Mission and Scope Statement

By publishing original theoretical articles, empirical studies, and book reviews, Human Affairs: Postdisciplinary Humanities & Social Sciences Quarterly aims to foster an interdisciplinary, multicultural, and international conversation concerning the broad spectrum of human affairs and social issues.

The journal creates a space for dialogue between the humanities and social science disciplines across diverse social, cultural, and epistemological contexts. In particular, we welcome studies that combine conceptual and/or methodological contributions from multiple disciplines. The journal seeks to facilitate communication across sub-disciplines such as social psychology, educational psychology, bioethics, anthropology, philosophy of mind, political science, and related fields.

We also encourage submissions addressing practical and applied dimensions of human affairs and human interactions.

Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement

Human Affairs: Postdisciplinary Humanities & Social Sciences Quarterly is firmly against plagiarism and strives to promote publication ethics by establishing specific guidelines for authors and editors.

Human Affairs accepts only original articles which have not been published, are not in press, or under consideration for publication by another publisher at the time of submission. When working with a new submission, the editors first check the originality of the article, using different database searches to identify other articles by the same authors and related published articles. In case of problems, our editors work with the Publishing Ethics Resource Kit developed by Elsevier.

When submitting a manuscript, the author(s) are asked to agree to the transfer of copyright. In the agreement, the author(s) also declare that “the article is original, written by the stated author/s, has not been published before, contains no unlawful statements, does not infringe the rights of others, and that any necessary written permissions to quote from other sources have been obtained by the author/s.”

During submission, authors are required to complete and upload the journal’s Ethical and Legal Declarations form. The form includes declarations regarding acknowledgements, research ethics, informed consent, author contributions, use of Large Language Models (LLMs), AI and machine learning tools, conflicts of interest, research funding, and data availability.

Online Manuscript Submission

Human Affairs: Postdisciplinary Humanities & Social Sciences Quarterly operates an online submission and peer review system that allows authors to submit articles online and track their progress via a web interface. All papers must be submitted via the online system. Please visit https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/humaff and submit your article.

Manuscript Preparation

Authors are requested to strictly follow the guidelines for authors provided below. Submissions that do not conform to Human Affairs style requirements will not be considered for publication.

Manuscripts should be submitted in English in Microsoft Word (.doc/.docx) or rich text (rtf) format. Manuscripts should be formatted in Times New Roman, 12 pt font, with 1.5 line spacing throughout.

All manuscripts must be written in clear and concise English (American or British usage is accepted, but not a mixture). Manuscripts may be rejected due to insufficient language quality. Authors who are not native speakers of English are strongly encouraged to have their manuscripts proofread by a fluent English speaker or a professional language editor prior to submission.

Research Articles

Prepare your manuscript according to the Instructions for Authors.

This journal uses a double-blind peer review, meaning the authors’ identities are concealed from the reviewers and vice versa. Please submit a blinded manuscript (without author details); the main body of the paper (including title, abstract, keywords, references, figures, tables and any acknowledgements) should not include any identifying information, such as the authors’ names or affiliations.

Please enclose a separate Title Page with your submission. The Title Page should include the title, author(s)’ full names and affiliations, optionally an ORCID iD, and correspondence details, including an email address.

For detailed formatting requirements regarding manuscript structure and elements (including abstracts, keywords, headings, figures, tables, and supplementary materials), please consult the “General Format and Manuscript Elements” section of the Instructions for Authors.

Manuscripts should not exceed 7,000 words, including endnotes and references.

Empirical research papers are generally expected to contain the following sections: Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Conclusion.

There is no prescribed manuscript structure for theoretical/conceptual (interpretative, critical, or historical) contributions. The requirements for these conceptual articles are: a) clarity of the aim/s and the lenses deployed to achieve those aims, b) explication and justification of the choice and role of theories and concepts, c) cogent, complete, and logically coherent argumentation, and d) a critical perspective.

Book Reviews

Book reviews can be submitted in the form of a Single Book Review or a Multiple-Book Review (two to four titles). The review should not exceed 1,600 words (Single Book Review) or 2,700 words (Multiple-Book Review). The title( s) under review should appear at the top of the first page and include the following bibliographic details: author, title, place of publication, publisher, year of publication, and number of pages.

The title(s) under review should have been published no more than two years prior to the submission of a Single Book Review and no more than four years prior to the submission of a Multiple-Book Review. The review should situate the title(s) within the relevant scholarly context and engage with related literature where appropriate. It should summarise the authors’ arguments, explain the book’s theoretical and methodological significance, critically assess its strengths and weaknesses, and emphasise its scholarly contribution. Reviews should not be structured merely as chapter-by-chapter summaries of the book.

Multiple-Book Reviews may adopt a more essay-style approach and should focus primarily on a comparative and integrative discussion of the selected titles.

The submission should also include a short biography of the reviewer(s) at the end of the manuscript. The biography should not exceed 100 words.

References

All references should be alphabetised and placed at the end of the article on a new page, and follow the CHICAGO MANUAL OF STYLE. References should be cited in the text by the author’s last name and the publication date in parentheses, e.g., Rorty (1979) or (Rorty 1979, p. 25). For works with more than three authors, cite the first author followed by “et al.” in the text.

If you use the original version of a non-English work, use the formula:

Author. Year Published. Title in the Original Language [Translated Title]. City: Publisher.

Do not translate foreign journal titles into English.

For example:
Book: Rorty, Richard. 1979. Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.

Journal article: Rorty, Richard. 1993. “Hilary Putnam and the Relativist Menace.” Journal of Philosophy 90 (9): 443–61. https://doi.org/10.2307/2940859

Roberts, Lucy, Karolina Bačová, Tigist Llaudet Sendín, and Marek Urban. 2023. “Cultural Differences in the Construction of Gender: A Thematic Analysis of Gender Representations in American, Spanish, and Czech Children’s Literature.” Human Affairs 33 (1): 34–50. https://doi.org/10.1515/humaff-2022-2030

Molinari, Enrico, and Alida Labella. 2007. Psicologia Clinica: Dialoghi e Confronti [Clinical Psychology: Dialogue and Confrontation]. Milan: Springer.

Book chapter: Rorty, Richard. 1994. “Daniel Dennett on Intrinsicality.” In Dennett and His Critics, edited by Bo Dahlbom, 10–25. Oxford, UK: Blackwell.

Open Access and Publication Charges

Authors publishing in hybrid journals do not have to pay APCs if they do not wish to publish their article open access.

Human Affairs is committed to maximising access to scientific knowledge. To support this aim, authors have the option to publish their articles under an Open Access licence upon payment of an Article Processing Charge (APC). Information on the fee for publishing a hybrid Open Access article can be found here.

The journal also provides immediate free access to one Editor’s Choice article in each issue. In addition, all articles become freely accessible after a 24-month embargo under the journal’s moving wall policy.

Please note that corresponding authors affiliated with institutions that have a transformative agreement with De Gruyter may publish Open Access without paying the APC. More information about eligible institutions and Open Access agreements can be found here.