Peter Lang is one of Europe's established humanities and social sciences publishers - a book-primary house producing over 1,100 new academic titles a year, with a backlist of more than 40,000 books and roughly 20 scholarly journals. Founded in 1970 in Frankfurt am Main by the Swiss editor Peter Lang, the company is today the independent Peter Lang Group AG, headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland since 2018, with publishing offices in Berlin, Bern, Brussels, Oxford, and New York and editorial presence in Vienna, Dublin, Warsaw, and Istanbul. Ownership passed through the Peter Lang Children's Trust after the founder's death in 2001, and a management buyout made the group independent in 2015.

If you work in linguistics, education, media and communication, history, literary studies, law, or theology - particularly with a European or German-speaking-Europe angle - Peter Lang is a realistic home for your monograph, edited volume, or revised dissertation. This guide covers what the press publishes, its open access routes and fees, the peer review workflow, and how to submit.

Peter Lang organizes its program into 13 subject areas: the arts, education, English studies, German studies, history and political science, law/economics/management, linguistics, media and communication, Romance studies, science/society/culture, Slavic studies, theology and philosophy, plus the Peter Lang Classics reprint line. The output is dominated by:

• Monographs and edited volumes - the core of the program, usually within established book series.
• Revised dissertations - Peter Lang has long been a major outlet for doctoral research from German-speaking Europe and beyond.
• Textbooks and course readers - especially from Peter Lang Publishing USA (New York, founded 1982), which is strong in education and Black studies.
• Journals - roughly 20 scholarly titles, largely in German studies, philosophy of culture, history, translation studies, and Slavic linguistics, hosted online via Ingenta Connect.

Funders such as the SNSF (Switzerland), FWF (Austria), and Volkswagen Stiftung routinely cover Peter Lang OA fees; the press supports authors in funding applications. OA books are distributed through OAPEN and DOAB and preserved in Portico, and self-archiving terms are registered in Sherpa Romeo. Note there are no transformative (Read & Publish) agreements - those are a journal-publisher mechanism and Peter Lang's program is book-led.

• Model: in most cases two independent reviewers are appointed by the publisher; review is coordinated by the acquisitions editor for your field.
• Screening: manuscripts are checked with CrossCheck (iThenticate) plagiarism-detection software before review.
• Standards: reviewers and editors follow COPE ethical guidelines.
• Selectivity: around 30% of projects entering peer review are rejected, and more are filtered out earlier for scope.
• Timeline: proposal screening typically takes weeks rather than months; full-manuscript review time varies by field and reviewer availability.

1. Identify the right list. Browse the 13 subject areas on peterlang.com and note the series closest to your project.
2. Complete the proposal form. Download the Publishing Proposal Form (Book or Series) from the For Authors pages.
3. Submit your enquiry. Send the form via the Submit Your Enquiry page or directly to the relevant acquisitions editor - there is no Editorial Manager-style portal for books.
4. Peer review and contract. After positive reviews, you receive a publishing agreement covering format, OA options, and any funding arrangements.
5. Prepare the manuscript. Follow the Peter Lang style guidelines (available for American English, British English, German, French, and Spanish); citation style varies by series - MHRA, Chicago, and APA are all common.
6. Production. Standard production begins on manuscript delivery; the Prompts short-form model completes production in about 8-10 weeks.

Peter Lang follows COPE ethical guidelines in editorial decisions and peer review, screens all manuscripts for plagiarism with CrossCheck before review, and registers its self-archiving and OA compliance terms in Sherpa Romeo. Corrections and retraction handling follow standard COPE-aligned practice. As with any book publisher, confirm indexing and cataloguing expectations (e.g., Scopus coverage for a specific journal) per title before committing.