Matrix: A Journal for Matricultural Studies
ISSN 2563-3392
Matrix: A Journal for Matricultural Studies (Matrix) is an open-access, peer-reviewed and refereed scholarly journal published by the International Network for Training, Education, and Research on Culture (Network on Culture), Canada. Matrix is published online twice yearly (Autumn/Winter and Spring/Summer).
Matrix is a new journal in the humanities and social sciences, founded to provide an interdisciplinary forum for those who are working from the theoretical stance of matriculture as a Geertzian cultural system. Matriculture refers to the cultural system that brings together all cultural aspects informing the lives of mothers, usually women, of a given society, and by extension, the lives of women. Talking about matricultural systems allows us to consider as primary the cultural context of a given society as perceived, constructed, and lived by its women.
Similar to other cultural systems such as art, religion, or mathematics, employing the heuristic of matriculture allows for, among other things: cross-cultural comparisons; fresh insights into the social roles of women, men, otherwise identified, children, and the entire community of humans, animals, and the environment; and/or renewed understandings of historically mis-labelled cultures. With Guédon’s work in mind, then, and based on Geertzian principles, the concept of matriculture is both a model of reality by rendering the structure of matricultures apprehensible and a model for reality, where psychological relationships are organized under its guidance.
We encourage submissions from scholars around the world who are ready to take a new look at the ways in which people - historically and currently - have organized meaningful relationships amongst themselves and with the natural environment, the myths, customs, and laws which support these relationships, and the ways in which researchers have documented and perhaps mis-labeled the matricultures they have encountered.
To join our private mailing list and receive notification of new issues, send a request to the email address below here.
Contact: info@networkonculture.ca (subject line: Matrix Editorial Collective)
Issues
Open Journal System (OJS)
* Matrix Volume 3, Issue 2 (Spring-Summer 2024) Warfare and Peacemaking Among Matricultures
This site
- Matrix Volume 3, Issue 1 (Spring - Summer 2023) Mythmaking and Storytelling Among Matricultures
- Matrix Volume 2, Issue 2 (Autumn 2021 - Winter 2022) Matricultures of the Pacific Northwest
- Matrix Volume 2, Issue 1 (Mar 2021) Matricultural Societies of East Asia
- Matrix Volume 1, Issue 1 (May 2020) Introduction to Matriculture
Calls for Papers
- CfP Volume 5, Issue 1 (2025) - Men and Masculinities from Matriculturel Perspectives
- CfP Volume 4, Issue 1 (Spring/Summer 2025) - Women and Water: The Flow of Matriculture NOW CLOSED
Creative Contributions
Matrix encourages creative artworks in any media and community contributions which focus on the theme of the issue. As an online journal, any medium suitable for inclusion will be of interest.
Personal Reflections on the Theme
Matrix welcomes essays which are personal reflections on the theme of an issue. These personal reflections are not peer-reviewed, but offer ideas, thoughts, or analyses which may suggest new directions for research, subjective conclusions regarding research, or, simply, expand our consciousness about the topic.
Book Reviews
Matrix is interested in reviewing books pertaining to the subject matter of the journal. Authors are welcome to inquire about the possibility of a review, which the Editorial Collective will co-ordinate, and reviewers are welcome to submit their review for consideration in an upcoming issue.
Letters to the Editorial Collective
All good scholarship inspires discussion and respectful debate is crucial to the advancement of knowledge. Matrix invites responses, feedback, comments, and constructive criticism to the material we publish. With permission, letters to the Editorial Collective may be published in an upcoming issue (contact is via the email address above).
For further details about the journal:
Focus and Scope
Matrix: A Journal for Matricultural Studies accepts pieces written in either English or French. Submissions in another language need to be translated into either English or French by the author(s). The abstracts of articles are published in both English and French. Abstracts submitted in only one language and accepted for publication will be translated by Matrix. The Introduction to a Special Themed issue will be published in both English and French; if it is submitted in only one of these languages, the Introduction will be translated by Matrix. We are also open to discussing the publication of titles and abstracts in the language of the community discussed in the article.
The Editorial Collective (EC) invites submissions that explore aspects, elements, and dimensions of matriculture. We accept for publication:
- Journal articles (generally 5,000 - 10,000 words; for submissions outside this range, contact the EC)
- Creative works in any medium
- Reflections on special themes
- Reports or Interim Reports on fieldwork or other research
- Book Reviews
- Announcements
- Letters to the Editorial Collective
This journal is open-access: free to authors and readers.
Peer Review Process
All research articles will pass through a double-blind review process before publication, in which authors and reviewers are not identified to each other. This process aims to enrich and strengthen the submitted texts. Reviews will be made by external professionals whose field of expertise relates to the topic of the article; reviewers are encouraged to provide constructive comments.
Contributions to Community Creativity and Matricultural Perspectives and Reflections on (issue theme) will be reviewed by members of the Editorial Collective.
Publication Frequency
Matrix: A Journal for Matricultural Studies will be published twice per year, with issues in Spring / Summer and Autumn / Winter.
Publication Ethics
We adhere to the Principles of Transparency and Best Practices in Scholarly Publishing, as published by the Committee on Publication Ethics, UK (COPE).
With this commitment, we particularly bring to attention the following:
-
All our research articles will pass a peer-review process.
-
Both the Editorial Collective and the Scientific Advisory Circle, as the journal's Governing Body, consists of experts in the field and are informed about all decisions being made for the journal. Contact information is available on this webpage (see Contact, above).
-
No fees will be applied to authors or readers.
-
Matrix is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License, which allows reusers to copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in unadapted form only, for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator. Authors may enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the subsequent non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of their work (for example, to post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book) with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
-
We do our best to adhere to the highest standards of academic editorial integrity. We will work hard to ensure that any reported or identified issues of misconduct will be addressed in an appropriate and timely manner.
-
The International Network for Training, Education, and Research on Culture (Network on Culture) owns and provides the platform for Matrix: A Journal for Matricultural Studies.
-
Conflict of Interest is taken seriously; authors and reviewers must state any when submitting.
Privacy Notice
All data shared with us will be used only for the purposes of the journal. The only data stored (names and email addresses) is required for publication of journal papers, and it will not be shared with third parties, nor used for any commercial purpose.
Allegations
We take any allegations regarding misconduct in the publication of content in our journal very seriously.
Such allegations, including any complaints about plagiarism, disputed authorship, multiple/duplicate/concurrent publication, simultaneous submission, misappropriation of research results, research standards violation, research errors or fraud, reviewer bias or competitive harmful acts by reviewers, or undisclosed conflicts of interest, will be addressed following Elsevier's publicly-available Publishing Ethics Resource Kit (PERK). We will follow PERK's guidelines regarding any ethical issues arising at any stage of the process, evaluating each allegation on a case-by-case basis.
For details: https://www.elsevier.com/editors/perk
Once a complaint has been assessed from the ethical perspective outlined by PERK, and the EC and author agree a revision, clarification, or correction needs to be made, we will deal with it using the style guide for Correction Notices followed by the American Psychological Association.
For details: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/research-publication/correction-notices
We will publish any corrections, clarifications, retractions, and/or apologies when needed.
Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge the publications Anthropologica and Offa's Dyke Journal for the high standard of their Policies, and thank their authors for ideas which influenced the structure and content of Matrix's policies.