The Death of the Monograph?

Abstract

A survey of English language academic publishers in the UK, Europe and North America was undertaken in 2021. The objective was to gather data on the current landscape of academic monograph publishing in the arts, humanities, and social sciences and to identify trends. Respondents were asked about their monograph publishing activities, sales, distribution, and about the future direction of their programmes. The paper offers independent analysis of publisher information that may be helpful in informing the debate among stakeholders as to the future of the publication of long-form research in the arts, humanities and social sciences. The results offer key insights into the growth in output of titles, the level of print sales, the move towards open access, usage of monographs, and their pricing.