SUNY Press

• 1. Introduction

  ›

  The State University of New York Press, usually called SUNY Press, began in 1966 and works from the city of Albany, New York. It is a university press tied to the State University of New York system, and its job is to publish scholarly work. Most people never think about who prints the specialized books that professors cite in their research. A press like this one is where that work becomes a book. This documentary asks who the press writes for, how many of its authors come from inside its own university system, and how its books travel from Albany to readers who may never visit the city.

  123

• 2. Scholars And General Readers

  ›

  Eighty percent of the books published by SUNY Press are scholarly works. Most of those come from professors within the SUNY system, though authors at other schools and universities also appear on the list. That ratio shows what the press is for. It exists mainly to give academic research a place to be published, and only secondarily to chase a wide audience. The remaining twenty percent is a different kind of book, aimed at a general audience instead of specialists. The press covers various fields rather than a single discipline, so one catalog can hold very different subjects. The source does not name individual titles or authors, so the exact shape of that general-interest list stays unknown.

  134

• 3. Getting Books To Readers

  ›

  Ingram, Integrated Books International, EBSCO, ProQuest, Project MUSE, the Philosophy Documentation Center, Google, and Amazon all have agreements with SUNY Press. Together they show how a small academic publisher reaches the world. Some of these partners handle print-on-demand, which means a copy can be made when someone orders it rather than sitting in a warehouse. Others deal in electronic versions, so a scholar can read a SUNY Press book on a screen. The press is also a member of the Association of University Presses, a group that connects it with other publishers of its kind. That membership places the Albany press within a larger network of university presses.

  125