Humanities, Social Sciences and Interdisciplinary Studies Article Classification Policy

1. Purpose of the Policy

The Dyal Singh Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences (DSJHSS) publishes multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research across the humanities and social sciences. Because many contemporary fields - including linguistics, gender studies, media and communication studies, cultural studies, history, religious studies, education, area studies, and political thought - cross conventional disciplinary boundaries, the appropriate section for an article cannot always be determined solely by its title, topic, departmental affiliation, or the discipline named by the author.

This policy establishes transparent and consistent criteria for determining whether an accepted manuscript should be published under the Humanities, Social Sciences, or Interdisciplinary Studies section of the journal.

Classification is based primarily on the article's research orientation, research question, nature of evidence, methodology, analytical purpose, theoretical framework, and the extent to which it integrates more than one disciplinary tradition.

2. General Principle

For section classification, DSJHSS adopts the following general distinction:

Humanities research primarily seeks to interpret, understand, critically examine, or contextualize human ideas, meanings, values, texts, histories, languages, cultural expressions, and intellectual traditions.

Social Sciences research primarily seeks to describe, investigate, explain, compare, or evaluate human behaviour, social relationships, institutions, organizations, communities, policies, and broader social phenomena through systematic empirical or analytical inquiry.

Interdisciplinary Studies research substantially integrates two or more disciplinary perspectives, theoretical traditions, bodies of evidence, or methodological approaches in order to address a research problem that cannot be adequately represented by a single Humanities or Social Sciences orientation.

Accordingly, manuscripts shall be classified according to what the research actually does. A disciplinary label may inform, but shall not by itself determine, section placement.

3. Criteria for Classification under Humanities

An article will normally be classified under the Humanities section when the majority of the following characteristics are present and the article is not substantially integrating a second disciplinary orientation.

3.1 Research Objective

The principal objective of the research is to:

interpret meaning;

examine ideas, values, beliefs, or concepts;

analyse representation, narrative, symbolism, rhetoric, or discourse;

critically examine literary, philosophical, historical, religious, linguistic, or cultural material;

understand intellectual, linguistic, historical, or cultural development; or

provide historical, philosophical, textual, conceptual, or interpretive analysis.

3.2 Nature of Research Material

The principal sources or objects of analysis may include:

literary texts;

novels, poetry, drama, and other creative works;

philosophical works;

historical records and archival documents;

religious texts;

speeches and writings;

cultural artefacts;

films and other cultural productions;

linguistic texts and language corpora used primarily for textual, stylistic, philological, or historical interpretation;

manuscripts;

diaries and personal narratives;

intellectual traditions; or

other textual, historical, artistic, cultural, or linguistic materials.

3.3 Methodological Orientation

Common Humanities methodologies include, but are not limited to:

close reading;

textual analysis;

literary criticism;

historical interpretation;

archival analysis;

philosophical analysis;

conceptual analysis;

hermeneutics;

rhetorical analysis;

comparative literary analysis;

interpretive discourse analysis;

stylistics;

philological analysis;

historical-linguistic interpretation; and

cultural criticism.

3.4 Typical Humanities Disciplines and Orientations

Articles with a predominantly Humanities orientation may arise from areas including:

Literature

History

Philosophy

Religious Studies and Theology

Languages

Literary Linguistics and Stylistics

Philology and Historical Language Studies

Classics

Cultural Studies

Arts and Aesthetics

Intellectual History

Comparative Literature

Political Thought and Intellectual Traditions

The disciplinary label alone, however, shall not determine classification.

4. Criteria for Classification under Social Sciences

An article will normally be classified under the Social Sciences section when the majority of the following characteristics are present and one social-scientific orientation clearly dominates the study.

4.1 Research Objective

The principal objective of the research is to:

examine human behaviour;

investigate attitudes, perceptions, practices, experiences, or language use within social groups;

explain social relationships or institutional processes;

identify relationships between variables;

examine causes, consequences, patterns, or trends;

evaluate policies, programmes, institutions, interventions, or educational practices;

compare populations, organizations, communities, societies, or demographic groups; or

develop or test explanations concerning social phenomena.

4.2 Nature of Research Material

The principal evidence may include:

survey data;

questionnaires;

interviews;

focus groups;

observations;

experimental data;

demographic data;

economic data;

institutional or administrative records;

public opinion data;

coded datasets;

social-media or digital data used to investigate social or communicative behaviour;

social, behavioural, educational, or organizational data;

linguistic data used primarily to investigate social variation, language behaviour, acquisition, attitudes, policy, or communication; or

systematically collected empirical evidence concerning individuals, groups, communities, or institutions.

