We have received quite a few requests to write for Racialicious and we are open to outside submissions.  Please note, it may take us up to two weeks to respond to your submission due to the high volume of tips and submissions we receive. Before submitting a piece, we recommend that you pay attention to the tone and execution of pieces already on the site. Make sure you are familiar with our comments moderation policy before you submit.  Also, please do NOT send in your resume.  The only thing that really matters to us are ideas and execution, so we preferred completed pieces or idea pitches.  Other things to consider:

0. This should really go without saying, but this site is called Racialicious. That means your pitch should have something to do with race, racial analysis, and people of color. Please note, over 70% of our audience is of color, and about 25% of our audience is from outside of North America. While the editors will occasionally publish pieces that are about related struggles, we are only looking for pieces that critically engage with race. Simply mentioning your race does not equal racial analysis.

1.  Racialicious is a multiracial, multicultural audience.  When crafting your piece, keep in mind that people from a lot of different backgrounds will read this, and ensure that the piece is easy to follow and understand.  Please make sure you have spent some time on the blog, reading the posts and comments, and checking the archives before you submit a piece.

2.  Racialicious is somewhat “business casual” in tone. We use the Elements of Style and the AP Stylebook as loose guides, and we generally do not publish poems, rants, or pieces that do not advance the discourse around race, identity, and pop culture.  Even if you are submitting an academic essay, please make sure your submission is easy to read and accessible to the general populace.

3. Reviews should be more or less timely.  We have a very lax view of timeliness – a week after a movie hits theaters or midway through a season of a show is still fine by us.  But we generally are not interested in things that are a little too far past their fresh date – unless you are providing a different drastically different analysis of the work, or taking a retrospective look at a classic work.

4. There is no word limit for pieces, but generally, if a piece is less than four paragraphs, there isn’t enough analysis there to work for us.  And if the piece is more than four printed pages, we would need to really scrutinize the length and structure of the piece.  (Critical essays and academic works are a little different.)

5. If you wish to write a counter piece, or a piece in response to another on the site, feel free.  However, please remember that we do not publish pieces that argue in favor of the status quo. A good example is Gran Torino – both the point and counterpoint pieces were well considered, made arguments outside of the normal flow of conversation, and each writer demonstrated a good grasp of the issues at play in the film and the larger environment. Also, a successful response piece will use the original piece as a jumping off point, and not become a point by point refutation.

6. Race studies do not exist in a vacuum.  Therefore, submissions should also have a working understanding of other types of oppression, like  homo/transphobia, heteronormativity, sexism, ableism or classism as well as racism. We aren’t saying that you must be an anti-oppression scholar, but you should be aware of your own privileges as you write.

7. We do accept reprints, as long as you own the rights.  We are happy to cross post from your blog. Since there is no financial compensation associated with writing for Racialicious, we actually encourage you to try to sell your piece before you place it here.

8. If you submit a piece to Racialicious, or allow us to cross post, it will remain on Racialicious in perpetuity. We do not take down pieces that have been published on the site, so please think about submitting anonymously or using a pseudonym if you are writing about controversial subjects. This is the internet and pieces travel. If your loved ones, friends, coworkers, or classmates came across this piece, would you be ready to have this kind of conversation with them? If you are not, please use a pen name.

We are always interested in:

• Submissions for our open series “Racialicigious,” “Outside the Binary,” “The Things We Do To Each Other,” and “The Things We Do To Ourselves”
• Discussions of race and sports
• Queer perspectives on race, pop culture, and identity
• Perspectives on how race manifests in countries outside of the US and Canada
• Discussions on race and fandom
• Professional perspectives on race and science (due to the sensitive nature of this subject, we will ask for your experience)
• Coverage of the arts, particularly museum exhibits and plays