Editing and Publishing at JU

Opening in OUP Chennai

2012-01-13T19:33:00.002+05:30

OUP Chennai is looking for an Associate Development Editor. If anyone from previous EditPub courses would like to apply, please mail Rimi B. Chatterjee or Abhijit Gupta with CV. Only those who have completed an MA in English as well as the EditPub course may apply by this route.

Editing and Publishing 2012: List of Selected Candidates

2012-01-13T16:44:00.000+05:30

School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University
PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing 2012

List of Selected Candidates

1. Sreemoyee Dasgupta
2. Paromita Sengupta
3. Sinjita Basu
4. Debapratim Chakraborty
5. Sumedha Dan
6. Tanisha Shome
7. Sejuti Roy
8. Shramana Das Purkayastha
9. Sayoni Ghosh
10. Shreerupa Banerjee
11. Sambuddha Ghosh
12. Jennifer Monteiro
13. Sanchari Bhattacharya
14. Kamalika Ghosh
15. Arunima Das
16. Suchismita Dattagupta
17. Priscilla N. Rozario
18. Payel Ghosh
19. Anwesha De
20. Soumi Biswas
21. Anuprova Dey Chowdhuri
22. Sayan Chattopadhyay
23. Kaustubh Jog
24. Roshni Mondal
25. Suchismita Datta

Waiting list
1. Pritika Datta
2. Samyak Ghosh

Classes will begin on 16 January 2012 at 6 p.m. in the AV Room of the Department of English. The course fee of Rs 7,000 is to be paid on the same day, by cheque or demand draft payable in Kolkata, made out to the ‘School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University’.

Selected candidates are required to produce original graduation certificates and mark-sheets on the day of admission.

Amlan Dasgupta
(Director) 13 January 2011

Editpub course 2012

2011-11-05T12:16:00.004+05:30

Applications are invited from Honours Graduates in any discipline for a PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing to be conducted by the School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University, from 16 January to 13 April 2012. Classes will normally be held four days a week from 6-8 p.m. Applicants have to appear for a screening test on 11 January 2012, at 6 p.m., to be held on the first floor of the UG Arts Building. Course fee: Rs 7,000. Applications may be made on plain paper or by email to culture@school.jdvu.ac.in, addressed to the Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records. Paper applications should be submitted to the School of Cultural Texts and Records, (SCTR Annexe, 1st floor, Energy Studies Building, JU) between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. on working days. Last date for receipt of applications: 9 January 2012.

Amlan Dasgupta,
Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records
Jadavpur University

Pearson Comes to JU

2011-04-01T13:17:00.004+05:30

Attention All!

Pearson Education (ELT and HSS) is conducting its recruitment session next week. Be prepared, and send me an email confirming that you wish to apply.

The schedule is as follows:

7 April, 3 p.m.: Pre-recruitment talk and test

8 April, 11.30 a.m.: Interviews

Current edit-pubbers: Be advised that they also want to see your presentations on one of the two days, so you'll need to be ready with them.

Edit-Pub: Timetable for 7–18 February 2011

2011-02-14T00:03:00.002+05:30

Sl. No.	Date	Subject	Resource person
13	07.02 Mon	Aspects of Editing	Shantanu Ray Chaudhuri
14	10.02 Thu	Project Work: Company Auction	Rimi B. Chatterjee
15	11.02 Fri	MS Word: Editing with track-changes 1	Rimi B. Chatterjee
16	14.02 Mon	MS Word: Editing with track-changes 2	Rimi B. Chatterjee
17	15.02 Tue	Choices and Decision-making Parameters for Working in Publishing 1	Devlina Mookerjee
18	17.02 Thu	Choices and Decision-making Parameters for Working in Publishing 2	Devalina Mookerjee
19	18.02 Fri	Editing Exercise	Pradipta Sarkar

Company Auction Results

2011-02-13T19:35:00.005+05:30

Rosebud Children's Books

Rs 5,00,000

Ishita B. Mallik

Ranja Chaudhuri

Yashodhara Ghosh

Janki Singh

Gimlet Press

Rs 50,000

Monidipa Mondal

Shreya Sarkar

Tanuka Mukherjee

Lav Kanoi

Screaming Silver Fantasy and Fiction

Rs 70,000

Roopkatha Banerjee

Debalina Chowdhury

Riya Das

Priyadarshini Goswami

Watermelon Books

Rs 2,20,000

K.K. Neelakantan

Sohini Pal

Nilanjana Chakraborty

Arindam Dutta

Karnan Books

Rs 3,80,000

Khyati Patel

Subir Bhattacharjee

Malini Bhattacharya

Sportacus Books

Rs 80,000

Chandrima Bardhan

Mousumi Datta

FrameWork 10

Rs 2,60,000

Antoreep Sengupta

Arunava Banerjee

Rajrupa Das

Dolon Chattopadhyay

Word Exercise

2011-02-11T18:06:00.002+05:30

Copy this file to MS Word, turn on track changes and copyedit it. Let the fun begin.

HOW TO MAKE STUDENTS COMMUNICATE
Speaking well is something that most people recognize when they see it and hear it, but very few have any idea how it works or works. Children lean to speak from their parents and other adults at an age when the process is not open to their conscious inspections. Later on, they may learn other languages as adults, but in most cases the fundamental groundwork of language and concept acquisition happens by age three or not at all. As a result, most of us are unaware of how this happens, and have no controller over whether the process happens well or badly. If anyone has any control it is the adults who teach us, though of course there is a great deal of controversy over the relative rolls of nature and nurture in language acquisition as well as other in forms of learning.
Once we learn language, the road is open for other skill to enter our knowledge bass. All these skills, mathematic and scientific, operate over the language platform. But it is unfortunate that we expend a disproportionate amount of effort on teaching these later skills but comparatively little on maintaining or upgrading the plat from on which they depend. What is worse, most high school mathematics or science teachers do not think it essential that they acquire optima linguistic skills in order to get their subject across to students; as a result they often ‘teach by doing’ with minimal commentary, or with explanations not taylored to the needs and capabilities of their listeners. The students observe the teacher solving a problem or doing a experiment, then try to duplicate the process.
This ‘learning by doing” is a good method up to a point, but is open to abuse by bland imitation; the student may get the right results, but that does not guarantee that he or she understands what is being done or why these results showed up. If there is no ‘de-briefing’ session, when the students, having succeeded in solving the problems, then go back with the teacher’s guidance and think consciously about what they did to get results, the students may become quiet skilled at an unconscious label without that skill being open to their own inspection and analysis. They will be able to salve complex problems, but unable to verbalije satisfactorily what they are doing. This failure is not restricted to the sinces; in the humanities also, say in teaching grammar, very often the teacher merely parses sentences and makes students learn the rules for doing so, without any of explanation why this should be done or attempt to make sense of the logic of language. Should a student be trained by this method become a teacher, they will in turn become the sort of teacher who taught them, and the cycle continues. Most of us, even if we do not become ‘teachers’ in the formal sense of the term, have to instruct our junior colleagues in the field in which we do work. If we do not do this correctly, we are not getting the best out of our workers. Some will be able and intelligent enough to compensate with self-learning, but some will not.
Part of the problem is engendered in the subject divisions-partitioning what we are taught in school. A question very often asked to muddle school children in this country is: which stream will you choose science or hearts? Accordingly private two shuns are arranged, correspondence coarse material is acquired, friends are dropped or cultivated and study hours are fixed. The conscientious parent is usually over-joyed if his or her child chooses the former stream. Depending on the child’s preference, pure or unsatisfactry results in humanities and social sciences are excused for ‘science stream’ students, while indifferent performance in the sciences is excused for ‘artist stream’ ones, irrespective of the fact that ‘arts steam’ people need to know how to do there taxes or maintain their car, and ‘science stream’ people need to know how to write laters, make presentations and inter act with people.
Given that the physical world is somewhat more unforgiving than the world of people, there is a limit to how fear ‘arts stream’ people can get away with impracticality (though some of them are definitely stretching the limits), but ‘science stream’ people seem less worried if they have suboptimal communication and people-managing skills. This is probably because it is less easy to quantify the losses concurred through the lack of such skills. Also there is no ‘correct’ state that can be easily described; a presentation may be judged acceptible if the content is sound even though the presentation is bad, causing the listeners to strain to construe meaning; the overall result may have been bet if the presentation improved, but how much better could this particular presenter be with the right training? How to determine this without going through actually the process of training? And if this cannot be predetermined, how then does one take on the decision to spanned resources on train and how does one know in advance what the return on expenditure will be? This makes planning difficult and quantification of results even more so.
Most people would not argue with the necessity for communication in principal, but they lraise objections when one descends to the practicalities. $$$ Science, the argument runs, is developing at such a rat and information is burgeoning so rapidly that bidding scientists have no time for anything other than learning their subjects. The time set aside for other skills has to be squeezed to accommodate these very important and vital instruction-hours. Everything else must be an after thought.
There are several flairs in this argument. One of them is that, even on its own terms, this form of teaching is failing to keep pace with scientific innovation, both theoretical and practical. Teachers themselves admit that most of what they teach will be obsolete as soon as their students grade wait or soon after, and what they rally teaching is the history of science. Granted that history is enormously important and that unless one knows how a thing was done and why, one cannot comp rend how it is done today, we still aren’t teaching students what they really need to know. We are not training their minds to plan and think ahead, only to be containers for ‘facets’. We may spend a great deal of time in plugging the leaks and enlarging the container, but what we are making is essentially a passive instarument. A trained mend should be able to trans form its contents in response to changing needs and goles; it should not be a bucket, but a crucible.
Unfortunately, the damage is done very yearly. When we are first introduced to science, it is as a collation of ‘facts’ about the natural world. We learn about how whether happens, the way things be have, how things were discovered or invented, what are the properties of various materiel (usually given to us in long lasts which we faithfully commit to mammary) and so on. But science is not about facts at all. Facts are, in whey, the byproducts of science, which is a process of liking at things. We are taut in school that science has discovered the ‘laws’ of the universe and everything operates according to the lays. What we are not told is that scientists don’t be leave on laws; they are constantly devising new tastes of established laws and trying to poke wholes in the ‘facts’ that we so reverentially memorized. Science is about doubt; about axing awkward questions and then trying to trek the answers to beets. The ‘laws’ are, in fact, merely guidelines, and can be upset by anyone with a thought-experiment and a pill of observational data. What is more, a ‘law’ does not describe what happens in realty, except in a reductionist way. A law cannot possibly explain ‘everything’ about reality: that is not it’s purpose. Without reductionism, we can’t deal with reality in any sensible way. For instance, the common wisdom is that Newton’s laws tell us how, for example, a car with the breaks off roles down a hill, but they won’t explain the pattern of dents it guts, the trajectories of the gravel that it scatters with its wheels, why a dog on the road narrowly missed being run over, why the car should happen to be blue with white seat covers, weather the radio was on nor why it hats a particular tree. For that we have to factor in the operation of friction, the individual oddities of the car’s components, the bumpiness and nature of the toad, the owner’s taste in car décor and music, the speed of the dog’s reflexes, the position of the tree — in fact, a model of this particular incident that was true in every respect would be so complex it would be useless for understanding the incident itself. Nevertheless, people continue to claim car insurance, and they can do so because physical laws allay them to infer that the colour of the car is irrelevant, but the friction coefficients of the tyres and brake shoes are not. The essential fact of the car rolling down the hill depends on a few factors which can be mathematically quantified. So when we say, ‘laws explain reality’, what we mean is, ‘laws explain the bits of reality we’re interested in, and allow us to ignore the rest’. Laws are shorthand, and which law we use depends on which bit of reality we are after. This is all very will when we know the answer in advance, as with the car; but when we are dealing with phenomena that are not fully explained, unthinking thrust in laws is unwise. We heave to bee alert to the vast con text that the law is signed to filter oat, because there mite be something important in that context that we were ignoring, and which has the potential to knock out or deeply modify our precious law. If we forget this, we are liable to talk about ‘theories of every thing’ as though the discovery of such a theory would explain everything about the wild, from how some people can waggle their ears to why we get black holes.

