Submissions

Author Guidelines

Articles sent to LETRAS magazine must meet the following conditions. If they do not comply, they will not be included in the arbitration process.

1. The materials sent to Letras must be unpublished. The article must not be simultaneously submitted to another arbitration or publication process. If there are versions in Spanish or other languages, they must be delivered to verify their unpublished nature.
2. Those who send a work must attach a letter to request that it be submitted to arbitration and study the possibility of including it in the magazine. Likewise, they must indicate their commitment to serve as an arbitrator in their specialty, if admitted. It is understood that the author is subject to these editorial standards. In the letter, the following information must be specified: author's address, landline and cell phone, email. In the case of two or more authors, each one will prepare their own communication.
3. See letter for the Arbitration Request, declaration of originality and copyright recognition.
4. Articles sent to LETRAS magazine must meet the following conditions of the editorial standards. If they do not comply, they will not be included in the arbitration process. You can also review the Shipping section
5. Upon receipt, the manuscripts go through a first review process, in this case, it is evaluated that they comply with the editorial standards and the thematic areas of the journal. This first process takes place over a period of 15 days.
6. If they are accepted, the authors are informed that their work will go to the arbitration process and the estimated time periods for the different stages of the editorial process are described.
7. Because the arbitrators belong to different national and international institutions and universities, a period of approximately forty-five (45) days is expected for the specialists to form their judgments. Upon receiving everyone's observations, the Journal Coordination prepares a single report that is sent to the author. This transit may last another month. The writer, after receiving the comments, has thirty (30) days to send the final version. If you do not do so within this period, the Coordination will assume that you have declined your intention to publish it and, consequently, will exclude it from the edition projection.
8. The approved works become part of future issues of Letras and their publication may take a certain time (approximately three months), because there is a convenient planning and editing projection, taking into account the length of the magazine, its periodicity. (two issues per year), heterogeneity of columnists, thematic variation and diversity of perspectives.
9. In the case of materials not approved in the arbitration, the Coordination will limit itself to sending the author the arguments that, according to the arbitrators, justify the rejection.
10. The arbitration process (double blind) contemplates that two or three judges evaluate the work. They do not know that they are refereeing the same manuscript, since they are evaluating an article, whose author is not identified. The author, in turn, does not know who judges his research. The reviews and other contributions to the magazine are also refereed.
11. The manuscripts received are evaluated by external national and international peers and internal peers of the Universidad Pedagógica Experimental Libertador, Venezuela. Each judge will receive an arbitration request communication with a report format containing the following aspects: see the evaluation form used in the peer review process.

Identification of the work to be evaluated and the referee:

• Work title
• Area
• Sub-area
• Category: specialized article, review, creation, among others.
• Last names and names of the referee
• Institution of affiliation

Likewise, this form establishes the following evaluation categories on which the judge must issue an opinion.

1. Aspects related to form:
2. General structure

• Introduction
• Development
• Conclusions
• Bibliography
• or Others

3. Bibliographic update
4. References and citations
5. Writing
6. Speech coherence
7. Other (specify)
8. Aspects related to content:

• Methodology
• Validity of the topic and its approach
• Treatment and discussion
• Rigority
• Confrontation of ideas and/or results
• Discussion of results (if applicable)
• Others (specify)

12. In addition to the previous aspects, the judges must consider the adaptation of the article to the publication standards of the magazine LETRAS.
13. The referees can complete this information with observations that support the judgments made and add any other aspect that they consider relevant to the evaluated work.
14. The results of the evaluation will be expressed according to the following parameters:
    • Suggest publication: with or without corrections
    • Does not suggest publication
15. The arbitrators must specify the arguments (referring to form and/or substance) that justify whatever the decision indicated in the previous section was.
16. The Coordination of the LETRAS magazine will once again submit the article that requires major modifications to the consideration of the corresponding referees.
17. The Coordination of LETRAS magazine reserves the right to make the pertinent corrections once the article is accepted for publication.
18. The shipment will be made digitally to the following email address: Revista.letras.ipc@upel.edu.ve

