Cardiff University Press’ review of 2022

Happy New Year to all our readers and followers!

2022 has been another eventful year for CardiffUP, with some really encouraging new developments. We published three monographs in the space of five months – you can find out more about them in this post – and we accepted another one for publication later this year. We’ve also launched a new journal, the 13th title in our journal portfolio.

Here are some highlights of our last 12 months:

• Following an excellent response to the call for expressions of interest in membership of the CardiffUP Editorial Board last January, we welcomed nine new members in the first half of the year. Staff and students step down from the Board every now and then, as their careers develop and change – although we’re sorry to see them leave, opportunities then arise to refresh the membership. The different areas of specialist knowledge and experience that our new members have brought to the Board during 2022 are proving invaluable.
• The current sub-groups of the Board, one for monographs and the other for strategy and advocacy, have also been re-energised by the addition of two new members each.
• In May, we published our seventh monograph, The face-to-face principle: science, trust, democracy and the internet by Harry Collins et al.
• This was followed in August by our eighth one, Digital supply chain transformation: emerging technologies for sustainable growth, editedby Yingli Wang and Stephen Pettit.
• October saw the publication of our ninth monograph, Divine descent and the four world-ages in the Mahābhārata: or, why does the Kṛṣṇa avatāra inaugurate the worst yuga? by Simon Brodbeck.
• In September, we officially launched the Journal of Ammonia Energy (JAE)  at the 1^st Symposium on Ammonia Energy, hosted by Cardiff University. This is the first CardiffUP journal from the College of Physical Sciences and Engineering, and its inaugural issue is due for publication next May.
• Throughout the year, the Strategy and Advocacy sub-group of our Editorial Board has been improving the visibility of CardiffUP and building support for it within Cardiff University. This has been achieved by holding meetings with key stakeholders, organising exhibitor stands at conferences and other events on campus, exploring new funding and partnership opportunities, and informal networking.

We look forward to expanding our range of publications and developing CardiffUP further in 2023. If you’re interested in submitting your work for possible publication with us, please read the submission guidelines on our website and contact us with any queries you may have.

Cardiff University Press’ review of 2021

Happy New Year to all our readers and followers!

CardiffUP has continued to raise its profile and publish valuable original research outputs during 2021. The numerous challenges of the pandemic have often steered academics towards focusing more on teaching and less on research, but that didn’t prevent our hardworking journal editors from putting together this year’s high-quality volumes and issues. We’ve also launched a brand new journal and another is planned for next summer. The monograph publishing programme has been making very good progress, with another title published, two titles approved for publication and a further two in peer review by the end of 2021.

Here are some highlights of our last twelve months:

• In January, we completed our Annual Report and Future Vision document (copies available on request), looking back on the successes of 2019-20 and forward to what CardiffUP could potentially achieve in the next five years.
• Also in January, we decided to renew our Partner Press Agreement with online hosting platform provider Ubiquity Press for another three years.
• In February, we welcomed Claire Gorrara as a new member of the CardiffUP Editorial Board.
• In March, Cardiff University submitted its chosen publications for the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 assessment, five of which had been published by CardiffUP.
• In April, the British Student Doctor Journal published its much-anticipated LGBTQ+ special issue. This guest post outlines the background to the issue.
• In June, we approved a new journal for publication, the forthcoming Journal of Ammonia Energy (JAE).
• In August, we published our sixth monograph, Educators of Healthcare Professionals: Agreeing a Shared Purpose by Julie Browne et al. Read more about the monograph in this guest post.
• In September, we approved two more monographs for publication in 2022.
• In October, we launched the student-led journal Intersectional Perspectives: Identity, Culture, and Society (IPICS), increasing our journal portfolio to 12 titles. Find out more about IPICS in this post.
• In November and early December, we redesigned the home page of our website, making it easier for everyone to keep track of the latest CardiffUP developments.

We look forward to publishing more monographs and journal articles in the coming year. If you’re interested in submitting your work for possible publication with us, please read the submission guidelines on our website and contact us with any queries you may have.

Promoting intersectionality with our new student-led journal

We at CardiffUP are very proud to announce the launch of our new journal, Intersectional Perspectives: Identity, Culture, and Society (IPICS), on 25 October 2021. Along with all our other publications, this is an Open Access title – so you can read and download the launch issue completely free of charge, without embargoes or other restrictions.