Padmini Ray Murray's 'Introduction to Publishing' class:

2011-02-09T14:59:00.008+05:30

On 20th January 2011, Padmini Ray Murray taught 'Introduction to Publishing' to the students of the PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing, conducted by the School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University.

She had prepared an on-screen presentation to take the students through the different aspects of publishing. She started by talking about the basic kinds of books that are published, for example children’s fiction, literary fiction, thrillers and so on. Then she spoke about the different markets suitable for different kinds of books and how to classify consumers into groups, in order to figure out what books are suitable for them. She gave the students a clear idea about the various kinds of booksellers and how they operate. Certain aspects about the history of publishing were also covered in class. She spoke about the Net Book Agreement and comparatively recent developments like the Nielsen BookScan. She also gave an overview of the publishing industry in the UK and the US.
The students were made aware of the different posts editors may hold. Since most of the students are aspiring editors, it helped them immensely. She took questions from students throughout and at the end of the class. Her class was enjoyable as well as informative, and she very successfully introduced the publishing industry to the students.

Project Outlines

2011-02-09T11:31:00.002+05:30

These companies are going to be auctioned on Friday. This is part of your project work. Read and enjoy.

Projects

The class will sort themselves into companies. The first time we did this the class made the teams among themselves (this did involve a little groupism, but one wants each group to be able to work together well, so that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Besides, companies are pretty groupist). We then gave each team five lakhs of virtual money and auctioned the companies to them. Another possible way of doing this is to appoint the five most active students ‘CEO’s of the companies they like best and have them ‘hire’ their team. Either way what you want is a good match between the team members and their company.

Each company gets this basic outline of who they are and what they do. They can augment this profile or to a limited extent modify it. Augmentations may include company logos, mission statements, vision, codes of conduct and corporate social responsibility, even balance sheets and stock quotations if they’re feeling inventive. However they mustn’t lose sight of their firm’s core competencies, or damage the company’s existing brand equity.

The team decides an overall policy for their company’s new list in keeping with their line of business or their policy decisions so far, and each team member individually develops a book or a series within that plan. The companies will present together, with an introduction of the firm by the CEO and then individual presentations by the team members.

The book suggestions given at the end of each company profile are suggestions only. Then can be modified, replaced or added to as the team chooses.

Each team member must generate the following

1. A concept note for the book or series, including title (and subtitle if any). If a series, then a general outline of the series with descriptions of the first three titles in it. The concept note will include the type or genre, an outline of the content, a few notes on the target readership, a summary of the probable need and a brief description of your marketing strategy.

2. A private note to your boss (or yourself) detailing the profile and/or CV of the prospective (fictitious) author or editor. You can base this on a real person, but not too closely: give them a made-up name and background. Essentially what we’re looking for here is your idea of the kind of person who would be best to write or edit your book/series. The profile should include the prospect’s published work both with the company (if any) and outside, professional expertise, suitability and strengths, celebrity status and fan following if any, and known issues (such as slow delivery or sloppy grammar). Bear in mind that this is a confidential memo. Note also that genius writers can also be a little—how shall I put it?—psychologically fragile, and you will have to deal with that. It helps if you forewarn your boss a little.

3. A proposal letter addressed to the prospective author, embodying the essential points of your concept note. Remember that your concept note is likely to be modified, sometimes quite radically, by your author or editor, and you want this to happen because they are the subject expert and may have strong opinions on how the books should be done. However you also want to make sure the book turns out useful and marketable. So in this approach letter do not lay down the law, but make it clear to your author that you are open to negotiation on some points of your proposal. Be careful to get the tone of your letter right, and keep in mind who you are addressing. The process of actually building the book will happen through discussion and negotiation with the author. Expect long working lunches to happen.

4. A look-and-feel sample of the finished book. This includes the cover with blurb (keep in mind that your cover design should showcase the content of the book, be appropriate to it and help to sell it) and one or two double spread inside pages (use any text such as the lorem ipsum template to demonstrate the page design and layout). If your book has illustrations do one opening with an illustration and one without. Also keep in mind that fiction is more immersive than non-fiction and therefore needs a less busy page design.

5. A marketing strategy. This has already been roughly outlined in your concept note; here you flesh it out and give it life. Your strategy will depend very much on what kind of book it is and who are the readership. You will have to be creative here. For instance, you could promote a cookbook through a website, cooking blogs and/or a TV cooking competition. Be bold but keep in mind the cost burdens that your book will have to carry. In general, specialist books for a small readership at a cheap price have dirt cheap marketing, and if any of these variables is large the marketing budget goes up. If you have cost constraints, explore how social networks and viral marketing might help you. Also keep in mind what is ‘cool’ to your intended readership. A marketing strategy that doesn’t take the tastes of readers into account will fail.

When you present, each person must take us through the process of developing the book, touching on all five points. If all the members of a team are working on a series, the general editor may introduce the series and the team members may deal with their individual books. Grading will involve a base grade for the company as a whole, with a top up for each individual depending on the quality of their presentation. Hence you must work together as a team and share expertise with each other as well as develop your individual projects. Work out your book concept notes before the second module starts and utilise the sessions upstairs in the computer room to develop the deliverables such as cover and layout.

Presentations will happen at the end of the course and recruiters may sit in on them. If you want to be thorough, develop a print version as well as power point presentation so that you can use the print version as your portfolio for recruiters.

