About Saga

Saga is the principal academic history journal in Iceland. Established in 1949 and published biannually, it is the world’s only peer-reviewed journal specializing in Icelandic history.

Saga is not only widely read by academics, but also enjoyed by non-academic readers who form a large portion of the journal’s subscribers. In addition to peer-reviewed articles, each issue contains book reviews and various shorter articles.

The journal is in Icelandic, but articles include abstracts in English. From 2020, the editors will also be accepting articles in English.

To ensure permanency of all publications, SAGA is archived in the database http://timarit.is, which is owned and operated by the National Library of Iceland. As SAGA is not an Open Access journal, there is a three-year online publication delay.

The editors of Saga are Kristín Svava Tómasdóttir and Vilhelm Vilhelmsson.

For enquiries regarding the submission of articles please contact the editors at saga@sogufelag.is.

Editors

Vilhelm Vilhelmsson is the Director of the University of Iceland’s Research Centre in Northwest Iceland. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Iceland and has published widely on various topics in labour history, social history, and cultural history, as well as historical theory and methodology. In 2017, the Historical Society published his book Sjálfstætt fólk: Vistarband og íslenskt samfélag á 19. öld [Independent people: Compulsory Service and Icelandic Society in the 19^th Century], which was nominated for the Icelandic Literary Prize and the Hagþenkir Prize. Vilhelm became one of two editors of Saga in 2017.

Kristín Svava Tómasdóttir holds an MA in history from the University of Iceland and specializes in the history of gender and sexuality. In 2018 she published the monograph Stund klámsins [The Pornographic Moment: Pornography in Iceland 1969–1978]. The book was awarded the Hagþenkir Prize, a special award given by the Association of Non-fiction and Educational Writers in Iceland for academic work of outstanding quality. Kristín Svava was among the four authors of Konur sem kjósa – aldarsaga [A History of Women Voters], which was nominated for the Icelandic Literary Prize and won the Women’s Literary Prize in 2020. She has also written four critically acclaimed books of poetry, the most recent being Hetjusögur in 2020. Kristín Svava was the director of the Icelandic Association of Historians from 2016 to 2019, when she became one of two editors of Saga.

The editorial board

The editorial board assists and advises the editors of Saga. Its purpose is to maintain rigid academic procedures and professional standards in the journal’s publishing process. The board consists of 10‒12 experts with varied backgrounds and expertise.

Among the roles of the editorial board are:

To advise the editors on matters concerning long-term strategy and direction of the journal
To give their opinion on editorial decisions
To review articles if requested by editors
To take over editing of individual articles if the editors are professionally disqualified by a conflict of interest or other reasons
To the journal in the academic community, encourage authors to publish their material in Saga, and alert the editors to promising research
To take part in an annual meeting with the editors in which the status of Saga is discussed, along with future plans, material, approach, and any matter of opinion

Members of the editorial board are chosen by the board of the Icelandic Historical Society upon the proposal of the Saga editors. Each member sits on the board for three years, with the possibility of renewal. Members of the editorial board are chosen using the following criteria:

They should be recognized as experts in their field
Members of the editorial board should cover all main fields of historical study and all periods (medieval, early modern, modern, and contemporary)
In composition, a balance of gender, status, and seniority should be considered
If possible, members of the editorial board should come from at least three different institutions or universities

Currently, the editorial board consists of:

Anna Agnarsdóttir (Professor Emerita of History, University of Iceland)
Auður Magnúsdóttir (Assistant Professor of History, University of Gothenburg)
Davíð Ólafsson (Assistant Professor of Comparative Cultural Studies, University of Iceland)
Helgi Þorláksson (Professor Emeritus in History, University of Iceland)
Karen Oslund (Professor of History, Towson University)
Óðinn Melsted (Postdoctoral Researcher, Maastricht University)
Páll Björnsson (Professor of History, University of Akureyri)
Ragnheiður Kristjánsdóttir (Professor of History, University of Iceland)
Sveinn Agnarsson (Professor of Business, University of Iceland)
Viðar Pálsson (Associate Professor of History, University of Iceland)

Peer review process

Each issue of Saga contains 3–5 peer-reviewed articles. Peer reviewers provide constructive comments and an evaluation of the quality of the articles. All articles are subject to a double-blind peer review by experts in the appropriate field of study.

Therefore, in addition to being read by the editors, all articles are read by two anonymous reviewers. General rules of scientific journals are followed in this context. In addition, editors instruct reviewers to follow the code of ethics published by the Committee on Publication Ethics for peer-reviewed scientific journals.

Research integrity

SAGA is committed to upholding the highest standards of quality and integrity in the publication of its articles.

SAGA follows a thorough, double-blind, peer review procedure, by external reviewers for all its research articles. All reviewers are directed to adhere to the ethical guidelines of COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) for peer reviewers. The anonymity of authors and reviewers will be monitored with the utmost care. Publications of a commentary or opinion nature may not be sent for external peer review but will include extensive editorial review and revisions.

The editors will take reasonable steps to identify and prevent the publication of papers where research misconduct has occurred, including plagiarism, citation manipulation, and data falsification/fabrication, among others.

SAGA adheres to the best practices in the ethics of scholarly publishing stated in the COPE’s (Committee on Publication Ethics) Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines (https://publicationethics.org/guidance/Guidelines ) for all parties involved: Authors, Reviewers, and the Publisher.

The editors of SAGA undertake to publish all corrections, clarifications, retractions, and apologies as soon as possible, if and when they are required.

Authors are required to sign a document stating that the submission has not been previously published, that permission has been obtained for the use of copyrighted material and that they do not infringe on the rights of third parties.To ensure a reliable and open publication process, all authors, reviewers, and editors are required to declare any interests that could appear to compromise, conflict, or influence the validity of the
publication.

The history of Saga

Saga was established in 1949. In the first years, the journal was published in sheets, which were then bound together into a single volume. As a result, labelled volumes of the journal are fewer than years of publishing. A new volume of Saga has been published annually since 1968, and biannually since 2002. Saga is a peer reviewed scientific journal.

The editors of Saga

Einar Arnórsson (1950-1955)

Jón Jóhannesson (1954-1958)

Björn Sigfússon (1954-1976)

Björn Þorsteinsson (1960-1972)

Björn Teitsson (1972-1980)

Einar Laxness (1973-1978)

Jón Guðnason (1979-1983)

Sigurður Ragnarsson (1981-2001)

Helgi Þorláksson (1984-1986)

Sölvi Sveinsson (1987-1989)

Gísli Ágúst Gunnlaugsson (1990-1994)

Ragnheiður Mósesdóttir (1995)

Guðmundur Jónsson (1995-2002)

Guðmundur J. Guðmundsson (1995-2002, 2005, 2007)

Anna Agnarsdóttir (1995-1996)

Már Jónsson (1997-1998)

Hrefna Róbertsdóttir (2001-2006)

Páll Björnsson (2003-2008)

Eggert Þór Bernharðsson (2007-2008)

Sigrún Pálsdóttir (2009-2016)

Erla Hulda Halldórsdóttir (2017-2018)

Vilhelm Vilhelmsson (2017- )

Kristín Svava Tómasdóttir (2019- )

Um Sögu

About Saga

Editors

The editorial board

Peer review process

Research integrity

The history of Saga

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