The launch is taking place virtually on the first day of International Open Access Week 2021, an annual celebration of the principles of Open Access. This year the theme of OA Week is “It matters how we open knowledge: building structural equity.” An introductory blog post from the organisers of the event states:

“Diversity, equity, and inclusion must be consistently prioritized year-round and integrated into the fabric of the open community, from how our infrastructure is built to how we organize community discussions to the governance structures we use.”

We’ve been improving our own level of compliance with this requirement since our first publications appeared online, and we’re committed to continuing to do so. We offer publishing opportunities to academics and students across the globe, regardless of how they identify themselves or what their protected group status is, and our publications frequently discuss topics related to disability, sexual orientation, sex, nationality and other protected characteristics. Here are some examples of these publications, including the special issue featured in our previous blog post in May:

• disability
• sexual orientation
• sex
• nationality

Intersectional Perspectives takes this commitment to diversity and inclusion one step further. Intersectionality can be defined as two or more forms of identity or protected characteristics interacting with each other, often creating new types of discrimination or social oppression as a result. The journal will bring intersectionality into the foreground, exploring the representation and construction of identity, sexuality, race and gender in social and cultural texts, discourses, practices and subjectivities, publishing articles that address how these markers of identity challenge or intersect with culture and society.

It’s one of four student-led journals in our journal portfolio, which means that it’s edited and managed by students. The Editor-in-Chief Arwa Al-Mubaddel, and her Associate Editors Beth Pyner and Ethan Evans, are all PhD students in Cardiff University’s School of English, Communication and Philosophy. They are supported and advised by experienced academic and Professional Services staff, some of whom sit on the journal’s Editorial Advisory Board.

Arwa, Beth and Ethan are currently looking to expand their editorial team, so if you’re interested in working for the journal, contact them at intersections@cardiff.ac.uk .

Find out more about the journal

Discover how to submit your work to CardiffUP

Cardiff University Press’ review of 2020

Happy New Year to all our readers and followers!

As an online publisher, CardiffUP has found it relatively straightforward to move to 100% remote working during the COVID-19 pandemic, although there have inevitably been a few challenges along the way. The publication processes for our journals and monographs have continued unabated.  Here are some highlights of our last twelve months:

• In January we launched our second Annual Report in infographic format.  We’ll be launching the third one shortly.
• In February the Chair of our Editorial Board, Paul Bowman, stepped down from the role.  The Board appointed two Co-Chairs in his place, Julie Browne and Mark Llewellyn.
• In March, along with most of our colleagues at Cardiff University, we started working from home because of the pandemic.
• In May we published our first volume of conference proceedings, Human Computer Interaction and Emerging Technologies: Adjunct Proceedings from the INTERACT 2019 Workshops, edited by Fernando Loizides et al.
• Also in May, one of the founding Co-Chairs of our Monograph Commissioning Panel, Ben Hannigan, stepped down from the role.  He was replaced as Co-Chair by Julian Brigstocke.
• In June the two new Editorial Board Co-Chairs agreed to take on oversight responsibilities for CardiffUP’s publication activities, with Julie focusing on journal titles and Mark on monograph titles.
• In July Mark was confirmed as a new member of the Monograph Commissioning Panel, in accordance with his additional responsibilities.
• Also in July, we approved a sixth monograph for publication, Educators of Healthcare Professionals: Agreeing a Shared Purpose by Julie Browne et al.  This is intended for publication in spring 2021.
• In November the journal New Readings was relaunched with issue 17(1), its first issue to be published under the CardiffUP imprint.
• Also in November, we published the long-awaited fourth CardiffUP monograph Reporting on Poverty: News Media Narratives and Third Sector Communications in Wales by Kerry Moore. The Welsh translation of this book, Adrodd ar Dlodi: Naratif y Cyfryngau Newyddion a Chyfathrebiadau’r Trydydd Sector yng Nghymru, was published simultaneously as our fifth monograph.

We’re delighted that some of the monographs and journal articles we’ve published in recent years will be submitted for the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021, demonstrating the excellent quality of academic research in Cardiff University and other higher education institutions across the UK. We look forward to publishing more monographs and articles in 2021: if you’d like to publish with us, please see our web pages for details.

