Sydney University Press is the digital and print-on-demand scholarly publisher of the University of Sydney

University of Sydney

The University of Sydney is a public university located in Sydney, New South Wales. The main campus spreads across the suburbs of Camperdown and Darlington on the southwestern outskirts of the Sydney CBD. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and Oceania...

. It is part of the Library's Sydney eScholarship

Sydney escholarship

Sydney eScholarship is an innovative set of services provided by the University of Sydney Library to the University of Sydney that integrates the management and curation of digital content with new forms of access and scholarly publication....

 service.

Sydney University Press was founded as a traditional university press and operated as such from 1962 to 1987. It was re-established in 2003 under the management of the University of Sydney Library

University of Sydney Library

The University of Sydney Library is the library system of the University of Sydney. According to its publications, it is the largest academic library in the southern hemisphere, with a print collection of over 5.1 million items . It is composed of twelve libraries across eight campuses of the...

 to meet the new challenges of scholarly communication in the networked environment.

History

The original Sydney University Press was established by the University in 1962.

University by-law at the time enshrined its objectives:
"...the objects of Sydney University Press shall be to undertake the publication of works of learning and to carry out the business of publication in all its branches".

The Press was effectively dismantled in 1987 to become, for a time, an imprint of Oxford University Press

Oxford University Press

Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...

 till the mid 1990s when Oxford University Press relinquished the imprint and business name.

During this relatively brief period of time Sydney University Press published several hundred books and many journals representing scholarship at the University and beyond. These publications included major works by many of the University's leading scholars such as JM Ward, Butlin, Turney, Wilkes, K Campbell, J Young, Wolnizer, Jeans, Meaney, and Webby. It included series such as the Challis Shakespeare, Australian Literary Reprints, and journals such as Journal of Industrial Relations

Journal of Industrial Relations

The Journal of Industrial Relations is published five times a year by SAGE Publications on behalf of the Industrial Relations Society of Australia. First published in 1958 by IRSA, it is currently edited by Dr. Bradon Ellem and Dr. Marian Baird of the University of Sydney...

, Mankind, Australian Economic History Review, Abacus, and Pathology. The output of Sydney University Press represented the breadth, and the best, of the University of Sydney.

Current activities

Sydney University Press publishes 20-25 new titles each year. SUP's publishing scope includes Australian history, literature, biography, urban planning, social policy, public health and social issues. Books need to have an Australian focus or relevance to Australia. The majority of SUP's authors are Australian, but not necessarily from the University of Sydney.

SUP also publishes a few titles related to activities on campus. These include the annual student anthology edited by a group of volunteers from the Master of Publishing degree (Threads 2007, Cellar Door 2008, Margins 2009, Sandstone 2010) and the creative writing journals from the University of Sydney Union, ARNA and Phoenix.
SUP has also published a number of official and unofficial histories from the University, including 150 Years of the Faculty of Medicine, 150 Years 150 Firsts: People of the Faculty of Medicine, Sydney University Sport 1852-2007: more than a club, 50 Great Moments: Celebrating the Golden Jubilee of the University of Sydney's Electron Microscope Unit; and Educating for business, public service and the social sciences: A history of the Faculty of Economics at the University of Sydney 1920-1999.

Australian literature

SUP has used a number of CAL Cultural Fund grants to improve access to out-of-print Australian literature. In 2003, 25 Australian novels were brought back into print under the Classic Australian Works series. In 2009, a new series, the Australian Classics Library was commenced. Twelve titles, chosen by Professor Robert Dixon and Emeritus Professor Bruce Bennett, had new introductions written to reposition them for the scholarly and education markets. In 2009, Resourceful Reading: The New Empiricism, eResearch and Australian Literary Culture was released, containing a series of essays on emerging research into literary theory and the use of digital technology in the humanities.

External links

• Sydney University Press website