COMPANIES FOR AUCTION

1. Rosebud Children’s Books

A fifteen-year-old private limited publisher of illustrated children’s books, Rosebud does about twenty books a year, is quite respected in the field, and did well in the 1970s and 1980s. Its best known books were the Leela series, a set of illustrated storybooks for young girls of the 8 to 14 age group intended to teach life skills, dealing with issues like a new baby in the family, homework, sports, shopping etc. They also produced the popular Kalu Kaka series of illustrated storybooks for boys of the same age group, which taught math and science through the figure of Kalu Kaka, a retired scientist who would design homemade experiments for the young boys who came to visit him. There were also a number of general knowledge and popular science reference books. Sales of these series were very good and Rosebud was a good investment in those days.

In the 1990s, Rosebud lost market share because of failure to modernize the list. The older writers have died or become frail and the company did not then make enough of an effort to cultivate enough younger writers till now. The majority stake in the company was bought in 2009 by the Rainbow Printing Works and a new team of young college graduates drafted in. They discovered that by and large, the copyrights of the older books were now worthless, but the company has been supporting some of these authors all their lives and letting some of these titles go suddenly out of print might involve adverse publicity. However, if the company wants to continue to bear the cost of printing and offering these books for sale, it will have to start making a decent profit.

The team began by clearing old stock and retrenching the company’s assets. Rosebud is now stable enough to contemplate floating new series. The team is now creating a plan to salvage Rosebud’s flagging fortunes while keeping its core image of being a socially responsible children’s publisher. Rainbow plans to print Rosebud’s new illustrated titled at its own four-colour printing house so as to be able to price cheaply. Some ideas for new books that have been discussed are as follows:

(a) A guide on traffic safety and/or civic sense for 8-18-year-olds, using a funky new character as mascot, in comic book format.

(b) A guide to using the internet responsibly for 8-14-year-olds,

(d) Environment-related activity books for 8-14-year-olds.

2. Gimlet Press

This is a publisher of poetry books based in Scotland, founded in 1989 by a Punjabi and a Senegalese poet. They are primarily known for their prestigious poetry festival held in Glasgow every August which also serves as a marketplace for them to get new authors for their list. In the UK they run a number of competitions such as poetry slams, online poet-a-thons and write-ins, for which the prize is usually a book contract with them. Another popular line is books of poetry with themes, such as golf, sandwiches or cats. They are particularly known for promoting the poetry of non-white minorities in the UK such as rap and dub. Recently they have begun ‘Gimlet Hour’ a programme airing on Radio 4 showcasing young performance poets.

In 2008 the founders visited Mumbai and attended the Kala Ghora Arts and Literature Festival. They made a lot of contacts and became interested in entering the Indian market. To that end they have hired a bunch of bright youngsters and given them the task of launching Gimlet in India. The team have to come up with a strategy and pilot projects to establish Gimlet as the premier poetry publisher in India, beginning with English but with plans to expand into vernacular markets in future.

Some ideas that have been discussed include:

(a) a book of poems by a new, happening and trendy young urban author. You will have to profile this person and design the look and feel of the book, which must reflect the author’s edginess.

(b) a really good translation of a well known out-of-copyright book of poems in an Indian language. You will have to identify the book and profile the translator.

(c) a book of selected ‘slam poetry’ generated by a series of poetry slams that Gimlet will organize in cities around the country. If successful this could be an annual thing.

(d) a book of 55-word love poems by various hands.

3. Express Research and Publishing

Express Research and Publishing is a German company that publishes doctoral theses. They came to India in 1999 but found that the number of good doctoral these worth publishing was abysmally low. They published a few disastrous titles, the low point coming in 2004 when a thesis they published turned out to have been plagiarized wholesale from a series of internet articles by Andre Beteille. The bad publicity from this almost caused ERP to pull out of the Indian market; the only thing that stopped them was the convoluted bureaucracy involved in shutting down a company in India. While talks were on to close the Indian branch down, a new CEO in Berlin decided to give India another chance. In 2010 the head office in Berlin fired 70 percent of the old Indian team and hired fresh young graduates. This team has been given the task of rebranding ERP and reinventing its list. They have been allocated a million Euros and five years to do this: if they fail to show a two percent return on investment by 2015 the company will close for good. The name of the company cannot be changed for forex reasons.

The team has been given a fairly wide mandate. Their task is to find a new vein of reference, academic and technical publishing that ERP can exploit. Some ideas that have been tossed around include:

(a) a series of guides to the best colleges and universities in India for those seeking admission to various streams; this series of print volumes will be backed up by a website where realtime updates will be posted by ERP’s research team. The team is deciding whether to divide this by stream, city or ranking.

(b) a series of books on new courses in Indian academia such as film theory, culture studies and gender studies, intended for first year students

(d) a series of guides for young publishers, including what to expect when joining a publishing firm, basic skills needed, editing guidelines, design and production, marketing, specialty editing for STM, rights handling, commissioning and other topics.

4. Screaming Silver Fantasy and Fiction

Screaming Silver was set up by a group of ex-Caltech NRIs who have returned to India, and are based in Pune. They are a publisher of games, books and web content catering to the 15-25 age group. Popular games include GothCarnival, Bullionaire, and All the World, all real-time strategy massively multiplayer online games as well as stand alone PC installs, popular with teenagers and also with parents as they are perceived as edutainment. The games are based on game theory concepts and are designed to teach players negotiation skills, forward planning and efficient resource use. The scoring pattern and bonus system privileges skills that are useful in the real world.

All these games have two supporting manuals, one for the player which explains how to play the game, and one for parents and educators which explain the game concept and skills taught by the games. These Teacher Notes also reassure parents and teachers that the games are not a waste of time. Screaming Silver would like to achieve more penetration into Indian schools with these games, but is encountering stiff resistance, partly because of technical issues with hardware and internet access, but also because of lingering suspicions from teachers and administrators.

Last year Screaming Silver ran a popular gaming competition and acquired a certain amount of visibility among the youth. They have just started up their publishing wing and have had some success publishing their game manuals. However these sales piggyback on the popular games and the head office wants some stand alone titles in the market to boost perception of SS as a serious publisher. Some ideas the team have come up with include:

(a) a book of research profiling new teaching methods, out of the classroom teaching and their effects on learning, skill-building and retention. Probably this will have to be done in partnership with a progressive school which would provide a testing environment.

(b) a book of short stories on the theme of the quest.

(d) a book popularizing game theory concepts for a general audience

5. Watermelon Books

Watermelon was founded in 1977 by a group of women journalists in Mumbai as a partnership. It began as a publisher of women’s magazines, the flagship titles being House and Home, for urban housewives, and Saheli, for the suburban audience. However from the beginning there was disagreement among the partners as to how to manage these magazaines, with a minority wanting to make them more ‘gossipy’, filmi’ and entertaining. In the 1990s, facing eroding market share as many older publishers did, the minority won the chance to try an experiment and launched a series of romance novels called Passions, which failed as the books were too expensive, not well written and not marketed widely enough, though they still remain popular among women travelers on the Mumbai suburban trains and sell from railway bookstalls on several platforms. Now most of the original partners want to retire and are looking for young professionals who can take their place, failing which they will shut the company down.

They have agreed to take on a team of fresh young publishers on a trial basis to be their replacements, and have asked them to come up with a vision to take the company forward. Some suggestions for new books the team is considering include:

(a) a series of novellas on inter-community romance, mild to medium hot (the rationale being that the forbidden is much more exciting than the permitted)

(b) a non-fiction popular reference book about Indian love habits

(d) a series of ‘his’ and ‘hers’ tongue-in-cheek guides to dating in the Indian context for the young urban professional.

6. Big Productions

Originally a TV serial producer, Big Productions went into publishing in the 1990s when they found that the scripts of their TV serials could be repackaged as books for the show’s fans. They specialized in domestic and corporate drama, and under their publishing banner they hired a team of ghostwriters to hammer the scripts into novels. The popularity of these persuaded them to publish novels on these themes independently of the shows, but these did not do so well, primarily because the ghostwriters couldn’t keep the action tight enough if they did not have a ready script to work from. Big Publishing decided they needed to attract better writers who could come up with fresh stories, but the company’s reputation was not attractive to serious writers. The company did experiment with hiring an established prize-winning writer to be overall editor of the fiction lines, but this did not work as the readers felt the resulting books were too highbrow and refused to buy them.

Big Productions needs to find a middle road that will attract talent and new readers but will not alienate the core readership who are used to the sensational drama titles. A team of young publishers has been hired to accomplish this. They need to identify the kind of titles that will fit in with their existing reputation while offering enough newness to attract readers. They also need to identify the kind of authors who offer the best skill set for their titles. Some possibilities include:

(a) a non-fiction book on real-life saas-bahu stories

(b) a series of true-crime books

(d) a novel or series on corporate corruption.

