H-WOMEN  DISCUSSION LIST GUIDELINES

1.  H-WOMEN is a moderated (edited) electronic forum for discussion about women's history across all eras and regions. The list encourages scholarly exchanges on all aspects of the topic and subscriptions are open to anyone with a serious interest in women's history. The list welcomes the
exploration of inter-disciplinary and methodological approaches, and the evaluation of new archival sources.

2.  H-Women operates in the manner of scholarly journals, the program committees of professional organizations, or indeed anyone conducting a seminar. The list editors reserve the right to keep the
discussion focused on women's history and free from personal attacks or other arguments that go beyond the limits of accepted professional discourse. We encourage posts for discussion by subscribers to the network as a whole.  Most personal messages that request private responses to the
original sender will not be accepted.  This policy is intended to stimulate group discussion rather than private email exchange.

3.  H-Net policy stipulates that all postings to H-Women be electronically "signed" with the subscriber's name and e-mail address. Posts without the signature may be returned to the subscriber with a request for a signature.

4.  H-Women is non-partisan. The list will not post submissions in which the primary content or objective is partisan or political. The list will run information about the status of current controversies or policy debates that might affect the interests of our subscribers. The editors welcome frank and
open discussions about such issues.

5.  H-Women does not run advertisements.  It welcomes information about new books, new journals, new sources, fellowship and scholarship opportunities, proposed conferences, and -- through the H-NET  weekly Job Guide. But it will not run solicitations to purchase books, or to subscribe to journals, or to apply for admission to particular academic programs.

6.  H-Women posts reviews it has assigned through the H-NET book review project.   The list encourages discussion of posted book reviews.  The editors will also, from time to time, post reviews forwarded from other lists if they appear to be of interest to H-Women subscribers. H-Women will not post unsolicited book reviews.

7.  H-Women posts abstracts of articles appearing in scholarly journals or of papers presented at scholarly conferences, as well as items from other discussion lists, if in the judgment of the editors these relate to subscribers' interests and are not of excessive length, or violate copyright.

8.  H-Women regularly posts information about new discussion lists or other resources on the Internet.

9.  H-Women will not provide e-mail addresses beyond those listed on communications addressed to the list as a whole.  The editors will refer subscribers to directories where such information is usually
available.

10.  H-Women welcomes requests for information from subscribers for whom standard reference sources have proved inadequate, but it discourages inquiries easily answerable from such sources. It is helpful if posts include a summary of already consulted sources.

11. The editors  encourage potential authors of theses and dissertations, as well as articles  and books, to use H-Women facilities as a way of determining who else may be working on particular topics. The editors may ask those responding to such inquiries to consider whether their reply will be of general interest to everyone on the list, or might better be sent directly to the subscriber making the inquiry.

12.  H-Women seeks to promote discussion among as wide and diverse a group of its subscribers as care to participate.  The editors recognize that too many e-mail messages, especially if they seem to come repeatedly from the same individuals, can cause other subscribers to "tune out."  Accordingly, the editors may, from time to time, ask frequent contributors to delay, consolidate, or even withhold messages when the prospect of "overexposure" seems imminent.

13.  H-Women reserves the right to ultimately reject any message that does not fall within the list's guidelines.  In all cases, the editors will contact the contributor to explain the reasons for rejection and possible alterations that will make the message acceptable for posting. The editors may not always assume this obligation when non-subscribers forward messages originating on other lists.

14.  H-Women has an appeal mechanism.  Unresolved disputes will be referred first to the editors.  If they are unable to resolve a dispute, the editors will refer the issue to the Editorial Board, whose decision will be final.

15.  H-Women is still a "work in progress." The editors and the Editorial Board encourage suggestions from subscribers as to how the list might be improved.