The Little Black Book Series

Research Methodology, Theory & Praxis

A Scholarly Book Series of Universal Write Publications
Advancing methodological scholarship. Strengthening canon research practice. Building an enduring intellectual legacy.
Series ISSN: 3070-9911
Series DOI: https\://doi.org/10.65724/ROVJ6444
Currently available volumes here: DOI 10.65724/ROVJ6444

ABOUT THE LITTLE BLACK BOOK SERIES

The Little Black Book Series (LBBS): Research Methodology, Theory & Praxis is a scholarly collection of compact, authoritative volumes dedicated to advancing rigorous, culturally grounded approaches to research, analysis, and knowledge production while contributing to the development of an enduring academic methodological canon. Each volume provides an authoritative, accessible examination of a research method, methodological framework, or analytical approach, integrating theoretical foundations, practical procedures, and scholarly applications. Encompassing qualitative, quantitative, statistical, historical, ethnographic, mixed-methods, computational, and community-engaged research, the series advances methodological innovation while maintaining its commitment to studying and understanding African and Black communities. The series recognizes methodology as more than a technical instrument of inquiry. Research methods are shaped by intellectual traditions, epistemological assumptions, historical experiences, and the questions scholars consider worthy of investigation. Accordingly, each Little Black Book is expected to establish its methodological foundations, explain its procedures, demonstrate its applications, and critically examine its possibilities and limitations.

Designed for faculty, students, researchers, and academic institutions, these volumes provide conceptual foundations, systematic procedures, and illustrative examples necessary to understand, evaluate, teach, and apply research methodologies across disciplines. They serve as resources for graduate research training, classroom instruction, scholarly inquiry, and the development of culturally grounded research practices. Through rigorous scholarship and enduring intellectual contributions, the Little Black Book Series seeks to strengthen the academic record, inform future research, and advance the institutional canon of methodological knowledge. Its purpose is not simply to document existing methods, but to cultivate an expanding body of scholarship that future generations can teach, examine, critique, apply, refine, and extend.

FOR ACADEMIC LIBRARIES AND INSTITUTIONAL COLLECTIONS

The Little Black Book Series contributes to research methods collections, Black Studies and Africana Studies scholarship, interdisciplinary graduate education, and faculty research. Its concise, methodologically focused volumes support teaching, scholarly reference, and the preservation and discovery of intellectual traditions that continue to shape research across disciplines. Libraries may identify the series through ISSN 3070-9911 and series DOI 10.65724/ROVJ6444, with individual volumes cataloged through their respective bibliographic records.

THE FOUNDING VISION AND INTELLECTUAL LEGACY

The Little Black Book Series: Research Methodology, Theory & Praxis was conceived and established through the vision of Dr. Ayo Sekai, Founder and Publisher of Universal Write Publications, a political scientist whose Black Politics and International Relations training and scholarship grounded her commitment to African-centered knowledge production and the importance of developing, preserving, and advancing the methodologies through which knowledge is produced.

Dr. Serie McDougal III, a distinguished research methodologist and steadfast champion of Black Studies, spearheaded the series’ founding editorial stewardship. As inaugural Founding Series Editor, Dr. McDougal helped establish its scholarly direction, methodological standards, and body of publications, grounding the collection as both a distinct academic discipline and an intellectual tradition that informs inquiry across disciplines and the global African world. Together, they shaped these meaningful contributions to the academic canon demand intellectual discipline, methodological rigor, and a shared conviction to guide the series, incorporating scholars trained in political science, psychology, history, education, and among fields working across Caribbean, African, and global diasporic traditions, that contribute to and extend the theoretical and methodological foundations of Black Studies. Dr. McDougal continues as Founding Series Editor Emeritus and Editorial Advisor, providing continuity and honoring the intellectual foundations he helped establish while welcoming new scholars, theoretical frameworks, and methodologies. His contributions remain integral to the series’ enduring commitment to advancing African-centered scholarship and cultivating a methodological canon that future generations can study, teach, critically examine, refine, and extend.

Invitation to Submit Scholarly Proposals 

Universal Write Publications invites scholars, researchers, and methodological innovators to submit proposals for consideration in the Little Black Book Series.

We welcome original works that clearly articulate a methodological contribution, establish its intellectual and theoretical foundations, and demonstrate its application to scholarly inquiry.

We are particularly interested in scholarship with the intellectual depth, methodological originality, and enduring relevance to contribute to the academic canon. This includes works that formalize established research traditions, advance emerging methodological frameworks, recover and critically examine important methodological contributions, or introduce new approaches capable of informing future research and disciplinary development.

Proposed volumes should be concise, intellectually rigorous, and sufficiently developed to function as practical methodological resources. They should also demonstrate the scholarly substance necessary for sustained engagement within university teaching, graduate research training, academic libraries, and the wider research community.