7. Karnan Books

A large wholesaler established in the 1950s by Vijay Karnan, the son of a freedom fighter, Karnan made its reputation as a publisher with educational books for regional markets, as well as Vikas Kiran, a successful swadeshi weekly newspaper promoting village education and uplift. In its heyday Vikas Kiran had a readership of over seven lakhs in five languages over the country, and was published from eight offices. However, a large part of VK’s revenue came from Panchayat libraries which got grants to buy it. The contract with the Central Government on which this market was based lapsed in 1996 and was not renewed, largely because of complaints about VK’s falling quality. The heir, Vikas Karnan, avers that its failure was due to his refusal to pay bribes. The educational list was not updated after this, although many of the primary textbooks had become iconic in rural areas. Asha Kiran, the civics textbook, became the generic name for all textbooks on the same subject in the Hindi-speaking belt, such that teachers would ask students ‘Have you brought your Asha Kiran?’ even if they were actually using some other textbook.

However, the company languished, and the Karnan family’s investment in the publishing side dwindled over the next ten years, though they continued to run the wholesale business. A family feud in 1999 led to the publishing firm being hived off and given to a younger son, who was incapable of running it; the wholesale arm was renamed Karnan Distribution. In 2005 Karnan Books went into receivership. It was taken over by Deutsche Bank which auctioned it to Futuria, a private equity firm, in 2009. Futuria aims to turn Karnan Books around and make a profit from it in five years. Accordingly they have put together a team of young professionals to develop a new list for the firm.

The core strength of Karnan Books is its visibility in the rural market, and Futuria wants to capitalize on this with a new batch of books to address the needs of the 2010s. Preliminary market research by the new team has indicated that village readerships are hungry for information on the globalised economy and want titles like the following:

(a) a ‘dummies’ guide’ to the share market,

(b) a slightly more advanced guide to export-import, finance and recession

(d) a simple guide on how to file an FIR, open a bank account, get a passport, use speed post, money transfer, electronic voting machines, make the most of mobile phones etc.

8. Sportacus Books

A publisher of sports books set up in 2000 by a pair of retired cricketers, Sportacus wants to appeal to the young. Based in Pune, they have already published the biographies of two eminent cricketers of the last century along with a rather odd assortment of books relating to sport. The most notorious failures among these were 100 Things You Didn’t Know About Cricket compiled from the internet by a venerable old pace bowler, and The Autobiography of a Pitch, apparently by an eminent cricketer but actually ghostwritten by his eleven year old niece. Naturally both of these titles lost a lot of the founders’ personal savings, and the company was only saved by a bailout from an angel investor who was a fan of their game.

Till recently the two partners were averse to hiring professional help and wanted to do everything themselves, but they are now quite frail and realize they cannot carry out the more onerous tasks and haven’t the energy to develop the list. They have also lost confidence over the near bankruptcy and are very reluctant to risk any more money. The only capital available is five and a half lakhs left over from the angel’s bailout. The founders want to remain connected to the company, but have put a team of young people on the job who will look after the business and plan for the future.

The company’s strengths are the reputations of its founders, which continue to open doors and give access to current sports stars for the new editorial team. The company’s weakness is a lack of vision on the ground, such that the projects undertaken so far have been costly, dull and badly put together. The team’s first task was to politely scrap a few editorial disasters that were brewing in the hands of the founders’ friends and family. They then sat down to brainstorm new titles, and came up with the following. They have to work under fairly stringent monetary constraints, so big sales are a must.

(a) a history of Indian cricket by an eminent historian and well known fan, formatted like a coffee table book but selling for half the price. Costs to be kept down by sticking to greyscale for the illustrations.

(b) a set of pamphlet guides to things like the doosra, sledging, and other cricket trivia, written by figures associated with them or experts on them, with illustrations by a famous comic book artist.

(d) a book for girls encouraging them to take up sports

9. Inner Light Press

A publisher of spiritual books in the 1960s, Inner Light has seen its market erode recently. It’s not that people are not buying spiritual titles, but rather that Inner Light’s bestsellers seem quite dated in the present market, and little has been done to update them. Inner Light has now tied up with Soup with Crotons, a Canadian publisher of self help books, to repackage and adapt SWC’s titles to the Indian market. Most of SWC’s titles have a North American Christian flavour, which is why they cannot be launched as is, but SWC is willing to allow adaptation of the basic material by Indian writers. A team of young Indians has been given the task of going over SWC’s list and picking out the books that will work best for IL. They will also have to find and approach Indian authors to do the work of adaptation. They are launching these books initially in English but plan to diversify into at least three major Indian languages by 2016.

The team has to keep in mind that the work of adapting will require a sensitive understanding of cultural difference and the ability to reinterpret social situations across cultures. At the same time, the books must be popular and written in an accessible style. They must look and feel reassuring and calming, ‘like a good friend you can rely on’, as the VP in charge of rights for SWC had explained to the team. The team has shortlisted the following books for the first phase of adaptation:

a. A book on how to cope with divorce

b. A book on how to adjust to and handle adopting a child.

c. A book on how to cope with or lessen work-related stress.

d. A series of books for parents on different neuropsychological problems in children such as dyslexia, stuttering, epilepsy, autism etc, and how to manage them.

10 FrameWork 10

FW10, as its fans call it, is a startup comics publisher founded in 2007 by an NRI who got out of Wall Street in time to avoid the crash of 2008. For the past few years it has been surviving by republishing comics from the US and Canada in India, mainly from small, independent, often creator-owned houses. But because FW10 cannot pay very high copyright fees, the quality of this material has tended to be uneven, and sales have been slow, although the company has acquired a small but loyal cult fan following. Some of these titles are realistic adventure, some are fantasy, some are manga-type bubblegum romance, some are horror and some ‘adult’, a catchall genre that includes a series about a tavern caught in a time-warp in Spanish Harlem, a manga yaoi tribute about a six-foot-tall transvestite named Harvey, and a series about a planet of half-plant people with four sexes. However, because many of the source houses abruptly fail or simply miss their deadlines, FW10 has never been able to finish a series and has a bit of a reputation among its readers for this; on one fan site they were quoting odds on the chances of the latest acquisition ever seeing its final volume.

While this cult status has worked for FW10 till now, it is rather precarious, as cults can die without warning, and the founder now feels it is time to begin publishing original Indian content and building a local list that will be high quality and high profile. To that end, he has hired a team of young professionals to sniff out new writers and artists and relaunch the brand. He recognizes that since there is as yet no established comics culture in India, the new creators will need a lot of handholding in the technically difficult business of making comics, and he has counseled his team to expect to have to give a lot of input for the first few titles. He has suggested that the team start by holding a series of workshops in the four major cities where writers and artists will come together and create a sixteen page story each. He has set aside a budget of twenty seven lakhs for this, and hopes that each workshop will generate three or four possible titles. He wants it made clear to the participants that these are intended to be books for adults, not children.

The team has decided to concentrate on four major themes: participants can choose which one they want to work on, and the best stories on the four themes will be collected into four books. They will have to make sure that the workshop are advertised correctly and they get enough good content for their volumes to get off the ground, so they will have to screen participants and ask for writing/artwork submission beforehand. The themes are:

a. The New Millennium: Future worlds, alternate worlds

b. The Secret Life: What lies beneath the world we know

c. Stranger in a Strange Land: Being lost, being in the wrong place, being misunderstood.

d. And So I Came to Paradise: The lineaments of gratified desire

Opening at Frank Brothers' and Company

2011-01-12T23:30:00.003+05:30

From comment received on a previous post:

We at Frank Brothers' and Company (an India subsidiary of Macmillan Publishers India Limited) are looking for ELT editors. The position is in NOIDA. The office is in sector 4, NOIDA and is quite close to a metro station. We are looking for people with an M. A. in English/Comparative Literature/Linguistics.
One can write to me at arani.banerjee@macmillan.co.in

http://editpub.blogspot.com/2010/11/editpub-course-2011.html?showComment=1293782622186#c4462587534093919494

DK India Jobs

2011-01-08T21:38:00.010+05:30

Dorling Kindersley India is looking for editors and designers. Post-graduates interested in publishing should apply. DK India is currently based in Noida.

For details, look at http://www.penguinbooksindia.com/Careers.aspx. Please ignore the deadline there.

Send in your CVs to jobs@dk.com or cheena.taneja@dk.com. Please mention the job profile in the subject line.

