Natalia

NATALIA has been published every year since 1971. Its forerunner from 1969 to 1970 was Natal Notes and Records compiled by university librarian on the Pietermaritzburg campus, Ron Brown. Its first editor, for five issues, was Colin Webb of the Department of History. It publishes research on the history (in the broadest sense) of the KwaZulu-Natal region in line with the Natal Society’s stated purpose of 1865: ‘The acquisition and preservation of information of local value and interest, and the general encouragement of habits of study, investigation and research.’ Natalia is now an open access, online journal.

Publication date is 31 December of each year. Contents may be categorised as:
Articles varying in length between 1,000 and 8,000 words;
Obituaries preferably no longer than 1,500 words;
Discussion papers of 1,000 to 2,000 words;
Book reviews of up to 2,000 words.

Submission of material intended for publication

The deadline for submissions is 31 July.

They should be in MSWord format and in the case of longer articles authors are encouraged to suggest subheadings. Formatting other than paragraph breaks should be avoided. The style favoured involves plain language that avoids jargon and theory wherever possible.

Natalia is consciously distanced from the academic bureaucracy that now disfigures the publication landscape. It is a forum for serious writers on regional issues who produce well-written articles that have scant chance of publication elsewhere. It seeks to occupy a space that overlaps accessible academic writing and high-quality journalism, both of them under threat in the modern world.

The journal uses endnotes for referencing purposes and additional information. Referencing follows the guidelines shown here:

Edgar H. Brookes and Colin de B. Webb, A History of Natal (Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press, 1965) [book with joint authorship].

Charles Ballard, ‘Traders, trekkers and colonists’ in Natal and Zululand from Earliest Times to 1910, ed. Andrew Duminy and Bill Guest (Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press and Shuter & Shooter, 1989): p [chapter in an edited collection].

Elizabeth van Heyningen, ‘Agents of empire: the medical profession in the Cape Colony, 1880‒1910’ Medical History 33(4) 1989: p‒p [article in a journal].

Siphamandla Zondi, ‘African demand and missionary charity: the development of mission health services in KwaZulu to 1919’ (PhD, Cambridge University, 1999) [thesis].

In line with the Natal Society Foundation’s commitment to its founding principles, and in modern times to the Creative Commons, there are no financial aspects to publication and authors should be aware that all content published is made available to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search or link to the full text, or use for any other lawful, non-commercial purpose without prior permission. It is essential, however that authorship and source should be appropriately and clearly acknowledged. For further details see Budapest Open Access Initiative.

For commercial use advance permission must be sought via this website’s contact page.

Some hard copy back issues of Natalia are still available.