Oxford University Press: Difference between revisions
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Revision as of 12:40, 3 June 2006
Oxford University Press (OUP) is a highly-respected publishing house and a department of the University of Oxford in England. As a department of a charity it enjoys tax-exempt status. It transfers 30% of its annual surplus to the rest of the University, with a commitment to a minimum transfer of £12 million per annum. OUP is the largest university press in the world by the number of publications, publishing more than 4500 new books every year and employing some 4000 people. OUP publishes many reference, professional, and academic works including the Oxford English Dictionary, the Concise Oxford Dictionary, the Oxford World's Classics and the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. A number of its most important products are now available electronically in a package called "Oxford Reference Online".
History
William Caxton established the first printing press in England in 1476, following the invention of the printing press by Johann Gutenberg in 1450 and the subsequent spread of the technology across Europe. Two years later, in 1478, the first book was printed in the city of Oxford. For the next hundred years, books used by or produced for the University of Oxford would be printed by a succession of local independent printers. In 1586, however, the University applied for and obtained a decree from the Star Chamber granting the privilege to print books in its own right. King Charles I increased the independence and latitude of the University Press when he entitled the University to print "all manner of books" by granting a Great Charter to the University in 1636. The content of the charter was negotiated by Archbishop Laud, at the time Chancellor of the University, as part of his drive to establish a set of statutes (the Laudian Code) that were to govern the running of the University for the next two centuries.
It was chartered as one of the two privileged presses in 1634. OUP grew into the world's largest press after it received the rights to publish the King James Version of the Bible and it expanded beyond academic and learned printing. Books published by Oxford have International Standard Book Numbers that begin with 0-19, making the Press one of a tiny number of publishers who have two-digit identification numbers in the ISBN system.
Of late, Oxford has been acquiring specialty publishers such as Oceana Publications[1].
It has lent its name to the Oxford comma.