List of selected candidates for editpub 2011

2011-01-06T00:21:00.001+05:30

PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing 2011
List of Selected Candidates

1 Yashodhara Ghosh
2 Priyadarshini Goswami
3 Sanjana Sarkar
4 Sohini Pal
5 Nilanjana Chakraborty
6 Isheeta B. Mallik
7 Kapil Kumar Bhattacharya
8 Sanjukta Mukherjee
9 Arindam Dutta
10 Lav Kanoi
11 Riya Das
12 Janki Singh
13 Rajrupa Das
14 Antoreep Sengupta

15 K.K. Neelakantan
16 Arunava Banerjee
17 Chandrima Bardhan
18 Malini Bhattacharya
19 Shreya Sarkar
20 Monidipa Mondal
21 Tanuka Mukherjee
22 Roopkatha Banerjee
23 Debalina Chowdhury
24 Khyati Patel
25 Dolon Chattopadhyay
26 Mousumi Datta
27 Subir Bhattacharjee
28 Ranja Chaudhuri

Selected candidates are to report for registration and payment of course fee according to the following schedule:

January 11-14, 2011, between 11am-5 pm at the School of Cultural Texts and Records (UG Arts/Science Building, 3rd floor, near Film Studies Department), Jadavpur University, Kolkata 700 032. The course will begin on Monday, January 17, 2011.

The course fee of Rs 6,500 is to be paid at the time of registration by demand draft or banker’s cheque payable in Kolkata, made out to the ‘School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University’. Personal cheques payable in Kolkata will be accepted, but if payment is refused, the fee will have to be paid in cash with an additional amount of Rs 100. Outstation cheques will not be accepted.

Selected candidates are required to produce original graduation certificates and mark-sheets on the day of admission.

Amlan Dasgupta
(Director) 5 January 2011

List of selected candidates for editpub 2011

2011-01-06T00:21:00.000+05:30

Editpub course 2011

2010-11-17T14:11:00.000+05:30

Applications are invited from Honours Graduates in any discipline for a PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing to be conducted by the School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University, from 17 January to 15 April 2011. Classes will normally be held four days a week from 6-8 p.m. Applicants have to appear for a screening test on 4 January 2011, at 5 p.m., to be held on the first floor of the UG Arts Building. Course fee: Rs 6,500. Applications may be made on plain paper or by email to culture@school.jdvu.ac.in, addressed to the Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records. Paper applications should be submitted to the School of Cultural Texts and Records, (UG Arts/ Science Building, 3rd floor, near Film Studies Department) between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. on working days. Last date for receipt of applications: 31 December 2010.

Amlan Dasgupta,
Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records
Jadavpur University

OUP Wants You!

2010-09-09T18:37:00.002+05:30

Oxford University Press New Delhi urgently needs recruits for editorial posts. Any of our ex Editpubbers who are between jobs or yet to get a job are encouraged to apply. Send your CVs to Bharti.Saxena@oup.com

People wanted for Trisys

2010-05-09T22:35:00.002+05:30

Trisys communications urgently needs copywriters and editors to work in corporate communications and advertising. Email Mudar Patherya mudar@trisyscom.com with your CVs

Vacancies at Dorling Kindersley

2010-04-16T13:58:00.002+05:30

Dolring Kindersley have the following vacancies. If anyone from present or past years of Editpub would like to apply, please send me your cv at rimibchatterjeeATgmailDOTcom, or comment here, and I will forward it.

Dorling Kindersley India is looking for suitable candidates to fill up the following vacancies:
For our DIGITAL MEDIA DIVISION we require:

A) 5 Assistant Editors/Editors– (depending upon skill set) –
The ideal candidates should:

* Be graduates/post graduates with 2-3 years of relevant working experience.”
* Possess knowledge of XML and/or HTML

* Be fast, on-screen English-language editors and proof readers.

* Be able to cope well with managing high workloads, tight deadlines and working as part of a diverse team.

* Have an aptitude and enthusiasm for learning new technologies.
* Tech-savvy freshers with excellent written and verbal English communication skills may also apply.

B) 2 programmers/ Software Engineers:

The ideal applicants should fulfil the following requirements:

Experience
2-3 years

Education
Graduation – B.Tech/BE – Computers/Graduation with computers/PG – M.Sc. – Computers/MCA

Job Description

* Participate in the design, development and maintenance of production systems for conversion of Book content into electronic formats.
* Maintaining the required level of quality work throughout the project – from initial test material to final output.
* Liaison with others in the team and department to deliver projects and support technical issues.
* Maintain version control to ensure code quality, scalability and maintainability.
* Maintain Content Management System.
* Development and commissioning of new projects, as directed,

Desired Profile

* Version control and configuration management
* Excellent presentation and communication skill
* Experience developing web based and/or interactive media products
* Proper SDLC understanding
* Knowledge of Agile and test driven development methods
* Database Design experience
* Quality assurance

Extensive experience in the following areas:

o XML, XSLT, XPATH, XQUERY, DTD
o VB.NET, C#.net, ASP.net
o IIS
o RAD tools like Macromedia Dreamweaver, XML Spy or similar XML editor
o RDBMS preferably Microsoft SQL server
o Javascript, VBScript, Perl
o HTML, XHTML and CSS
o Open Packaging Format (epub) and Kindel (Mobi) e-book development
o Interactive multimedia development with Flash

Candidates with knowledge of MAC OS, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign and iPhone SDK will be given preference.

C) Assistant Graphic Designer:

Candidates should have:

* Photoshop/Illustrator/Fireworks skills
* Flash animation skills.
* Webs designing (to include advanced HTML skills)
* 1-2 years of experience would be good but freshers with the above skills may also apply.

The deadline is Wednesday, 21 April 2010. People who have already mailed their CV in the last six months need not reapply as we will be using our database.

Pearson shortlist

2010-04-12T11:30:00.001+05:30

The following candidates have been shortlisted for Pearson posts:
1. Shayani Bhattacharya
2. Athena Mondal
3. Nayantara Mazumder
4. Parameshwari Sircar
5. Darshana Ghose
6. Suchismita Bose
7. Anukta Ghosh
Jaishree Sharma, the HR head, will be coming to Ju on the 13 April that is tomorrow at 4pm to meet the shortlisted candidates. If your name is on this list, be at the department before 4 tomorrow.

CVs on Monday

2010-04-04T20:38:00.002+05:30

All of you intending to sit for the test/interview with Pearson, please bring your CVs on Monday, that is TOMORROW. Ex students can bring them on Tuesday.
There will be a signup sheet with me for interview timings.

Urgent Revision of Timings

2010-04-03T15:26:00.002+05:30

Pearson's timetable requires us to push forward the presentations to 2pm on Monday 5 April. Likewise, the interviews will begin at 2pm on Tuesday. We will have two rounds of copytests: 2pm for the first batch, and 4pm for latecomers. On Monday I will have an excel spreadsheet with time slots. Please come to me during the presentations and sign up for your preferred timeslot for interview on Tuesday.

Pearson Coming to JU

2010-03-23T12:42:00.003+05:30

At long last, we have finalised the dates for Pearson to come and interview the candidates from Edit Pub. They will be here over 5,6 and 7 April. On 5 April from 4 to 8pm we will have the final presentations by current students. This means about forty minutes per 'company', and 8-10 minutes per person.
On 6 April from 4pm we will start with a half-hour copy test for all the prospective interviewees. Then interviews from 5.30pm.
Ex-students of the course are welcome to present themselves for the copy test and interview. They should arrive on the 6th by 4pm.
If there is any overflow of interviews, we will continue from 4pm on 7th April.
All events in the AV Room of the English Department, JU.
To sum up:
5 April 4-8pm Project presentations by current students. Ex students need not come for this but can sit in and observe if they wish to do so.
6 April 4-4.30pm copytest
4.30-8pm interviews
7 April 4-6pm interviews.

And another...

2010-01-14T17:40:00.003+05:30

Do you have a passion for new technology, especially in how it relates to education? Are you as interested in the medium and delivery modes of content as you are in the content itself? Do you have the ability to discern good visual electronic design, with a fundamental appreciation of the user experience? If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, we want to talk to you.

The Higher Education division of Pearson Education is hiring a new media editor in its Noida office, responsible for researching and evolving digital educational solutions. New Media editors develop and enhance e-products by creating supplementary media for textbooks, introducing and updating areas of the Pearson Education Web site, publishing content on the Web Publishing System, and creating and editing new content.

The ideal candidate has excellent English-language skills, aptitude and enthusiasm for new technologies, the ability to manage time and meet strict deadlines, and possess familiarity with Flash, Java, CSS, HTML, XML, metadata, and SEO.

For the right person, this is a fun and fulfilling position. If interested, please get in touch with the HR department for details. (You may also refer your friends/acquaintances.) Please mail your CV with a covering letter to harinder.kaur@pearsoned.co.in. The last date for application is 30 January 2010.

