The Year's Work in Modern Language Studies

YWMLS covers as published by Maney (left) and MHRA (centre), and a copy of the YWMLS style sheet

The Year's Work in Modern Language Studies (YWMLS) is a British bibliographical journal produced by the Modern Humanities Research Association and appearing annually, containing reports on new scholarship in the fields of European languages, linguistics, literature and film, except for English studies. The MLA Literary Research Guide says: "YWMLS is the single most comprehensive evaluative survey of scholarship on European and Latin American languages and literatures. Taken together, the annual volumes offer an incomparable record of scholarly and critical trends as well as of the fluctuations of academic reputations of literary works and authors."[1]

Contents

YWMLS is divided into the following main parts:

  1. Latin (medieval and modern)
  2. Romance Languages
  3. Celtic Languages
  4. Germanic Languages
  5. Slavonic Languages

These are subdivided into reports on individual languages and periods, such as "Early Medieval French Literature" or "French Literature 1945–1999". In total about 75 such reports are written by scholars based mainly in Britain but also around Europe and North America. The volume typically appears early in the second year after the report year, so that for example volume 72, containing the report on 2010, was published in February 2012.

History

YWMLS first appeared in 1930, covering Medieval Latin, Italian Studies, French Studies, Hispanic studies (including Basque and Rumanian), Germanic Studies and Celtic Studies. There was a break during the war years, and volume 11 covers 1940–49. From volume 11 onwards, Scandinavian Studies and Slavonic Studies were included. The reports grew in length until volume 44 filled 1432 pages, after which page limits were introduced. Over its 76 volumes, YWMLS has generated some 70,000 pages of critical bibliography and indices.

For many years, the work was edited by Glanville Price and David Wells. In 1991, General Editorship passed to Peter Mayo, with separate sectional editors for each subject area. The current general editor, since 1997, is Stephen Parkinson (Oxford). Volume 76 (survey year 2014) has five sectional editors and 56 contributors.

The volumes were published by Oxford University Press, then later by Maney Publishing, and since volume 72, by MHRA. YWMLS is now also accessible on JSTOR.

External links

YWMLS Website

References

  1. ↑ James L. Harner, Literary Research Guide: An Annotated Listing of Reference Sources in English Literary Studies, 3rd edn (New York: Modern Language Association of America, 1998), p. 540.
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