THE MANUSCRIPT

1. Two documents (in Word format) must be sent with your work: the first must contain information about: a) title; b) full name of the author; c) institution of affiliation (the country must be indicated) d) curricular summary (in institutions, teaching area, research area, title and source of previous publications (if any); d) ORCID number. The second will contain only the work without any identification data or clues to reach it; Neither dedications nor acknowledgments should appear; These aspects may be incorporated into the final version, after the arbitration process.
2. In articles signed by more than two authors, it is necessary to include a statement specifying the nature of each author's individual contributions. For this purpose, we recommend the CRediT taxonomy (https://credit.niso.org/). This information should be added after the authors' introduction and before the title. In this regard, in this link, we add relevant information for our collaborators.
3. It must comply with the following specifications: “Times New Roman” or “Arial” font, size 12, double spaced, numbered pages, in letter size format, 3 cm margin on all sides.
4. The work must have a title and summary in Spanish. This summary must be one page long, that is, between 200 and 250 words and specify: purpose, theory, methodology, results and conclusions. For translation purposes, we suggest the use of short, direct and simple sentences. At the end, four keywords or descriptors should be located. The four descriptors must appear in the text and in the same order in which they are mentioned.
5. The length of the articles must be between 15 and 30 pages (plus three for the bibliography).
6. Regarding the structure of the text, the purpose of the article must be specified in an introductory part; In the section corresponding to development, it must be clearly distinguished which parts represent own contributions and which correspond to other researchers; and the conclusions can only be derived from the arguments handled in the body of the work.
7. For quotations exceeding forty words, block formatting should be used: start the insertion on a separate line, indenting 1.27 cm (half an inch) from the left margin, maintaining the same alignment as a new paragraph. If the quotation contains more than one paragraph, the first line of each subsequent paragraph should be indented an additional 1.27 cm. At the end of the block, the bibliographic reference (author, year, and page or paragraph) is placed in parentheses after the final punctuation mark. References should be prepared in accordance with APA guidelines (7th edition).
8. The list of references is placed at the end of the text, with the following subtitle, in bold and on the left margin: References. Each record is transcribed to one space, with hanging indentation. Between one record and another, space and a half is allocated. The APA Standards system (7th edition) must be followed.
9. The notes go at the foot of the page and not at the end of the chapter, in numbered sequence.
10. There should be no errors of any kind (neither spelling nor typing); It is the responsibility of the authors to ensure this aspect.
11. Drawings, graphs, photos and diagrams must be located within the text, in their corresponding place. The APA Standards system (7th edition) must be followed.
12. Those who wish to collaborate with reviews must consider that they constitute expositions and critical comments on recently published scientific or literary texts, with the purpose of guiding interested readers. Its length should not exceed six (6) pages.
13. The reviews require all the information about the book and a particular order: name and surname of the author of the book, the title of the work in italics, city, publisher, date and number of pages: Jonas Jonasson. The grandfather who came back to save the world. Barcelona: Ediciones Salamandra, 2019, 443 pages.
14. In the review it is necessary to stop at the author of the book: introduce the author to the cultural space, his academic or intellectual production... among other information that presents him to the reader (this is recommended for the first two paragraphs of the text).
15. When presenting the overall structure of the book it is necessary to describe it completely. This will provide necessary information for the reader to get a precise idea of the book to read.
16. Referees of non-publishable articles will be considered within the arbitration committee of an edition of LETRAS.
17. Those wishing to contribute notes should bear in mind that these constitute theoretical essays, methodological commentaries, or critical reflections on current debates in the journal’s subject areas. Unlike book reviews, their purpose is not to describe a new publication, but rather to present a reasoned position on a scientific or literary issue. They should not exceed ten (10) pages in length.
18. Notes must follow a specific format at the beginning: the original title in uppercase and centered, followed by the author’s complete information (first and last name, institutional affiliation, country, email address, and ORCID code).
19. In the body of the note, the problem or debate to be addressed must be clearly defined to situate the reader within the intellectual context (this is recommended for the first two paragraphs of the text).
20. When presenting the argument, the author must engage critically with existing schools of thought in the field, concluding with an overall assessment and conclusions that open up new avenues for reflection.
21. At the end of the manuscript, it is mandatory to include a complete list of references that support the theoretical discussion, strictly following the format of the APA Style Guide (7th ed.).

Letras magazine evaluation form