A Professor and former Head of Department of Library, Archival and Information Studies (LARIS), University of Ibadan, Professor Oshiotse Andrew Okwilagwe has urged authors to patronise professional textbook publishers and stop making the mistake that printers are publishers.
Okwilagwe who stated this as a resourced person at a workshop with a theme: ‘A Workshop On Textbook Publishing For Authors And Users’ organised by the authorities of Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma, Edo state took participants through the rudiments of book publishing and why it is important for them to patronise professional book publishers.
According to him, most authors are fond of patronising printers to produce books that are not up to the standard.
“Most authors make mistake by referring printers as publishers. Printers are not publishers and a matter of fact; printers are not professionally mandated to publish books.”
Speaking further, Okwilagwe stated the purpose of the workshop was to further enhance (perspective, technical and social economic skills) of the participants and lecturers of Ambrose Alli University on textbook publishing.
The publishing guru also stated that some of the objectives of the workshop were to discuss the relationships between the elements, principles, procedures, requirements in the process of publishing textbooks and ensuring textbook quality.
“We will discuss what constitutes textbook quality in the realms of contents and validation. The use of typefaces, font sizes, grammatical and quality. We will also determine the roles of quality of contents, organisation, illustrations, graphics, ideation and production in enhancing readability of textbooks.”
Discussing further on who a ‘publisher’ is, Okwilagwe stated that a ‘publisher is essentially responsible for the issuance of publications.
“A publisher takes professional, legal and financial responsibilities of all activities involved in the process of publishing. Publisher could be an individual, a group of persons, organisations such as UNESCO, World Bank and others.”
Declaring the workshop open, the Vice Chancellor of Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma, Professor Ignatius Onimawo said that the purpose of the workshop was to encourage participants and authors to produce good and quality textbooks that will be up to international standard.
“Already; we have on ground certain conditions that must be met by any author to produce textbook in Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma. We’re now looking at a scenario where quality textbooks published professionally by our authors could be sold in other institutions of higher learning and not just in Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma.”