4.3 Methodological Orientation

Common Social Sciences methodologies include, but are not limited to:

quantitative research;

qualitative empirical research;

mixed-methods research within a predominantly social-scientific design;

surveys;

interviews;

focus groups;

ethnography;

case-study research;

experiments;

statistical analysis;

regression analysis;

comparative analysis;

systematic content analysis;

corpus-based analysis used to investigate social, demographic, educational, or communicative patterns;

behavioural analysis; and

policy or programme evaluation.

The use of qualitative methodology does not automatically place an article within the Humanities. A qualitative study based on interviews, observations, focus groups, ethnography, or other empirical investigation of individuals, groups, institutions, or social processes will normally be classified under Social Sciences unless it substantially integrates an independent Humanities component.

4.4 Typical Social Science Disciplines and Orientations

Articles with a predominantly Social Sciences orientation may arise from areas including:

Political Science

Sociology

Economics

Psychology

Education

Anthropology

International Relations

Public Administration

Public Policy

Governance Studies

Development Studies

Communication Studies

Media Studies

Gender Studies

Management and Organizational Studies

Applied Linguistics

Sociolinguistics

Psycholinguistics

Language Education and Language Policy

The disciplinary label alone shall not determine the final section.

5. Criteria for Classification under Interdisciplinary Studies

The Interdisciplinary Studies section is intended for manuscripts in which the integration of disciplinary perspectives is substantive, necessary to the research design, and visible throughout the article. A manuscript shall not be classified as interdisciplinary merely because it cites authors from different fields, uses a fashionable cross-disciplinary topic, or includes a secondary concept from another discipline.

5.1 Core Eligibility Principle

An article will normally qualify for Interdisciplinary Studies when at least three of the following five characteristics are clearly present:

1. The research question crosses disciplinary boundaries and cannot be adequately addressed from only one Humanities or Social Sciences perspective.

2. The theoretical or conceptual framework substantially integrates theories, concepts, or scholarly traditions from two or more disciplines or from both Humanities and Social Sciences.

3. The methodology combines distinct approaches associated with different disciplinary traditions, rather than using one dominant method with a minor supplementary technique.

4. The evidence or objects of analysis include materially different forms of evidence, such as texts or archives together with interviews, surveys, behavioural data, institutional data, or other empirical material.

5. The findings or conclusions make a meaningful contribution to more than one disciplinary conversation and the integration is essential to the article's argument.

5.2 Typical Interdisciplinary Research Configurations

Examples may include, but are not limited to:

historical or archival interpretation integrated with political science, sociology, anthropology, or institutional analysis;

literary or cultural analysis combined with interviews, surveys, ethnography, audience research, or other empirical social inquiry;

linguistic or discourse analysis integrated with social, political, cultural, technological, demographic, or media analysis;

religious-textual interpretation combined with empirical investigation of religious communities, practices, institutions, or political behaviour;

media-text analysis combined with systematic audience, platform, communication, or behavioural research;

gender analysis integrating literary/cultural interpretation with sociological, political, economic, educational, or empirical analysis;

digital humanities research combining computational or corpus methods with historical, literary, cultural, or interpretive inquiry;

area studies or postcolonial research integrating history, culture, politics, sociology, language, and/or anthropology in a genuinely combined design; and

environmental, development, or policy research that substantially integrates ethical, historical, cultural, linguistic, or philosophical analysis with social-scientific inquiry.

5.3 What Does Not Qualify as Interdisciplinary

The following circumstances, by themselves, are insufficient for Interdisciplinary Studies classification:

an article written by authors from different departments;

a literature review containing sources from several disciplines;

the use of one theory from another field without substantive methodological or analytical integration;

a topic that is inherently broad, such as gender, language, media, religion, identity, politics, or education; or

a study that has one clearly dominant disciplinary orientation with only incidental reference to another field.

Where one disciplinary orientation clearly dominates, the manuscript should remain in Humanities or Social Sciences. The Interdisciplinary Studies section should be used when disciplinary integration is central rather than incidental.

6. Primary Classification Criteria

When deciding whether a manuscript belongs to Humanities, Social Sciences, or Interdisciplinary Studies, the Editorial Team shall consider the following criteria in order of importance:

1. Research Question - What is the study primarily trying to interpret, explain, evaluate, establish, or integrate?

2. Methodology - How has the author investigated the research problem, and does the design combine distinct disciplinary approaches?

3. Nature of Evidence - What constitutes the main material or data analysed in the article?

4. Research Purpose - Is the primary objective interpretation of meaning, systematic investigation of a social phenomenon, or integration of both?