Sharing knowledge to fight the virus: part 2

This is our second blog post highlighting freely accessible resources related to COVID-19.  If you’ve missed the first one, you can access it here.  As before, the links will direct you to authoritative publications, written by experts and available for anyone with an internet connection to read or download.  Please share the resources as widely as possible.

This time we’re featuring some of the online collections put together by database suppliers and large academic publishers (listed alphabetically), including some resources that have recently been made freely available for the first time.

Cambridge University Press: Coronavirus Free Access Collection
https://tinyurl.com/wk83x7o
Free access to a growing collection of COVID-19 related research for a limited period (until end of May 2020). Articles in the collection are from journals and Research Review series.

EBSCO: free/expanded-access resources and clinical information on COVID-19
https://www.ebsco.com/covid-19-resources#sect1
https://www.ebsco.com/covid-19-resources#sect2
Website aimed at academic library services,  offering links to a variety of relevant resources.  Some are free to access for a limited period (until end of May or end of June 2020).

Elsevier:
COVID-19 Healthcare Hub
https://covid-19.elsevier.health/
Free access to Elsevier’s relevant evidence-based tools and resources.  Also a series of Expert Insights podcasts, presented by front-line clinicians and providers, and clinical guidelines from health authorities worldwide about diagnosis and treatment.
Novel Coronavirus Information Center
https://www.elsevier.com/connect/coronavirus-information-center
Free health and medical research on the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) and COVID-19.  Divided into sections: Clinical Information, Chinese Language Resources, Research/Drug Discovery, Public Health and Patient Resources.  Includes a link to Elsevier’s full directory of COVID-19 resources.

Emerald: Coronavirus, the management of epidemics and the wider impact on society
https://www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com/promo/coronavirus.htm
Includes relevant Expert Briefings, journal articles and book chapters, free to access until at least the end of the year.  Emerald has “made research on COVID-19 and the management of epidemics and pandemics free for anyone to access and…also made this available with full text and data mining rights to PubMed Central and the World Health Organization repository”. 

Oxford University Press
https://academic.oup.com/journals/pages/coronavirus
https://global.oup.com/about/covid19?cc=gb
Free access to research resources on COVID-19, including journal articles and latest updates on human trials of a possible vaccine developed by Oxford University scientists.

Sage Publishing:
https://journals.sagepub.com/coronavirus
Free medical, social and behavioural science journal articles related to COVID-19.

Springer Nature: SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19
https://www.springernature.com/gp/researchers/campaigns/coronavirus
Freely accessible papers on COVID-19 from Springer Nature journals, along with additional commentaries and relevant books.
https://tinyurl.com/u53h95p
Free research data support service for Springer Nature authors with data relevant to the pandemic.
https://www.nature.com/briefing/signup/
Free daily newsletter, Nature Briefing, including a selection of the latest updates on coronavirus.

Taylor & Francis: COVID-19 microsite
https://taylorandfrancis.com/coronavirus/
Free access to T&F’s journal and book resources on COVID-19.

Wiley: COVID-19 Novel Coronavirus Outbreak resources
https://novel-coronavirus.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/
Journal articles: https://tinyurl.com/sd68xat
Book chapters:  https://tinyurl.com/wddn9me
Freely accessible resources on COVID-19 – most are made available within 24 hours of publication.

More comprehensive lists of publishers with COVID-19 resource collections, including smaller presses, are available via:

International Coalition of Library Consortia (ICOLC):
https://tinyurl.com/tp57d2d

Jisc:
https://subscriptionsmanager.jisc.ac.uk/about/resources-for-coronavirus-crisis
https://tinyurl.com/y7f5muuj

Wellcome Trust:
https://tinyurl.com/tc8j3up

 

 

 

Cardiff University Press’ review of 2019

Happy New Year everyone!