Vacancy at Pearson

2010-01-14T15:13:00.001+05:30

Are you interested in transforming education and educational texts? Do you have a passion for reading, writing and discussing books? Are you a quick learner willing to take on new jobs and develop new goals for education publishing? If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, we want to talk to you.

The Higher Education division of Pearson Education is looking for development editors at Noida, Chennai and Chandigarh, responsible for shaping manuscripts into rich and innovative textbooks. Development editors take theory and instructional test and—through a detailed process of review, feedback and testing—design course-defining and market-oriented learning solutions for the Indian and international higher education markets.

The ideal development editor has the ability to understand and facilitate a student’s needs, an author’s goals, and an instructor’s requirements, and synthesize them all into a successful textbook. They possess excellent language and editing skills, are creative and detail-oriented, are organized and able to maintain tight schedules, and employ superb communication skills.

For the right person, this is a fun and fulfilling position. If interested, please get in touch with the HR department for details. (You may also refer your friends and acquaintances.) Please mail your CV with a covering letter to harinder.kaur@pearsoned.co.in . The last date for application is 25 January 2010.

PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing 2010 List of Selected Candidates

2009-12-23T23:13:00.003+05:30

1 Rashi Ravi Ganguly
2 Nayantara Majumdar
3 Gargi Mandal
4 Soumanetra Basu
5 Priyanka Chakraborty
6 Swatee Sinha
7 Amrita Bandopadhyay
8 Arnab Banerjee
9 Sion Choudhury
10 Bimbabati Sen
11 Avishek Parui
12 Anurima Sen
13 Suchismita Bose
14 Surojoy Gupta
15 Athena Mondal
16 Parameshwari Sircar
17 Pallavika Ghising
18 Sayantanee Ghosh
19 Darshana Ghose
20 Anukta Ghosh
21 Asmita Mahapatra
22 Prayag Ray
23 Shelly Roy Choudhury
24 Priyanka Saha
25 Sunayani Bhattacharya
26 Pratik K. Bose
27 Amrita Chakraborty
28 Somerita Banerjee

Waiting List
29 Doel Bose
30 Shubhasree Deb
31 Aatreyee Guha Thakurta
32 Debarati Dutta
33 Uttaran Das Gupta
34 Tanaya Bose

Selected candidates are to report for registration and payment of course fee according to the following schedule:

Monday, January 4, 2010. Time: 6 p.m. in the Audio-Visual Room, Department of English, UG Arts Building (1st floor), Jadavpur University, Kolkata 700 032

The course fee of Rs 6,000 is to be paid at the time of registration by cash or demand draft or banker’s cheque payable in Kolkata, made out to the ‘School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University’. Personal cheques payable in Kolkata will be accepted, but if payment is refused, the fee will have to be paid in cash with an additional amount of Rs 100. Outstation cheques will not be accepted.
Selected candidates are required to produce original graduation certificates and mark-sheets on the day of admission.

Abhijit Gupta
Rimi B. Chatterjee
(Coordinators)

Editpub course 2010

2009-11-09T16:37:00.002+05:30

Applications are invited from Honours Graduates in any discipline for a PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing to be conducted by the School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University, from 4 January to 9 April 2010. Classes will normally be held four days a week from 6-8 p.m. Applicants have to appear for a screening test on 21 December 2009, at 5 p.m., to be held on the first floor of the UG Arts Building. Course fee: Rs 6,000. Applications may be made on plain paper or by email to culture@school.jdvu.ac.in, addressed to the Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records. Paper applications should be submitted to the School of Cultural Texts and Records, (UG Arts/ Science Building, 3rd floor, near Film Studies Department) between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. on working days. Last date for receipt of applications: 18 December 2009. Photocopies of graduation certificate and mark-sheets must be produced on the day of screening test.

Sukanta Chaudhuri
Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records
Jadavpur University

9 November 2009

Commented applications will not be accepted.

Some Job Openings

2009-10-28T16:31:00.003+05:30

A couple of large publishers have asked me in confidence if any prospective hires are available for entry-level editing jobs, full-time, Delhi-based. I'm writing to ask if any of you ex-editpubbers are still available and willing to relocate. If so, write to me at rimibchatterjee AT gmail,com (replace the comma with a fullstop) and I will give you the details.

Opening for the post of a lexicographer

2009-10-22T15:34:00.004+05:30

Wordster Inc., an online dictionary company, is looking for lexicographers.

Required qualifications: A post graduate degree in English/Comparative Literature/Linguistics from a reputed university.

The position is in Kolkata.

Interested candidates may please get in touch with Prajnaparamita Padhi at antevasini@gmail.com .

Recruitment of Junior Editor for E-learning

2009-07-20T16:18:00.001+05:30

Knowledge Factor Inc. is looking for a junior editor for its Indian operations. It is a is a Denver, CO, USA based company involved in developing e-Learning material for the US market. Knowledge Factor has set up operations in Kolkata, India, to service the domestic market with its patented academic methodology that enables a learner to attain Mastery over the subject.

The initial activities will be based on engineering and management subjects. The Subject Matter Experts will develop the content for this purpose.

We require the services of a full-time Editor to handle the material produced by the SMEs.

We request you to kindly refer eligible candidates to us for this position through email.

Yours sincerely,

K K Sengupta
Knowledge Factor
www.knowledgefactor.com
Tower II, Infinity, Sector V, Salt Lake 700091
+91 9830005445

Jobs at Pearson

2009-06-09T11:37:00.001+05:30

Pearson Education India is looking to recruit the following personnel with the prerequisites detailed below:

Marketing Coordinator- Higher Education Delhi

Job Description:
- Creation of effective sales tools like Subject wise Catalogues, Cluster posters, book marks etc.
- Assist with departmental reports (title count, comping analysis etc.)
- Assist in the collection, development, management and timely dissemination of product information to both internal and external customers
- Maintain databases of selected reviewers and enlist their service in marketing review projects.
- Collaborate, plan, organize and participate in events, seminars and conferences;
- Day-to-day support of marketing department, creating frontlist P&L’s, title creation etc.Coordinate projects with other departments.

Assistant / Associate Development Editor- School Division Chennai
Subject: Maths, Science (Environmental studies) and English
Levels- Primary Pre Primary, Middle Secondary and Sr. secondary

Job Description:
- To ensure the efficient and timely publication of school books so as to make the best use of Pearson Education’s resources in producing a high quality product with author and customer satisfaction.

- To copyedit and prepare manuscripts for handover to the PE

- To proof read text accurately, working with freelance proof readers when necessary, and ensure that the highest quality of work is maintained.

- Liaising with authors on editorial matters as and when required.

- To assist in drafting and sending copyright letters

- To assist in doing picture research and preparing artist brief

- To assist CEs in preparing competition analysis

Tele Sales Executive- Higher Education Division- Delhi

Job Description:
- Candidate should be very fluent in English (written and verbal).
- Should have good and error free typing speed.
- Should be able to handle sales related queries.
- Good at coordination; as one needs to be in touch with sales team.

Editorial Coordinator- School Division –Delhi

Job Description:
- To prepare and update reports
- To create and update author and reviewer database on regular basis
- To send the BPF for all the leads generated in CAMP
- To maintain and update syllabi bank
- To coordinate among editors for meetings and circulate the minutes of the meetings
- To maintain project files in consultation with CEs
- To coordinate with Rights (for e-files), and Accounts Departments (for cheques to reviewers/vendors and dispatching them)
- To maintain records for travel approval form, call reports, and P&Ls
- To maintain and update the records of POs and bills
- To update the pub schedule every week (Friday) and circulate it to all concerned
- To coordinate with the editors for timely generation of NBIs and order forms and maintain their database

Assistant or Associate Production Editor - Higher Education Division- Delhi

Job Description:
- To be finally responsible for delivering print ready files, complete in all respects, as per the schedule drawn in consultation with the Publishing Manager.
- To ensure print ready files for processing covers for all books.
- To adhere strictly to quality checks at each stage of prepress processes.
- To visualize the final product, and coordinate with authors and vendors.
- To post status report with respect to project editors with vendors.
- To interact closely with commissioning editors, development editors and production manufacturing.
- Ability to keep to schedules.
- Ability to liaise with all departments.

Associate Commissioning Editor- Higher Education- Chennai
Subject: Business and Economics

Job Description:
- To commission and publish a portfolio of distinctive textbooks and innovative media products in Pearson Education’s well-established Business and Economics textbook programme.
- You will be responsible for managing a significant product portfolio and the development of new books and electronic media publishing in established areas of the list.
- You will develop a clear understanding of the B&E markets while building strong relationships with Sales, Marketing and Product Development in order to harness all of Pearson Education’s expertise.
- Agree a publishing plan and commissioning priorities with the Product Development Team.