5. Disciplinary and Theoretical Framework - Which scholarly tradition or traditions principally guide the research?

6. Degree of Integration - Are multiple disciplinary perspectives genuinely integrated into the research design and conclusions, or are they merely mentioned?

No single criterion shall automatically determine classification. The overall scholarly orientation and degree of disciplinary integration shall be considered.

7. Humanities-Social Sciences-Interdisciplinary Classification Matrix

8. Classification of Interdisciplinary and Borderline Research

DSJHSS recognizes that contemporary scholarship frequently crosses disciplinary boundaries. Subjects such as gender, media, language, religion, politics, history, education, culture, communication, identity, and technology may be studied from Humanities, Social Sciences, or genuinely interdisciplinary perspectives.

The following examples illustrate how the same broad subject may lead to different section placement:

Gender: feminist literary interpretation of gender representation in a novel would normally be Humanities; a survey of workplace gender inequality would normally be Social Sciences; a study combining literary representation with interviews or social data to analyse gender norms across texts and lived experience may be Interdisciplinary Studies.

Politics: critical interpretation of political rhetoric or political thought in historical texts may be Humanities; empirical investigation of voting behaviour, political attitudes, institutions, or public policy would normally be Social Sciences; a study integrating historical discourse, political theory, and empirical institutional or behavioural evidence may be Interdisciplinary Studies.

Religion: textual, theological, or philosophical interpretation of religious concepts may be Humanities; interview- or survey-based investigation of religious behaviour or institutions would normally be Social Sciences; a study integrating scriptural interpretation with empirical analysis of religious communities or political behaviour may be Interdisciplinary Studies.

Media: interpretive analysis of films, narratives, or media texts may be Humanities; empirical research on audiences, communication behaviour, or platform use would normally be Social Sciences; a study integrating media-text interpretation with audience, platform, or behavioural evidence may be Interdisciplinary Studies.

History: archival reconstruction and historical interpretation would normally be Humanities; systematic empirical study of contemporary institutions or behaviours informed by historical context would normally be Social Sciences; a study in which historical archives and social-scientific theory/methods are both central may be Interdisciplinary Studies.

9. Special Classification Guidance for Linguistics

Linguistics shall not be assigned automatically to a single section. It is a broad field whose subfields and research designs may be Humanities-oriented, Social Sciences-oriented, or genuinely interdisciplinary. The Editorial Team shall classify linguistics manuscripts according to the research question, data, method, analytical purpose, and disciplinary integration.

9.1 Linguistics under Humanities

A linguistics article will normally be classified under Humanities when its dominant purpose is textual, historical, interpretive, stylistic, philological, rhetorical, or conceptual. Examples include:

literary linguistics and stylistics;

philology;

historical or diachronic language analysis centred on textual interpretation;

rhetorical or interpretive discourse analysis;

language, meaning, metaphor, narrative, or representation studied primarily as textual/cultural phenomena; and

linguistic analysis of literary, historical, religious, or cultural texts where interpretation is the principal outcome.

9.2 Linguistics under Social Sciences

A linguistics article will normally be classified under Social Sciences when its dominant purpose is empirical investigation of language use, behaviour, acquisition, variation, attitudes, policy, education, communication, or social patterning. Examples include:

sociolinguistics;

applied linguistics;

language education and second-language acquisition;

psycholinguistics and experimental language research;

language attitudes and language policy;

survey-, interview-, observation-, or experiment-based language research;

corpus studies designed primarily to identify social, demographic, communicative, educational, or behavioural patterns; and

computer-mediated communication studies focused primarily on measurable language behaviour or social variation.

9.3 Linguistics under Interdisciplinary Studies

A linguistics article may be classified under Interdisciplinary Studies when linguistic analysis is substantially integrated with another disciplinary tradition and neither component is merely incidental. Examples include:

digital discourse research integrating corpus/linguistic analysis with media studies, sociology, platform studies, or cultural analysis;

language-and-identity research combining discourse/textual analysis with interviews, ethnography, or social data;

political discourse research integrating linguistic analysis with political theory, political science, history, or empirical political communication;

linguistic landscape research combining language analysis with geography, sociology, anthropology, or urban studies;

multimodal discourse studies integrating language, visual culture, media, and communication analysis; and

digital humanities projects integrating computational linguistic methods with literary, historical, archival, or cultural interpretation.

