Bibliotekar (The Librarian): The Journal of Theory and Practice of Librarianship

INSTRUCTIONS FOR AUTHORS

These Instructions are aligned with the Regulation on the Categorization and Ranking of Scientific Journals issued by the Ministry of Science and Technological Development on 25 December 2025 and govern the preparation and submission of scientific and professional contributions to the editorial board of Bibliotekar.

Authors are responsible for securing the copyright permissions for submitted manuscripts. Submissions that are partly or fully generated by AI, or substantially revised using AI, will not be considered for publication in this journal.

Papers that have already been published or submitted for publication elsewhere cannot be accepted for publication in Bibliotekar.

Scientific and professional papers must receive two positive peer reviews in order to be published. Translations and reviews are subject to one review. The review process is double-blind. The list of reviewers is published annually in the imprint of the second issue.

Authors whose papers are accepted for publication are required to sign a statement confirming that they are familiar with the Instructions for Authors and the authors’ obligations defined in the Journal’s Editorial Policy, as well as a copyright transfer agreement assigning publication rights to the publisher of Bibliotekar, namely the Serbian Library Association. The Association will publish accepted contributions in electronic form and reserves the right to use abstracts or excerpts from submitted papers.

The Editorial Board of Bibliotekar will notify the author whether a manuscript has been accepted within a maximum of two months from the date of submission. However, the Editorial Board reserves the discretionary right to assess submitted papers and decline publication if they do not meet the journal’s content-related and formal requirements.

The Editorial Board supports open access to information and the publication of various types of texts in which authors may freely express their ideas. The journal does not exercise censorship of any kind, ideological or otherwise, but dissociates itself from the opinions expressed by its contributors.

Contributors are kindly requested to adapt their manuscripts to the thematic and formal structure of the journal and to indicate the section for which the manuscript is intended. Bibliotekar contains the following sections: Theme (invited papers), Practice, Chronicle, Documents, and Reviews.

Manuscript Structure

Each manuscript should contain the following elements:

• Author’s full name (Times New Roman, Bold, 14 pt)

• Name of institution and location (Times New Roman, 14 pt)

• (ORCID ID, if the author has it)

• E-mail address (Times New Roman, 14 pt)

• Title of the paper (Times New Roman, Bold, 16 pt)

• Abstract in Serbian (Times New Roman, 11 pt)

• Keywords (4–8 terms)

• Main text (Times New Roman, 12 pt; Cyrillic script for Serbian-language papers)

• Subheadings (Times New Roman, Bold, 14 pt)

• References

• Author’s name in Latin script (Times New Roman, Bold, 11 pt)

• Name of institution and location in English (Times New Roman, Bold, 11 pt)

• Abstract in English (Times New Roman, 11 pt)

• Keywords in English

To ensure consistency in the formal structure of contributions, authors are requested to observe the following guidelines:

1. Papers should contain between 10,000 and 30,000 characters (including spaces), i.e., they should not exceed one author’s sheet.

2. Manuscripts should be written either in Serbian (Cyrillic script) or in English. Font sizes should be:

   • Title: 16 pt

   • Subheadings: 14 pt

   • Main text: 12 pt

   • Abstracts and keywords: 11 pt

   • Footnotes: 10 pt

   The font should be Times New Roman (Serbian Cyrillic for Serbian-language texts), with 1.5 line spacing.

3. Manuscripts should be submitted in DOC format using Microsoft Word or another open-source text editor. The file should be named as follows:
   Author’s name – Title of contribution – Date.

4. The upper left corner of the first page should contain:

   • Full name(s) of the author(s)

   • Full official name and location of the author’s institution (affiliation)

   • Author’s e-mail address

   Authors are encouraged to provide their year of birth to facilitate identification of their scholarly output in the central normative database of the National Library of Serbia. The inclusion of middle initials is also highly recommended. Academic titles and professional positions should not be stated.

5. The title should accurately reflect the content of the article. Authors are encouraged to use words suitable for indexing and searching. If necessary, a subtitle may be added. The title should be provided in both Serbian and English.

6. The abstract is a concise and informative presentation of the article’s content, enabling readers to quickly and accurately assess its relevance. Authors are encouraged to include terms commonly used for indexing and searching scholarly articles.

7. Below the Serbian title, authors should provide:

   • An abstract (100–250 words)

   • Keywords (4–8 terms)

   both in Serbian.

8. A list of references should be provided at the end of the manuscript. To facilitate the journal’s inclusion in international databases, all references must be presented in Latin script (without translation), with a note indicating original Cyrillic publications where applicable. References should be arranged alphabetically.

9. Following the reference list, authors should provide:

   • Author’s full name(s)

   • Institutional affiliation in English

   • Author’s e-mail address

   • Title of the paper in English

   • Abstract in English

   • Keywords in English

   • Any additional notes concerning copyright, translators, etc.

10. The first time a foreign personal name appears in the text, it should be given in its original form in parentheses. Subsequent mentions should use a consistent transliterated form without repeating the original spelling.

11. Foreign expressions, terms, and abbreviations should be explained in footnotes. Translations of expressions and terms, as well as the full forms of abbreviations, should be provided in the relevant notes.

12. Tables and graphical presentations should be formatted consistently. Whenever possible, titles and textual content should be provided bilingually, in Serbian and English.

Footnotes

Footnotes should appear at the bottom of the page containing the referenced text. The longest footnotes should not exceed 100 words. Footnotes should be numbered consecutively throughout the manuscript using Arabic numerals.

Footnotes should be used primarily for references rather than extensive commentary.

Notes should be written in the language and script of the publication.

Citation Style

The journal uses the Chicago Style (Humanities) system for citations, footnotes, and the preparation of the reference list (bibliography) at the end of the manuscript.