Notes (also known as short papers) are short research papers with a maximum length of 4 pages excluding references. Notes provide authors the opportunity to share their ongoing work or latest results, which might not be suitable or ready for the full papers track. Submissions to the Notes track should be aligned to the conference topics of interest and provide original and succinct scholarly accounts of HCI research, design and/or theory. This may not necessarily include an entire projects’ work but should provide a more focused research contribution. Submissions that are clearly suited to the Full papers track will not be accepted. All accepted submissions will be presented at AfriCHI2023 as talks.
Content
We aim that notes advance HCI topics in relation to African contexts or perspectives; however, this relation does not need to be the central topic. Simply, authors should consider how the topic is relevant to African people, or places, events, processes, phenomena, languages, experiences, meanings, values, livelihoods or aesthetics in Africa etc and in line with this year’s theme of Beyond Limit.
Short papers should be well-written and use the English language; however we do not restrict this to UK or American English. Rather, we encourage authors to use language that feels comfortable to them and to include local language terms if these improve meaning. For clarity, we expect authors to include a preface in English to explain their use of language and clarification within the main text or in additional footnotes, of non-English meanings or use of local idioms or phrasings. For example, the use of “sawa” in a Kenyan paper might include a parenthetical remark or footnote defining “sawa” as “okay”. For further questions or clarifications about language, please refer to the main Languages and Mentoring page.
Anonymity
Your submission must be fully anonymised to permit double-blind peer-review by program committee members.Please ensure that the reviewers will be able to read and understand your paper without having to know who you are. Firstly, do not include your names and institutions anywhere in the document and omit acknowledgements – you will add these into your final camera-ready version. Secondly, ensure that the author(s) name/s or institution/s do not appear in the document properties/metadata (File… Info… Inspect Document or File… Properties).
Finally, so that reviewers take into account all prior, related (or background) work relevant to your paper, you should not anonymise the references to your own work. However, when citing your own work please refer to these contributions in third person. For example, rather than “We extend our prior work [5]..” you might say “We extend Awori’s prior work [5]…”.
References
We seek to encourage excellent referencing practices in order to contribute to advancing HCI. Referencing with the greatest potential to advance knowledge includes illustrating the relevance and value of African action, research, theory, innovation and intellectual products to discourse in HCI, and allied fields. Examples of the most common reference types formatted for ACM are in the lower half of the page available at: http://www.acm.org/publications/submissions/latex_style.
Format & Template
All submissions must be in the ACM proceedings format. We suggest you download the template in Word and replace the text with your content.
Template: https://www.acm.org/publications/proceedings-template
We will not accept Notes that exceed the prescribed number of pages. References do not count towards the page limit. Thus, the main content pages for Notes should be 4 pages. Any additional pages should only contain references. The main content pages of Notes includes the title, (anonymised) author list, an abstract of up to 150 words, all the body text, figures, tables, and any appendices. All submissions must start with “Note:” in the title to distinguish them from other submission categories
Quick Links
All submissions (Full paper, Notes, Workshop and Tutorials, Demo and Installation, Posters, Panel, and DMC)
- Microsoft Word
- LaTeX (Use sample-manuscript.tex for submissions)
- Overleaf (or search for ACM Conference Proceedings Primary Article)
Review & Selection
Notes will undergo a double blind peer review process with an option for revise and resubmit. This involves two rounds of reviews, Round 1 and Round 2. We kindly advise authors that the two-round review process is not meant for submitting draft manuscripts, and therefore Notes reviewed in Round 1 must be complete submissions. Any draft manuscripts will be rejected.
Submissions of Paper and Notes received by the submission deadline are refereed in Round 1 double blind peer review process. Notes will be assessed for: value and relevance to African contexts or perspectives AND to HCI; quality of presentation; coherence and integrity of scholarly argument, originality and importance of the contribution.
Content in a Note should be significant and original and not contain material that has been previously published unless it has been “significantly” revised or was previously in a language other than English. In the ACM Policies on Pre-Publication Evaluation and Prior Publication and Simultaneous Submissions guidelines for determining “significance” of a revision, a significant revision contains more than 25% new content (e.g. new insights or results, etc.) and markedly amplifies/clarifies the original material.
Additionally, work that was previously presented or published in a language other than English may be translated and published in English at AfriCHI; however the original author should also be the author (or co-author) of work translated into English. In such cases the new submission should clearly indicate that it is a translation. Notes are also assessed on their coverage of literature. We strongly encourage contributions that cite African works, within and beyond HCI/Interaction design, along with citing the background or related literature that is typically associated with a topic.
All authors will receive notification of the outcome and detailed report by independent reviewers that have been consolidated by a meta-reviewers overseeing that submission. The independent reviewers will provide feedback on the Note’s strengths and weaknesses, recommend improvements and specify areas that must be addressed for the Note to be considered for acceptance at AfriCHI’23. Notifications sent to authors will confirm whether the authors have been invited to resubmit the Note for a second round of reviewing or the Note has been rejected. Authors of Notes that are eligible for Round 2 review must revise the Note according to the reviewers reports. Authors receiving a confirmed rejection should consider whether they can re-frame some of the material in a Poster for submission to the Poster track.
Presenting at AfriCHI
At least one author of the accepted Notes submission must register and present at the AfriCHI’23 conference. Notes presentations could be hybrid. Each presentation will last 15 minutes in an assigned thematic session. You will be informed of your session reference and the time of your presentation about one month before the event.
Paper after the conference
Research papers will appear in the Proceedings of AfriCHI 2023, which will be published in the ACM Digital Library. Authors of accepted papers must present (in-person or virtual) at the AfriCHI 2023 Conference, and should therefore register for the conference.
Dates
Submission deadline: 19 June 2023
Feedback on submission: 7 August 2023
Camera ready version: 25 September 2023
Looking forward to hosting you at the conference!
Notes Co-chairs:
Hafeni Mthoko
Phillip Oyier
Email:notes@africhi2023.org