Examples
Worked examples
- Is an instance
A scholarly communication librarian reviews a faculty member's publisher agreement to confirm whether the accepted manuscript can be deposited in the institutional repository, and under what embargo period, in order to satisfy a funder's open access mandate.
- Is an instance
A scholarly communication librarian manages the institution's transformative (read-and-publish) agreement with a publisher, tracking which corresponding authors are eligible for APC coverage under the agreement and processing those requests.
Counter-examples
Looks similar, but isn't
- Not an instance
A subject-liaison librarian who selects journal and database subscriptions for a specific academic department, and provides discipline-specific reference support, is a distinct and more traditional collection-development role -- the two roles sometimes overlap at smaller institutions, but 'scholarly communication librarian' specifically denotes the publishing-system-facing set of responsibilities above, not general subject liaison work.
- Not an instance
A sponsored-programs or research-office grants administrator who tracks a funder's open access and data-sharing requirements as part of award compliance performs an adjacent but distinct function -- the library role is typically policy-interpretation, infrastructure, and researcher-education-facing, while the research office role is pre/post-award compliance tracking; the two commonly coordinate but are not the same position.
Editorial commentary
What the role does
A scholarly communication librarian is a library position oriented toward an institution’s relationship with the scholarly publishing and communication system, rather than the traditional collection-management or reference functions of a library role. The core responsibilities recur across institutions, even though the exact job title varies:
- Open access policy support. Interpreting institutional and funder open access mandates for individual faculty, and helping them determine which version of a manuscript can be deposited where, and under what embargo terms.
- Institutional repository management. Populating, curating, and maintaining the repository that hosts deposited manuscripts, theses, and other institutional scholarly output.
- Copyright and author rights advice. Reviewing publisher agreements with researchers to explain what rights they retain (self-archiving rights, use of author addenda, licensing terms) before or after signing.
- APC fund and agreement administration. Managing institutional article processing charge funds and transformative (read-and-publish) agreements with publishers, including determining author eligibility.
- Research data and identifier support. At many institutions, extending into research data management guidance and encouraging researcher identifier adoption such as ORCID.
How it interfaces with the research office
The scholarly communication librarian role is adjacent to, but distinct from, a research administration or sponsored-programs office. The library role is generally policy-interpretation, infrastructure, and researcher-education-facing — helping an individual researcher understand and comply with a funder’s open access or data-sharing policy, and maintaining the repository infrastructure that makes compliance possible — while a research office’s compliance function is typically pre- and post-award administration tied to the terms of a specific grant. In practice the two commonly coordinate: a funder’s open access or data management plan requirement often needs both the library’s repository infrastructure and the research office’s award-level compliance tracking to be satisfied together.
Where the title is used
Job titles for this function vary by institution — ‘Scholarly Communications Librarian,’ ‘Open Access Librarian,’ and ‘Research Data and Scholarly Communication Librarian’ all describe overlapping versions of the same core responsibilities. The professional community around the role includes groups such as the Library Publishing Coalition, the Society for Scholarly Publishing, and initiatives such as International Open Access Week, which scholarly communication librarians frequently organize on their campuses.
Machine-readable encodings
Use in your systems
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