Choosing a language strategy for a top-rated Russian academic journal

Abstract

Increasing citation and improving the impact factor is a challenging task for both authors and scientific journals. It is particularly so for Russian journals indexed in international scientometric databases, including Web of Science and Scopus. This study shows that researchers consider inefficient language strategies to be one of the main reasons for poor international outreach. This article explores    the strategies of several Russian journals indexed in Scopus as of March 2022, identifies their advantages and disadvantages as well as the subsequent risks. The study offers recommendations for choosing an optimal language strategy, including the one aimed at increasing citation in international and national databases and promoting rated Russian journals internationally. Based on the analysis of the journals indexed in the Scopus database, six linguistic models have been identified. The study has shown that the bilingual format – publishing in Russian and English – provides the best visibility at the national and international levels.