Open access in translation studies: A bibliometric overview of its distribution and development

Abstract

This article provides an analysis of open access (OA) publishing in translation studies for the 1961-2015 period. To this end, we have taken advantage of the translation-studies (TS) bibliographical database BITRA, which comprised over 75,000 entries as of December 2018, over 21,000 of which had been labelled as OA. The main bibliometric factors we examined from both synchronic and diachronic perspectives were the global status of OA, publication format, language, topic, kind of publisher and types of websites hosting OA publications, while also providing an estimation of how these factors predict OA. The results indicate that we are increasingly witnessing a balance between open and toll access due to the dramatic growth of OA in TS. We have also found that OA is still on the increase in TS, although with some notable variations within each of the categories under analysis.