2019 has been an important year for CardiffUP, with several milestones reached and lots to celebrate.  Here are some highlights of our last twelve months:

• In January we welcomed a new Student Representative onto our Editorial Board – Laura Sinclair, a PhD student from the School of Journalism, Media and Culture. By the end of the year Laura had also become the Student Representative on our Monograph Commissioning Panel.
• In March the journal SHARE: Studies in History, Archaeology, Religion and Conservation was officially relaunched after a temporary halt in publication.
• In May we accepted a research report for publication, Reporting on Poverty by Kerry Moore, which is due to be published in spring 2020; and we approved an application for publication from the established and well-respected journal New Readings, which is about to publish its first CardiffUP issue. Also during May, the Editorial Board formally decided to renew our Partner Press Agreement with Ubiquity Press for two more years.
• In June, we accepted another book for publication – Like Any Other Woman by Jac Saorsa with Rebecca Phillips. Later in the month we were delighted to announce the online publication of our very first monograph Deconstructing Martial Arts by Paul Bowman, with the paperback version following in early July.
• Also in July, we accepted another established and well-regarded journal for publication – Assuming Gender. At the end of the month we officially launched the CardiffUP Monograph Awards funding scheme, which provides selected Cardiff University authors and editors with financial support to publish monographs with us.
• In September, our oldest journal Welsh Economic Review became the first CardiffUP title to be accepted for inclusion in the prestigious online Directory of Open Access Journals, which should greatly increase its visibility to the global research community.
• In October, one of our Monograph Commissioning Panel members joined our Editorial Board too – Julie Browne from the School of Medicine. One week later, having progressed rapidly through its editing and production stages, our second monograph Like Any Other Woman was published.  This was very timely for the official launch event of our Monograph Publishing Scheme, held in International Open Access Week.  At the event, we and our invited guests celebrated the publication of our first two books, listened to speeches and enjoyed some great conversations along with our buffet lunch.
• In November, Hélène de Ribaupierre from the School of Computer Science and Informatics joined our Editorial Board, becoming the first Board member from the University’s College of Physical Sciences and Engineering.
• In December, our Editorial Board and Monograph Commissioning Panel met together for the first time to discuss a five-year plan for CardiffUP – we already have plenty of ideas for the future.

In 2020 we look forward to publishing more monographs and journal issues, and to contributing to Cardiff University’s Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 submissions where we intend to have some of our publications featured.  It looks like we’ll be having another busy year!

Feature: Martial Arts Studies no. 7

We’re happy to announce that Martial Arts Studies issue 7 is now freely available at https://mas.cardiffuniversitypress.org/9/volume/0/issue/7/ . Martial Arts Studies is the premier scholarly source for interdisciplinary work on a variety of topics surrounding the practice, sociology, history and media representation of the modern combat sports and traditional martial arts. Published twice yearly, it presents the best research written and reviewed by leaders in the field.

This issue contains an editorial, five articles and three short reviews. The editorial starts by discussing what an “open issue,” such as this one, suggests about the current state of martial arts studies.  The editors note that issue 7 stretches the discussion of the Asian martial arts in geographic terms, and contemplates many complex interactions between physical practice and identity formation.

In their article “The creation of Wing Tsun: a German case study,” Swen Koerner, Mario S. Staller and Benjamin N. Judkins take a detailed look at the global spread of Wing Chun, a hand combat style of kung fu from Guangdong Province.

Next, Kristin Behr and Peter Kuhn examine the “Key factors in career development and transitions in German elite combat sport athletes.” The purpose of their study was to identify factors that facilitate and constrain career development and career transitions. They conclude that an athletic career is a highly complex, multi-layered and individual process.

In the third article, “Fighting gender stereotypes: women’s participation in the martial arts, physical feminism and social change“, Maya Maor explores the social conditions that facilitate gender subversive appropriation in full-contact martial arts, in terms of: 1. close and reciprocal bodily contact, 2. learning new embodiment regimes, and 3. effects of male dominance in the field.

Veronika Partikova continues the ongoing discussion of martial arts and identity formation in “Psychological collectivism in traditional martial arts.” Her paper argues that ‘traditional’ martial arts offer physical skills, moral codes, rituals, roles and hierarchical relationships which, taken together, create the perfect environment for psychological collectivism.

Tim Trausch’s paper “Martial arts and media culture in the information era: glocalization, heterotopia, hyperculture” is derived from the Editor’s Introduction to the collection Chinese martial arts and media culture: global perspectives [Rowman & Littlefield International, 2018]. It argues that recent media texts reflect and (re)produce three paradigms of martial arts and media culture in the information age: glocalization, heterotopia, and hyperculture.

