The WIsCon Chronicles, Vol. 12: call for submissions

Isabel Schechter and Michi Trota are thrilled to announce that they will be co-editing Volume 12 of the WisCon Chronicles.

We have chosen the theme “Boundaries and Bridges” for this volume of the WisCon Chronicles to reflect how WisCon has often been a place where the exploration of boundaries and bridging of divides in SFF and fandom -- whether personal, cultural, political, or otherwise -- have been at the core of the WisCon experience.

We are interested to learn what boundaries you want to examine, redefine, create, or destroy. Why are some boundaries more acceptable than others? When are boundaries necessary, and when do they need to be torn down? How does our understanding of boundaries influence our ability to build bridges with others, or even within our own psyches? When is it time to build a bridge or burn it? And how does this all play out within SFF and fandom?

Here is a sample of topics we are hoping to see tackled:

● Was there a panel at this year’s WisCon that led to a new recognition of how boundaries function (or don’t function) in SFF?
● How has WisCon shaped/changed your understanding of boundaries among fandoms around gender/race/age/ability and other identities?
● Did a work of SFF encourage you to bridge parts of your identity you previously saw as isolated?
● How do we explore boundaries and bridges between genres (scifi, fantasy, horror, etc)?
● How do different formats of storytelling (written word, graphic novels/comics, film, TV, podcasting, fanfic) create/transcend boundaries and offer opportunities to build bridges?
● How is respecting boundaries a part of responsible storytelling?


We welcome nonfiction delving into these and other topics specifically through the lens of identity and the intersections thereof.

Submitters are encouraged to submit pieces such as personal essays, panel reports, critical essays, and other forms of creative nonfiction. If you have an idea for topics or essay formats that haven’t been mentioned in these guidelines but you feel would be a fit for the scope of the anthology, please feel free to query us. First-time writers, POC writers, and other writers of marginalized backgrounds are especially encouraged to submit; please don’t self-reject, instead allow the editors to do their job by submitting your work and ideas!

We will consider pieces with a word count of 500-4000, but are willing to consider submissions outside these lengths if the piece warrants it. Send queries and submissions to wcc.vol12@gmail.com with “Submission” or “Query” in the subject line. Please send submissions in .DOC, .DOCX, or .RFT formats. Queries are due by September 1, 2019 and submissions are due by October 1, 2019.

Authors will be paid a nominal fee of $25 for accepted pieces, and will receive a hard copy of the anthology.

WisCon Chronicles call for submissions: deadline extension

This from Jaymee Goh, editor of the forthcoming volume of The WisCon Chronicles:

WisCon, WisCon, DO YOU READ?

 In the face of the election results, I am EXTENDING the deadline for the WisCon Chronicles to December 1.And if you need to use this platform to talk about the trial of whiteness that is the election, that would not be amiss.

WisCon, WisCon, DO YOU READ?

WisCon Chronicles Vol. 11: Call for materials

I'm pleased to announce that the editor of the next volume of the WisCon Chronicles is Jaymee Goh, and she's eager to receive submissions. Here's her call for materials:

Call for Submissions

The WisCon Chronicles, Vol. 11: Trials by Whiteness

WisCon40 followed a seismic shift in the demographics of the convention. Following the success of the POC Safer Space, there is now a Genderqueer/Trans Lounge, and a Disability Lounge. Programming actively seeks a diversity of panelists. How have these changes come about, and what have their ramifications been?

The theme, "Trials by Whiteness," examines how what bell hooks calls the white-supremacist capitalist (cishetero)patriarchy has affected the feminism of WisCon and created difficult confrontations and conversations on the clashing perceptions of attendees. "Whiteness" refers to the position from which white supremacy operates. It has constantly moving goalposts by which everyone is measured. Whiteness does not refer only to white people; non-white peoples can also identify with this position and perspective. "Trials by whiteness," therefore, refers to all the problems people have to go through as a result of white supremacy, on various scales from microaggressions to abuse, whether institutionally or through individual behaviours.