A corpus-based method by itself does not determine section placement. The editorial question is what the corpus is being used to establish: textual or historical meaning generally points toward Humanities; social, behavioural, educational, or communicative patterns generally point toward Social Sciences; substantial integration of both orientations may justify Interdisciplinary Studies.

10. Other Borderline and Cross-Domain Fields

In addition to Linguistics, the following fields commonly operate across section boundaries:

Gender Studies

Media and Communication Studies

Cultural Studies

History

Religious Studies

Education

Area Studies

Development Studies

Political Thought

Postcolonial Studies

Digital Humanities

Environmental Humanities and Environmental Social Science

Articles from these fields shall be classified according to the research actually undertaken rather than according to the name of the discipline.

11. Editorial Decision-Making Procedure

For manuscripts where section classification is unclear, the Editorial Team should assess the article using the following sequence:

Research Question -> Methodology -> Evidence -> Research Purpose -> Disciplinary Framework -> Degree of Integration

The following three-part guiding test may be used:

1. Is the article primarily interpreting human meanings, texts, ideas, histories, languages, or cultural expressions? If yes, and no substantial second orientation is present, classify it under Humanities.

2. Is the article primarily investigating human behaviour, social relationships, institutions, policies, language behaviour, or social phenomena through empirical or systematic social inquiry? If yes, and no substantial second orientation is present, classify it under Social Sciences.

3. Does the article substantially integrate Humanities and Social Sciences perspectives, or two distinct disciplinary traditions, in its research question, framework, evidence, methodology, and/or conclusions? If at least three of the five interdisciplinary eligibility indicators in Section 5.1 are met, classify it under Interdisciplinary Studies.

Where uncertainty remains, the Editorial Team should identify the article's dominant scholarly contribution and document the reason for the final placement for internal consistency.

12. Editorial Classification Checklist

In cases of uncertainty, editors may use the following internal checklist.

Humanities Indicators

Interpretive research question

Textual, historical, philosophical, literary, linguistic, or cultural material as primary evidence

Close reading, hermeneutic, historical, conceptual, stylistic, philological, or critical methodology

Meaning, representation, values, ideas, language, history, or interpretation as the principal outcome

Humanities scholarship dominates the theoretical and literature-review framework

Social Sciences Indicators

Empirical, explanatory, comparative, or evaluative research question

Individuals, populations, groups, institutions, language users, or social data as primary evidence

Survey, interview, observation, statistical, experimental, qualitative empirical, corpus-empirical, or mixed-method methodology

Behaviour, attitudes, relationships, effects, institutions, policies, practices, language variation, or social outcomes as the principal focus

Social Sciences scholarship dominates the theoretical and literature-review framework

Interdisciplinary Studies Indicators

Research question explicitly crosses disciplinary boundaries

Two or more disciplinary/theoretical traditions are substantively integrated

Methods or analytical approaches from different disciplines are combined in a meaningful way

Different forms of evidence are brought together to answer the same research problem

Conclusions make a substantive contribution to more than one disciplinary conversation

Where a clear majority of indicators point toward Humanities or Social Sciences and interdisciplinary integration is limited, the manuscript should ordinarily be assigned to the dominant section. Where at least three Interdisciplinary Studies indicators are clearly met and the integration is central to the article, the manuscript should ordinarily be assigned to Interdisciplinary Studies.

13. Editorial Authority

The final decision regarding the classification and placement of an article within the Humanities, Social Sciences, or Interdisciplinary Studies section rests with the Editorial Team of DSJHSS.

Authors may indicate the disciplinary area or preferred section of their submission; however, such indication shall be treated as advisory and shall not bind the journal regarding final section placement.

The Editorial Team may reclassify a manuscript where its methodology, research orientation, evidence, disciplinary framework, or degree of interdisciplinary integration more appropriately corresponds to another section.

14. Principle of Consistency

DSJHSS seeks to apply this policy consistently across issues. Classification decisions shall therefore be based on the scholarly characteristics of manuscripts rather than solely on article titles, keywords, author affiliations, departmental labels, or isolated subject areas.

The guiding principle of this policy is:

Articles should be classified according to what the research actually does and how its disciplinary perspectives are integrated, rather than merely what subject it discusses.

15. Review of the Policy

The Editorial Team may periodically review and revise this policy in response to developments in interdisciplinary scholarship, journal scope, indexing requirements, or editorial practice.

Any revised version shall replace the previous version upon publication on the journal website.

 

Policy Title: Humanities, Social Sciences and Interdisciplinary Studies Article Classification Policy

Journal: Dyal Singh Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences (DSJHSS)

Policy Authority: Editorial Team, DSJHSS

Status: Journal Editorial Policy