In the review section of this issue, Andreas Niehaus, Leo Istas and Martin Meyer report on the 8th Conference of the German Society of Sport Science’s Committee for Martial Arts Studies, for which the theme was “Experiencing, training and thinking the body in martial arts and martial sports.” Then Spencer Bennington reflects on Udo Moening’s volume Taekwondo: from a martial art to a martial sport. Finally, Qays Stetkevych provides a candid review and close reading of the recently-published Martial arts studies reader [Rowman & Littlefield, 2018].

As always, this issue is freely available online. To find the latest calls for papers and learn more about the journal, go to http://masjournal.org.uk

Cardiff University Press’ review of 2018

Happy New Year!  The last year has been very busy for Cardiff University Press, with lots of changes, challenges and new adventures.  Here’s a summary of what we’ve been up to.

• In January, although it seems an age ago now, five of us were interviewed by Terry Morrell of ARK about our work with the Press. You can see extracts from the interviews on our YouTube channel (featured on this blog in August).
• In February we said farewell to Sonja Haerkoenen, our Scholarly Publications Manager, who has returned to her native Germany to work at the University of Augsburg, Bavaria (read her final post on this blog here). The duties of Sonja’s role have been shared between Helen Sharp and Dr Alison Weightman of the University Library Service.
• In March Prof Ben Hannigan was appointed as Chair of our Monograph Commissioning Panel, a new group to manage the submission, peer review and approval processes for our academic monograph publications. On the same day, an academic book manuscript entitled Deconstructing Martial Arts was submitted to us which will become our first published monograph in 2019.  Having made its way through peer reviews and Panel discussions, it was officially approved for publication by our Editorial Board in December.
• In May we also approved the publication of our first conference proceedings volume, which will contain the adjunct papers from a computer studies conference held in September 2019.
• In July our Editor-in-Chief Prof Paul Bowman succeeded Prof Damian Walford Davies as Chair of the Editorial Board, after Damian became a Pro Vice-Chancellor of Cardiff University.
• In August we appointed three new Student Representatives to the Editorial Board, one from each of Cardiff University’s Colleges, ensuring that the student voice within Cardiff University Press is stronger than ever before.
• In September a new publication, the Journal of Corpora and Discourse Studies, was launched on our online platform. Later that month we hosted a one-day introductory course on copyediting and proofreading, led by the Society for Editors and Proofreaders.
• In November two more Cardiff University academics joined the Editorial Board, increasing the membership to 19 people (our biggest ever). The Monograph Commissioning Panel held its first official meeting, and another journal title was launched: the Journal of Antipoetry Studies/Revista de Estudios Antipoéticos (our first bilingual journal, publishing both English and Spanish papers). 
• In December the first Cardiff University Press Annual Report was finalised and distributed in infographic format. One of Cardiff University Press’ founders, University Librarian Janet Peters, took early retirement and has been replaced on the Editorial Board by Tracey Stanley, the Acting University Librarian. In the week before Christmas we published the 30^th anniversary issue of the Welsh Economic Review, our oldest journal – and, as mentioned above, our first monograph was approved for publication.

Phew!  We’ve come a long way in the last year, and 2019 promises to be even more eventful, with (among other things) the long-anticipated publication of our first monograph titles. Onwards and upwards…

Feature: JOMEC Journal no. 12

We’re happy to announce that JOMEC Journal no. 12 is now available at: https://jomec.cardiffuniversitypress.org/ . JOMEC Journal is an online, Open Access and peer-reviewed journal interested in highest-quality innovative academic work in the fields of journalism, media and cultural studies.  

In contrast to previous issues, we decided to make an exception and do an open issue that wouldn’t be dedicated to a specific theme. The submissions we received were fascinating, along with the surprising connections we found between them. 

The issue begins with an editorial, and the seven articles that follow can be divided into two groups.

The first group takes us on a fascinating cultural studies journey through China: its ancient sexual practices, queering singlehood to queer filmmaking. Douglas Wile’s Debaters of the bedchamber: China reexamines ancient sexual practices addresses the ancient art of the bedchamber and traditional sex practices in China, a subject of controversy for more than two thousand years. Queering singlehood in mainland China by Benny Lim and Samson Tang discusses singlehood in relation to traditional Chinese culture, suggesting that state-backed media encourages marriage and stigmatizes those who don’t conform to this direction in life. From “celluloid comrades” to “digital video activism”: queer filmmaking in postsocialist China by Hongwei Bao gives a rich historical overview of Chinese ‘new queer cinema’ in the postsocialist era. It identifies a turn from an ambiguous portrayal of queer people by heterosexual filmmakers to an active participation of LGBTQ members in the production of film portrayals of their own lives.