Current Areas of Interest:

• Quantitative research design, statistical methods, and measurement, including analytical frameworks that strengthen empirical inquiry and methodological precision.
• Survey methodology, demographic analysis, and program evaluation, including approaches to research design, data interpretation, and evidence-based assessment.
• African-centered and Africological research methodologies, including the development, articulation, and application of epistemological and methodological traditions grounded in African and Africana intellectual thought.
• Qualitative, historical, archival, and life-history methods, including approaches that advance historical interpretation, documentation, narrative inquiry, and the preservation of scholarly knowledge.
• Community-centered and participatory research, including methodologies that recognize communities as contributors to knowledge production and scholarly inquiry.
• Psychological, educational, sociological, and public policy methods, including disciplinary and interdisciplinary frameworks that advance research, analysis, and institutional understanding.
• Mixed-methods and transdisciplinary approaches, including methodological innovations that integrate multiple research traditions and analytical perspectives.
• Digital, computational, and responsible data science methodologies, including emerging approaches to research technology, data interpretation, methodological ethics, and computational analysis.

These priorities are intended to expand the methodological breadth of LBBS, not restrict its intellectual possibilities.

The series welcomes contributions that strengthen established disciplines while also developing methodological frameworks capable of informing new areas of scholarly inquiry.

What Makes a Little Black Book?

A successful LBBS volume should make a recognizable methodological contribution with the intellectual substance, analytical clarity, and scholarly significance necessary to advance research practice and contribute to the continuing development of the academic canon.

Prospective authors should demonstrate how their work:

1. Defines a research method, methodology, analytical framework, or methodological intervention, establishing its purpose, distinguishing characteristics, and scholarly relevance.
2. Establishes its theoretical, epistemological, historical, and disciplinary foundations, situating the contribution within relevant intellectual traditions and existing scholarly literature.
3. Explains its principles, procedures, stages, or analytical components with sufficient clarity and rigor to support informed scholarly understanding and application.
4. Demonstrates its application through appropriate research examples, showing how the method can be employed in the design, execution, interpretation, or evaluation of scholarly inquiry.
5. Identifies its scholarly contributions, ethical considerations, scope, limitations, and relationship to established or emerging methodological debates.
6. Supports meaningful teaching, graduate research training, scholarly application, critical examination, and future methodological development.
7. Contributes to the cumulative body of methodological knowledge by advancing, formalizing, extending, or critically reexamining research traditions in ways that support sustained academic engagement.

The Little Black Book Series (LBBS) is especially interested in works that help another researcher understand not only what a method is, but how, when, and why to apply it; which intellectual traditions inform it; and how it may shape future scholarship.

A Little Black Book is a concise methodological publication that contributes to the scholarly record, serves as a resource for research and teaching, and may lay the foundation for future methodological inquiry.

We Will Tell Our Own Story.

Preparing a Proposal

Prospective authors should prepare a scholarly proposal that identifies:

• The proposed title and central methodological contribution
• The research problem or scholarly need addressed
• The theoretical and epistemological foundations
• The proposed organization and chapter outline
• The procedures or analytical approach to be demonstrated
• The intended academic audience and potential teaching applications
• The anticipated manuscript length and completion timetable
• A current academic CV or professional biography

Submission of a proposal does not constitute acceptance or a commitment to publish.

For submission instructions and current requirements, please visit UWP’s How to Submit page.

Editorial Governance and Scholarly Integrity

The Little Black Book Series operates within a rigorous scholarly editorial framework grounded in collective editorial assessment, independent peer review, senior scholarly consultation, interdisciplinary expertise, and formal publishing oversight. Recognizing Black Studies as both a distinct academic discipline and an intellectual tradition whose theories, epistemologies, and methodologies inform and are advanced by scholarship across fields, the series upholds academic publishing standards while honoring the intellectual traditions, historical experiences, ancestral knowledge systems, and methodological innovations of Africa, the Caribbean, and the global African diaspora. Through principled editorial stewardship, scholarly independence, and methodological rigor, the series advances the production, preservation, and critical examination of knowledge that contributes to an expanding and enduring academic canon.

Editors collectively evaluate prospective projects

The series’ editorial framework is guided by collective scholarly responsibility and the preservation of methodological integrity.

Serie McDougal III, PhD
Founding Series Editor and Emeritus Editorial Advisor

Faye Z. Belgrave, PhD
Senior Editorial Board Member and LBBS Editorial Oversight Advisor

Keisha Bentley-Edwards, Ph.D.
keisha.bentley.edwards@duke.edu

Olaocha Nwabara, PhD
onwabara@geneseo.edu

Sureshi M. Jayawardene, Ph.D.
sjayawardene@sdsu.edu

The Interdisciplinary Editorial Advisory Committee supports author identification, reviewer recommendations, emerging methodological priorities, and specialized scholarly consultation in an advisory capacity and does not replace independent peer review or the editors’ decision-making authority.

Universal Write Publications retains final publishing authority.

Founding Scholarship and Editorial Continuity

The Little Black Book Series was established under the founding editorial leadership of Serie McDougal III, PhD, whose scholarly contributions helped shape its methodological direction and initial acquisitions.

Dr. McDougal continues to support the series as Founding Series Editor and Emeritus Editorial Advisor, preserving continuity between its founding vision and future scholarly development.