- Achieve signings targets in line with the publishing plan.

- Work with Marketing and Sales teams to achieve sales targets.

- Work with authors and colleagues to ensure high quality and timely publications.

- Work with Editorial, Online Development and Custom colleagues to develop and deliver high quality, timely media and custom-published products and services.

Please send the CVs to jobs@pearsoned.co.in only. Interested Candidates can apply for these positions latest by June 12, 2009.

Vacancy at The Telegraph

2009-02-09T19:47:00.002+05:30

If anyone’s interested, there’s a vacancy at the Edit department of The Telegraph.

Location: Kolkata.

Qualifications they desire: Post graduate in Social Sciences/English, preferably a first class.

Mail your CVs to anusua79@gmail.com

EDITING AND PUBLISHING 2009: LIST OF SELECTED CANDIDATES

2008-12-26T14:22:00.005+05:30

1. Anandajit Hore
2. Anjali Kispotta
3. Arijita Chatterjee
4. Binita Roy
5. Deborina Roy
6. Dipanwita Roy Ghatak
7. Kumarjit Laha
8. Mouli Bardhan
9. Nirmal Kumar Mahato
10. Oindrila Hazra
11. Orance Mahaladar
12. Pallavi Bannerjee
13. Parama Sen
14. Parul Arya
15. Piyasa Mitra
16. Purbasha Auddy
17. Ragini Nag Rao
18. Ranjabati Das
19. Rashmila Maiti
20. Reep Pandi Lepcha
21. Rev. Morakandegoda Ariyawansa (overseas candidate)
22. Saroni Pattanayak
23. Satish C. Shambharkar
24. Shayani Bhattacharya
25. Sonal Kapur
26. Soumya Subhra Guha
27. Sreya Chatterjee
28. Sristy Ghimiray
29. Subhankar Bhattacharya
30. Suchetana Mahajan
31. Zaid al Baset

Waiting List
1. M.S. Narayanan
2. Soham Bose
3. Kalyan Kumar Das
4. Shunashir Sen
5. Subhadeep Palit
6. Sayoni Ghosh
7. Tanmoy Biswas

Selected candidates are to report for registration and payment of course fee according to the following schedule:
Monday, December 29, 2008. Time: 5:30 p.m. in the Audio-Visual Room, Department of English, UG Arts Building (1st floor), Jadavpur University, Kolkata 700 032
The course fee of Rs 6,000 is to be paid at the time of registration by demand draft or banker’s cheque payable in Kolkata, made out to the ‘School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University’. Personal cheques payable in Kolkata will be accepted, but if payment is refused, the fee will have to be paid in cash with an additional amount of Rs 100. Outstation cheques will not be accepted.
Selected candidates are required to produce original graduation certificates and mark-sheets on the day of admission.

Sukanta Chaudhuri,
Professor and Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records,
Jadavpur University 26 December 2008

P.S. Payments in cash will also be accepted.

Provisional schedule and faculty for 2009 course

2008-11-27T14:27:00.001+05:30

Classes will take place four days a week (Mon, Tue, Thu, Fri) from 6 pm to 8 pm in the UG Arts Building. The technical classes will take place in the Arts Faculty Computer Room on the 3rd floor of the UG Arts Building

Note: This is a provisional timetable. Classes are likely to change depending on the availability of the external resource persons.

MODULE A: EDITING WITH HARD COPY
1. 29.12 M Registration and introduction
2. 30.12 T Basic proof mark-up and symbols-1
3. 1.1 Th Basic proof mark-up and symbols-2
4. 2.1 F Style sheets
5. 5.1 M Transliteration of Indian names
6 6.1 T Practice proofing
7 7.1 W Stages of a text: receipt of manuscript to camera ready copy
8 9.1 F What elements in the text need documentation? Details of format and punctuation of notes, bibliography, bracketed references, reference lists.
9 12.1 M Overview of elements of documentation and what they do. Systems of documentation (humanities, author date etc) and authorities (MLA, MHRA, CMS )
10 13.1 T Indexing
11 15.1 Th Documentation practice
12 16.1 F Indexing and proofing test/practice

MODULE B: WORKING WITH SOFT COPY; PAGEMAKING AND DESIGN
13 19.1 M Introduction to Word Processing in MS-Word
14 20.1 T Using and
15 21.1 W Pagemaker-1
16 22.1 Th Pagemaker-2
17 27.1 T Photoshop-1
18 28.1 W Photoshop-2
19 29.1 Th Book design-1
20 30.1 F Book design-2
21 2.2 M Book design-3
22 3.2 T TBA
23 5.2 Th Practice
24 6.2 F Practice
25 9.2 M Quark-1
26 10.2 T Quark-2
27 12.2 Th Test/practice
28 13.2 F Test/practice

MODULE C: PRINTING , PUBLISHING AND SELLING
29 16.2 M Formes and Reams: calculating paper needs
30 17.2 T Preparing camera ready copy and costing out
31 19.2 Th Checking printability of visuals and graphics
32 20.2 F Old methods of printing; printing terminology and procedures
33 23.2 M Jackets, covers and binding
34 24.2 T Managing procedures
35 26.2 Th Preparing blurbs (fiction and non-fiction) and catalogues
36 27.2 F Pricing books: booksellers’ discounts and author’s royalties
37 2.3 M Distribution and bookselling
38 3.3 T New retail and e-selling
39 5.3 Th Editing textbooks
40 6.3 F Publishing textbooks
41 9.3 M Genres: Scientific, technical, medical
43 10.3 T Genres: social sciences, references
43 12.3 Th Genres: fiction
44 13.3 F Genres: translation
45 16.3 M Commissioning
46 17.3 T Copyright and permission
47 19.3 Th Tact, libel, plagiarism
48 20.3 F Author’s rights, duties and dues
49 23.3 M Dealing with authors; office correspondence
50 24.3 T Commissioning
51 26.3 Th Understanding the market-1
52 27.3 F Understanding the market-2
53 30.3 M Media synergies
54 31.3 T Visit to press
55 2.4 Th Presentation by publishing houses
56 3.4 F Presentation by publishing houses
57 6.4 M Feedback
58 7.4 T Valedictory

Holidays
Muharram: 8 Jan
Netaji Birthday 23 Jan
Republic Day 26 Jan
Dol / Holi Mar 11

Faculty
• Abhijit Gupta, Reader, Department of English, Jadavpur University
• Aloke Roychoudhury, CEO, DC Publishers
• Ananda Lal, Professor, Department of English, Jadavpur University
• Angshuman Chakravarty, Manager, Marketing Intelligence, Pearson Educational
• Chandrima Bhattacharya, special correspondent, The Telegraph
• Deeptanil Roy, author and graphic artist
• Mandira Sen, proprietor, Bhatkal & Sen (Stree and Samya)
• Moitreyee Chatterjee, freelance editor and entrepreneur.
• Pinaki De, designer, illustrator, typographer; Lecturer, Department of English, Uttarpara College
• Rimi B. Chatterjee, novelist; Senior Lecturer, Department of English, Jadavpur University
• Ronnie Gupta, proprietor, Argee Printers
• Sachin Rastogi, proprietor, Worldview Publishers and Booksellers
• Sreyasi Dastidar, chief subeditor, The Telegraph
• Sudeshna Banerjee, freelance editor
• Sukanta Chaudhuri, Professor, Department of English, Jadavpur University
• Supriya Chaudhuri, Professor, Department of English, Jadavpur University
• Swapan Chakravorty, Professor, Department of English, Jadavpur University
• Trinankur Banerjee, freelance designer; Dorling Kindersley

Editing and Publishing Course 2009

2008-11-04T20:31:00.002+05:30

CERTIFICATE COURSE IN EDITING AND PUBLISHING

Applications are invited from Honours graduates in any discipline for a PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing to be conducted by the School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University from 29 December 2008 to 8 April 2009. Classes will normally be held four days a week from 6 to 8 p.m. Applicants have to appear for a screening test in English skills on 22 December 2008, at 5 p.m., to be held on the first floor of the UG Arts Building. Course fee: Rs 6,000. Applications may be made on plain paper or via email (no enclosures/attachments required) to culture@school.jdvu.ac.in, addressed to the Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University, Kolkata 700032. Paper applications should be submitted to the School of Cultural Texts and Records (UG Arts/Science Building, 3rd floor, near Film Studies Department) between 11 a.m.-4 p.m. on working days. Last date for applications: 19 December 2008. Original graduation certificate and mark-sheets must be produced on the day of the screening test.

