It’s University Press Week! In the summer of 1978, US President Jimmy Carter proclaimed a University Press Week “in recognition of the impact, both here and abroad, of American university presses on culture and scholarship.”

In 2012, the Association of University Presses revived the idea of this celebration to recognize the impact that a global community of university presses has on every one of us. We mark University Press Week each November with a new theme, events, featured UP work, blog tours, and more.

This year’s University Press Week theme is #KeepUP. “Keep UP” is significant in a time when great change has come to all quarters of book publishing and the media. For university presses, the past decade has presented opportunities that have allowed these nonprofit publishers  to explore new ways to reach readers, amplify ideas, and sustain scholarly communities while remaining steadfast in their commitment to advancing knowledge. To mark a momentous and eventful decade of university press publishing and UP Weeks, this year AUPresses members have suggested a “Keep UP Gallery” and Reading List that showcase books, journals, open access reading platforms, podcasts, and other efforts that put member UPs at the forefront of today’s issues and ideas.

Our contribution to the Keep UP Gallery is one of our newest ventures, the Scholarly Publishing Collective, a partnership with nonprofit scholarly journal publishers and societies to provide journal services including subscription management, fulfillment, hosting, and institutional marketing and sales.

Through the Collective, publishers have access to resources that would otherwise be cost-prohibitive, such as a best-in-class web platform, proven customer relations and library relations teams, and a network of global sales agents with insight into university press content. 

On Wednesday, we invite you to check back here for an interview about the Scholarly Publishing Collective with Allison Belan, Director for Strategic Innovation and Services. That post will be part of the annual University Press Week blog tour.

Each day this week you can visit university press blogs for #KeepUp posts. Today Temple University Press shares how they have evolved over their history; MIT Press staffers pick their favorite university press books; Manchester University Press staff share what university presses mean to them; University of Toronto Press features a conversation on the future of scholarly publishing; and Bucknell University Press features a guest post by their author Manu Chander.

And on Friday at noon ET, we invite you to an online event featuring authors and editors from the Black Outdoors series. Series editors Sarah Jane Cervanak and J. Cameron Carter join authors Rachel Zolf, Mercy Romero, fahma ife, An Yountae, Eleanor Craig, and Marquis Bey for a conversation and Q&A. Register for the event here.

We hope you’ll share your love for university presses this week on social media with the hashtags #KeepUP and #ReadUP.