After these China-focused articles, the next four papers belong to the field of media and journalism studies. Antje Glück’s Do emotions fit the frame? A critical appraisal of visual framing research approaches focuses on television news and asks whether the concept of visual framing can be enriched by the integration of emotive elements. It argues that emotions can best be conceptualised as a frame element. The conclusion discusses the extent to which they are suitable for analysing emotions in the visual. Garrisi and Johanssen’s Competing narratives in framing disability in the UK media uses discourse analysis to compare and contrast the journalistic coverage of the story of a beauty blogger with facial disfigurement with that of her own work on her blog. It examines the extent to which a self-representational account may align with the journalistic coverage, showing that journalism and blogging can play a complementary role in shaping society’s understanding of the issue. Press coverage of the debate that followed the News of the World phone hacking scandal: the use of sources in journalistic metadiscourse by Binakuromo Ogbebor uses content and discourse analyses of news articles on the press reform debate that followed this scandal. The author has found that press coverage of media policy debates is characterised by a doubly narrow spectrum of sources. The final article, “Spying for the people”: surveillance, democracy and the impasse of cynical reason by Michael Kaplan, examines the Snowden affair as a sort of Rorschach test that traces the contours of what the author calls ‘the impasse of cynical reason’.

Visit our webpages to learn more about the journal and to find our call for papers: https://jomec.cardiffuniversitypress.org/ 

Paul Bowman and Petra Kovacevic

 

Reflections on work experience with a student-led journal

 

In this post, recent graduates Shaffi Batchelor and Mustafa Abdimalik tell us what it’s really like to work on the editorial team of the British Student Doctor Journal.  Shaffi’s role is Education Section Editor and Mustafa’s is Editorial Assistant.  You can download articles from the journal free of charge at: https://thebsdj.cardiffuniversitypress.org/

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 I have always had a love of written language: it’s one of the reasons I spent three years reading English at the University of York prior to studying medicine. After graduating and feeling that I had left the arts behind during the course of studying medicine, the opportunity to become involved with the British Student Doctor Journal felt like a breath of fresh air.

I have been genuinely humbled by the scope and quality of the submissions that I have been called to review as Education Section Editor. For all that we frequently dismiss our own actions as being those of “mere” medical students, the depth, nuance and innovation that I have been privileged enough to see have all reassured me that my peers are the worthy successors to a long tradition of medical development and clinical research, one that has never before been so forward-thinking or exciting.
On a personal note, it has been enlightening to gain first-hand insight into the process of peer review, both as reviewer and editor. I find that I now have a greater appreciation for the many individuals involved in creating spaces where research and discourse can flourish, with our own BSDJ as just one example. 

I have definitely learned a great deal over the past two years as Section Editor, and now happily consider myself a champion of both the peer review process and student-led endeavours; with both, we are collectively working towards something far grander than ourselves.

Shafqat Batchelor

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I first heard about the journal almost a year and a half ago. I was fascinated by the idea of a journal made and dedicated by students. To be honest, I knew very little about how to write a piece well (whether research article or reflection) and what happens after you submit it. All that changed when I expressed interest in working for the BSDJ.

Initially and for six months, I started as a peer reviewer. I still have and enjoy that role as it has provided me with insight into the process from submission to publication. Subsequently, I applied to work for the journal as peer review manager. The role involves managing peer review applications, updating the peer review database and helping section editors to identify peer reviewers during busy periods. 

I try to answer emails as promptly as possible and stay in contact with section editors to ensure articles are reviewed in a timely manner. With other work and life commitments, it is crucial to stay organised and maintain good communication on a regular basis with section editors. I have found the role both exciting and challenging at times. The work demands of the journal are not huge or difficult, but require attention and dedication.

I am grateful for the experience I have had with the journal. I believe it has improved many aspects of my academic development that are not often explored during clinical practice. I am also grateful to the amazing team we have. To sum it up, it is an experience that has been both educational and sociable.  

Mustafa Abdimalik