Sukanta Chaudhuri,
Professor and Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records,
Jadavpur University

P.S. Please mention your address, telephone no. and email address in your application.

Navayana Avarna

2008-10-23T11:11:00.000+05:30

Navayana Publishers have instituted a fellowship scheme for social minorities who need income support to attend the Edit Pub course at JU. Click here to go to the Navayana site and download the application details, available as a Word file and as a PDF. The deadline for Avarna applications is 28 November 2008. We will, however, continue to accept general applications till 15 December 2008.

There will be a screening test for all candidates, both fellowship and non-fellowship, in Calcutta on 22 December 2008.

Dorling Kindersley looking for Sr. Editors/Editors

2008-05-16T15:24:00.000+05:30

Dorling Kindersley is a based publishing house, creating high quality illustrated non-fiction books that offer comprehensive information and superb design. It is a part of the Pearson Group which also consists of The Penguin Group and The Financial Times.

Since 1974, Dorling Kindersley has published an extensive range of internationally acclaimed titles in 51 languages for adults and children. As the UK's market leader in illustrated non-fiction, we pride ourselves on creating books that combine comprehensive information and superb design.

Over the years, as the world's leading family illustrated publisher, we have inspired and informed readers who find DK books to be educational, distinctive and of consistently high quality.

Dorling Kindersley India is looking for enthusiastic individuals who can constantly deliver high quality work to fill the following vacancies:

Sr. Editors / Editors, applicants should:

• Be a Graduate/Post-graduate in English literature with 2-5 years relevant work experience, preferably in the publishing industry or news media
• Be fast, accurate on-screen English-language editors and proofreaders.
• Cope well with managing high workloads, tight deadlines and working as part of a diverse team.

For all past and present trainees

2008-03-22T14:37:00.000+05:30

As many of you will remember, Pearson Education India offered internships to many of the trainees of the last Editing and Publishing Course. Six of them took up the offer, and I am happy to report that five of them now have full-time employment with Pearson: Diyasree, Yajnaseni, Soumitri, Sukanya and Daniel. Congratulations to them all.
This time too, representatives from Pearson will be taking classes and conducting interviews for their internship programmes. The interviews will take place on Wednesday and Thursday, 2 and 3 April, from 2 p.m., in the Department of English, Jadavpur University. If you are a past alumni of the Editing and Publishing course and would like to appear for the interview, please get in touch with either myself or Rimi B. Chatterjee, by March 28, so that we can give you a slot.
Please note that these interviews are only open to those who have successfully completed, or are current trainees of, the Editing and Publishing course of the SCTR, JU.

Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing

2007-12-03T15:17:00.000+05:30

CERTIFICATE COURSE IN EDITING AND PUBLISHING

Applications are invited from Honours Graduates in any discipline for a PG Certificate Course in Editing and Publishing to be conducted by the School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University, in collaboration with the Editing as a Skills Programme, from 7 January 2008-11 April 2008. Classes will normally be held four days a week from 6-8 p.m. Applicants must be below 35 years of age, and have to appear for a screening test on 28 December 2007, at 5 p.m., to be held on the first floor of the UG Arts Building. Course fee: Rs 5,500. Applications may be made on plain paper or by email to culture@school.jdvu.ac.in, addressed to Prof. Swapan Chakraborty, Coordinator, Editing as a Skill Programme, Jadavpur University, Kolkata 700 032. Paper applications should be submitted to the School of Cultural Texts and Records, (UG Arts/ Science Building, 3^rd floor, near Film Studies Department) between 11-4 p.m. on working days. Closing date: 26 December. 2007. Photocopies of graduation certificate and mark-sheets must be produced on the day of screening test.

Prof. Swapan Chakraborty

Coordinator, Editing as a Skill Programme,

Jadavpur University

Job Openings: More Pearson

2007-07-25T17:15:00.000+05:30

Pearson require two more commissioning editors in the fields of business and economics. Detailed knowledge of these subjects is not needed: the candidates must have good language skills and sound editorial sense. The rest can be learned on the job. If there are enough candidates to justify the trip, Pearson will send someone to Cal to interview you, otherwise you'll have to go to Delhi to be interviewed. Travel expenses will be provided.

These are full time positions with salaries, not stipends. The actual amount will depend on the candidate's qualifications and skills.

Also Debsena Banerjee tells me a children's publisher in Delhi is looking for a junior subeditor and a senior ediot. Contact him at debsena_AT_gmail.com to learn details.

And now, Pearson

2007-07-04T10:32:00.000+05:30

Pearson Education India is looking to recruit the following personnel in Promotion Department with the prerequisites detailed below:

ü Should be a Graduate/Post Graduate with excellent command over English language.

ü Incumbent should have a bent towards devising, developing and implementing ideas for creating different marketing collaterals and carrying out promotional marketing campaigns.

ü Good knowledge of MS-Office.

ü Knowledge of software's like PageMaker, CorelDraw etc. is desirable though not essential.

Please get in touch with the HR department for more details and refer your friends/acquaintances for the above position. Please send in the CVs to jobs@pearsoned.co.in only.

VACANCY AT PENGUIN

2007-06-29T14:26:00.000+05:30

Penguin Books India is looking for suitable candidates for vacancies in the copy editorial department. A brief is given below:

The incumbent will be involved in the editing of fiction and non-fiction books, including liaising with freelancers, authors, commissioning editors and typesetters as well as our production, design and marketing departments. The job also involves initial assessment of book proposals and the literary quality and readability of manuscripts. The ideal candidates should:

Have a good academic record with a first class Bachelor's or Master's degree in any Social Science, the Humanities, Literature or Journalism
Relevant work experience, preferably in publishing
Have an excellent grasp of written English, an eye for detail, love reading and keep abreast of current literary trends
Have strong organization, word processing and interpersonal skills
Be able to work on their own initiative, and have a rigorous, self-motivated approach to meeting tight schedules and deadlines without compromising quality/editorial standards.

Please get in touch with the HR department for more details and refer your friends/acquaintances for the above position. Please send in your CVs to jobs@in.penguingroup.com only.

Best regards

Ranjani

editing can be beautiful!

2007-05-20T02:21:00.000+05:30

Here's a beautiful sentence this desk person encountered in a reporter's copy in May, apart from the inevitable 'not only, but also', 'that only too,' and the 'pall(s) of gloom' that accompany the reporter's repertoire 'each and every' day:

"We are planning to beautify our beautiful city in such a way so that one can be impressed after he visits a beautiful sight beautified by us in our beautification process too," said Mr. X...(in the context of a civic beautification drive)

Bib and Doc Course -- extension of date

2007-05-19T09:51:00.000+05:30

The course in 'research methods' at the School of Cultural Texts and Records, already blogged by Abhijit is, more accurately, a course in 'Bibliography and Documentation'. It will help you acquire some basic knowledge to work as project staff at the SCTR and similar research centres, handling documents and processing texts. It will run from 11 to 15 June 2007, more or less through the day -- exact times to be announced later.
The last date for applications has been extended to 4 June 2007. Leave your applications (on plain paper, stating your full or part Master's course results) in the SCTR Project Room (near the Film Studies Department). Preference will be given to those who have passed their Master's course, or at least completed their exams, but vacant slots can be filled up by current Master's course students.
Apart from the employment potential, the course will allow a soft landing on interesting professional terrain not covered by standard Master's courses, even in language and literature, or indeed by the Editing and Publishing course.

Sukanta Chaudhuri

And just when you thought it was safe to go out, here comes another course....

2007-05-19T00:20:00.001+05:30

The School of Cultural Texts and Records is holding a course for postgraduates in research methods from 11 to 15 June 2007 in the Project Room. Anyone who's finished their MA (ie PG2) can apply. This is being run for the fellows of the school to give them a grounding in research skills, bibliography, archival research, electronic techniques and book history, but 20 outside applicants will be selected.

You need to have passed your MA with 55%(B+) or have given your finals with 55% average in your other sems. The age limit is 25 years. The course fee is Rs 250/-

Please apply on plain paper with a copy of your marksheet or grade card with full contact details including email, phone no and address. Leave the application, addressed to the Director, SCTR, in the project room on the fourth floor next to film studies on any working day from 11.30 am and 4.30 pm. The last date is 18 May.

Publish thyselves

2007-05-19T00:04:00.000+05:30

It would be nice to know what our past students are doing. So if you would let us know where you are working now (or earlier, if it had a editing/publishing component) and your contact details.

First proof

2007-05-18T23:28:00.000+05:30

This is the home of the course in Editing and Publishing run every year by the School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University. Through this blog, we hope to keep in touch with old and new alums, and share whatever information we may have about jobs in publishing and media.

I am in the process of sending out invites to as many of our course participants. This might take a while so please be patient if you do not get an invite straightaway.