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Guidelines for Inclusion in the Scholarly Societies Project
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Category |
Inclusions |
Exclusions |
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Goal of the Society
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societies with
scholarly, academic, or research goals
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societies only interested in
entertainment, advocacy, or self-help goals,
or in spreading
political propaganda, or religious dogma
[societies devoted to the study of the above phenomena, however, may be
included]
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Membership Restrictions
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Preference is given to membership-based societies (in which
a qualified person may apply to become a member)
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In general, organizations are excluded if the only way that a person can
be a member of the organization is by having a contract to work there, or
by having temporary visiting privileges (the situation with
research centres).
Some latitude has been granted to organizations with a status similar to
academies and royal societies of broad scope or
international unions.
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Type of URL
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Societies must have the URL of their website in
standard domain-name format.
See the various editorials for
background leading up to this decision
Exceptions are made for
societies founded prior to 1800, and for
academies and royal societies of broad scope and for
international unions.
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Society websites whose URLs are not in
standard domain-name format, with the exceptions noted under
Inclusions.
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Broad vs Narrow Geographical Scope
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Preference is given to societies of an international or
national scope.
A more liberal policy is adopted for societies founded in the 19th c.
This applies even more so for
societies founded prior to 1800, since local
societies have played a very important role in the early history of
scholarship.
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The exclusion policy follows from the rather vauge inclusion policies
to the left; this area needs some re-examining.
Some societies currently included in the Project will probably be
removed as a result.
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Seat of Society
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any country
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none
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Language of Website
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all languages (with the exceptions mentioned under
Exclusions)
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Language is a barrier to inclusion only if it prevents the Editor from
determining basic information about the society
(see Minimum Detail below).
This is generally a problem only when the critical information is
available only in one of the less common languages.
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Subject
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all academic subjects
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non-academic subjects
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Existence of a Website for the Society
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societies must have a website if the society
was founded from 1900 to the present
[exceptions are made only in unusual cases, such as national academies, or
international academic unions]
for societies founded prior to 1900, information will be
provided even if there is no society website (assuming that the
society otherwise complies with the Guidelines for Inclusion)
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societies that do not have a website if founded from
1900 to the present, with the exceptions noted to the left
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Minimum Detail in Project for Societies
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The entry in the Project will include the
society name, an English translation of the
society name (if not originally in English), the URL and
URL Stability Index of the website (if the society has a
website),
the language of the website,
the subject pages in the Project where the website occurs,
the founding year and notes about name changes
(if any), and the geographical scope of the society
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types of information that are likely to change frequently, such as the
names of officers of the society, the
street address, etc.
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