About the Journal

About the Journal

Focus and Scope

Formerly called "The Anthropology Student Journal", The Ethnograph was established by the UBC Anthropology Students' Association to provide undergraduate students the opportunity to publish individual research papers and essays within the scope of anthropology and archaeology. Since 2012, The Ethnograph draws on a student-run editorial team that work to assist authors with their forthcoming publications. This year, The Ethnograph's faculty sponsor is Professor Amirpouyan Shiva, PhD. While lecturing in sociocultural anthropology at UBC, Dr. Shiva specializes in linguistic and media anthropology, with an additional interest in the anthropology of science and technology. 

Open Access Policy

The Ethnograph is an Open Access journal. We are committed to the accessibility and deprivatization of knowledge. All materials and research published are readily available to be read and cited by our readers. The materials belong solely to their author’s, given that used works are properly cited and formatted.

Copyright Policy

Authors published in The Ethnograph retain the copyright and all associated rights to their works. Author’s have granted the journal first publication rights. Works are open access and available to be used by readers under a Creative Commons BY-NC 4.0 license, given proper acknowledgement of authorship and publication in this journal are attributed.

Author’s are encouraged to post their works online and seek further publication with other journals that are non-exclusive, with acknowledgement of its initial publication in The Ethnograph.

Sponsorship Policy

The Ethnograph is currently sponsored by The University of British Columbia (UBC) Anthropology Department, and the Anthropology Student Association (ASA). Funding is provided by the Department and the Alma Matter Society (AMS) of UBC to the ASA, and allotted to the journal.

Ethics Statement

The Ethnograph upholds and aligns itself with Canada’s Tri-Council Policy on research involving humans. All works published in this journal are original works, in their first publication. The Ethnograph team reviews works to ensure originality and does not condone plagiarism.

Privacy Statement

All information that is stored (ie. names and emails) is agreed on between The Ethnograph and the authors, to be used and shared only with the author’s consent. The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party.

AI Policy

As a student-led, undergraduate journal, The Ethnograph strives to continually publish and showcase the unique perspectives, ideas, and voices of the UBC student body. With no official University wide policy on the usage of AI in academic writing, our team will be assessing AI usage on a case-by-case basis, with some general guidelines in mind, as listed below. Acceptable use of AI (listed or otherwise) falls under the discretion of the Executive team.

It is for this reason that we require an AI disclosure statement as part of the submission process. If you have used any form of GenAI at any stage in the writing process, even if it falls under the “acceptable usages”, we ask that you disclose it in the Comment for the Editor textbox below the Submission Requirement checklist. Please note that disclosure does not rule out your paper as a contender for publication, it is simply an element we must take into consideration when assessing submissions. Please include adequate details, including why you decided to use it and how it impacted your writing process. Failure to disclose AI use will result in a termination of your paper in the submission process. 

Papers that have already been submitted (as of December 26, 2025) are not required to follow the above policy as it was not in place.

Acceptable usages of AI: 

  • Spellcheck (such as Grammarly)
  • Structuring your paper
    • Creating a paper outline that suggests how to best arrange content
      • This does not include using GenAI to determine the logical flow of ideas or connection of content that will be used in the paper
    • Word-counting
    • Research outline (this does not include topic brainstorming or refining)

Unacceptable usages of AI: 

  • Content creation (if AI produced any of the text in your submission)
    • This includes creating citations for bibliography or reference list entries
  • Summarizing sources
  • As an information source (at no point in your paper should you have to cite AI)

If you have an extenuating circumstance that requires you to rely on GenAI tools beyond what is outlined above as acceptable, let us know and we will consider it when evaluating your case.