-sized publishing houses; I also interviewed agents, authors, scouts and booksellers 鈥� altogether, I did more than 250 interviews with key players in the industry. This enabled me to build up a detailed picture of how the industry works, how it has changed over the past few decades and how it is changing today.

I was able to show that three key developments have shaped the evolution of trade publishing in the English-speaking world since the 1960s. 探花直播first was the growth of the retail chains, like Waterstones in the UK and Barnes & Noble in the USA. These nationwide chains of book superstores transformed the landscape of bookselling in the 1980s and 1990s; they made books much more widely available, but at the same time they drove many smaller independent booksellers out of business.

探花直播second development was the rise of the literary agent. Although not new 鈥� the first agents appeared in London at the end of the 19th century 鈥� literary agents have, since the 1970s, become much more powerful brokers in the field of trade publishing. They control access to new content and, through auctions, are able to raise the stakes for books that are perceived to have high sales potential.

探花直播final development was the consolidation of publishing houses under the umbrella of large multimedia corporations. Many of the great publishing houses whose names are well known to us all 鈥� Penguin, Jonathan Cape, Macmillan, Knopf 鈥� are today owned by large corporations and survive as imprints rather than as independent publishing houses.

Making bestsellers

Together, these developments have created a field of cultural activity that has a distinctive structure and dynamic 鈥� a 鈥榣ogic of the field鈥�. They have led, for instance, to the polarisation of the industry, with four or five large corporate groups dominating the field and a plurality of small independent publishers on the margins. Very few medium-sized independent publishers remain active: in this new world of trade publishing, it is very difficult to be medium-sized.

These developments have also led to a preoccupation with what in the industry are commonly known as 鈥榖ig books鈥�. These are not yet bestsellers but rather 鈥榟oped-for bestsellers鈥�. Given the unavoidable role played by serendipity in trade publishing, it is simply unclear how well many new books will do in the marketplace 鈥� no-one really knows.

So how do publishers decide how much they鈥檙e willing to pay for them? Various factors come into play here, but a crucial role is played by 鈥榯he web of collective belief鈥� which is built up through the numerous conversations that take place between agents, editors and other players in the field. In the absence of anything solid, the expressed enthusiasm (or lack of it) of trusted others is decisive.

探花直播focus on big books is exacerbated by the financial pressures on the publishing houses owned by large corporations and by the practices of the retail chains, which order large quantities of some new books, charge publishers a premium for front-of-store displays and expect them to turn over quickly. Many new books fail to take off and are sent back to publishers in large numbers, resulting in historically high levels of returns. But in those cases where they do take off, publishers and booksellers mobilise quickly behind them, with additional resources and promotion, pouring more fuel on the flames 鈥� this in part is how bestsellers are made.

探花直播end of the book?

Today trade publishers are faced with unprecedented challenges. 探花直播economic climate is tough, overall sales (especially in North America) are down and the arrival of a new generation of ebook readers has raised fresh questions about the future of printed books. Do these developments mean that the world of the book as we鈥檝e known it is about to undergo a further transformation, even more radical than that which has characterised the industry in recent decades, perhaps even leading to the eclipse of the printed book as such?

Despite widespread speculation about the 鈥榚nd of the book鈥�, we are still a long way from a world in which trade books are routinely read on screens rather than on the printed page. Although ebook sales have increased significantly in recent years, especially in the USA, they still account for only around 1% of the revenues of trade publishers 鈥� a tiny fraction. This is bound to increase as reading devices become more widely available but no-one knows exactly how significant it will eventually become.

Whatever happens, it seems likely that books will continue to play an important role in our cultural and public life for the foreseeable future. Books have been, and remain for many, a privileged form of communication, one in which the genius of the written word can be inscribed in an object that is at once a medium of expression, a means of communication and a form of art. For the telling of extended stories or the sustained interrogation of our ways of thinking and acting, the book has proven to be a most satisfying and resilient cultural form, and it is not likely to disappear soon. But how books will be produced and delivered, and where they will fit in the new symbolic and information environments that are emerging today, are questions to which there are, at present, no clear answers.

For more information, please contact the author Professor John Thompson (jbt1000@cam.ac.uk) at the Department of Sociology.

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探花直播book publishing industry has gone through more change during the past few decades than in any comparable period in its 500-year history. Professor John Thompson examines this change and asks what impact it will have on the future of books.

Despite widespread speculation about the 鈥榚nd of the book鈥�, we are still a long way from a world in which trade books are routinely read on screens rather than on the printed page.

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Browsing for books at 探花直播Strand

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