I welcome essays and contemplations on the following:

·         the changing faces of WisCon;

·         the challenges in transmitting and sharing knowledge across generations;

·         clashes of ideology, theories, and/or practices as feminism grows; 

·         panel reports;

·         nice listicles, for example suggestions for how to ally with (and not over!) the various folks that come to WisCon!

I encourage personal essays, poems, or roundtable discussions that deal with any of the following, especially in the context of WisCon and within the SFF industry:

·         dialogs and difficult conversations about the rising discomfort of white SFF fans; 

·         intra-community conflicts within marginalized groups, which we fear to discuss because we fear whiteness turning these conflicts against us;

·         spillover of hegemonic whiteness onto other forms of oppression, such as disability, class, and gender expression;

·         productive outcomes of difficult conversations, e.g. Nalo Hopkinson's Lemonade Award;

·         what DID happen over the summer before WC39? for good or for ill, how did that affect WisCon40?

Further afield, I am a big fan of Academic Lite articles and welcome experimental and non-academic forms discussing the following topics:

·         how POC and conditionally white people are treated by people comfortably entrenched in whiteness;

·         the internalization of white/Eurocentric standards and difficulties of unlearning them in order to recognize oneself, whether as part of the system, or apart from it;

·         the challenges of being a white person confronting whiteness and demonstrating solidarity and good allyship, earning trust;

·         uncovering whiteness, the ramifications of naming it and dealing with the cognitive dissonance that it demands.

While this anthology does center the POC gaze, I am also interested in white essayists interrogating these difficult subjects from the intersections of their identities as well.

Don’t reject yourself—that’s my job!

I am particularly interested in articles that are conversations, especially between newer and older attendees, between attendees who identify differently, or in response to WisCon events. For example, attendees of color and white attendees who attended the Hamilton Sing-Along. Pitch me!

Send pitches and submissions to jhameia.goh@gmail.com with "WCC11: [title]" in the subject line. DOC / DOCX / RTF. Submissions open Aug 15, and close Oct 31. All pitched articles should be in by November 15.

The WisCon Chronicles, Vol. 10-- Call for materials

 Call for Materials

 The WisCon Chronicles, Vol. 10:  Social Justice (Redux), will be edited by Margaret McBride. She has issued the following call for materials:

"One thing I admire in Ursula K. LeGuin's writing is her willingness to publicly examine and change her way of seeing the world and her fiction (as in Tehanu, published almost 20 years after The Earthsea Trilogy or the 1976 "Is Gender Necessary?" followed by the 1989 "Redux" version of that essay). I hope The WisCon Chronicles 10 Social Justice (Redux) authors will have the same attitude, for we seem to bring up problems of social injustice so often.  Mary Anne Mohanraj, who edited The WisCon Chronicles 9,  focused on social justice issues in her introduction, as did several included essays. The fiction and WisCon 39 guest-of-honor speeches by Alaya Dawn Johnson and Kim Stanley Robinson focused on multiple aspects of social justice: environmental collapse, need for reduced population, and climate change; violence against women; racial inequality in publishing and elsewhere; gender issues, including reproductive rights; inequality of income and power; etc. Yet current newspapers or blogs about Ferguson or gay marriage or our own science fiction community show that we must continue to address such issues in fiction and elsewhere (I hope in WisCon Chronicles 10!). The "redux" aspect of the volume might include essays on how terms used in debates about social justice could be problematic.

"I am particularly interested in how science fiction is addressing social justice, especially the idea that environmental programs need to include equality for women and minorities. Essays examining the fiction of any past guest of honor at WisCon or Tiptree Award winner or any science fiction that looks at environmental concerns or diversity issues would be appropriate, also. 2016 will be the 40th year for WisCon, so personal memories from guests of honor, committee members, and also people new or long-time to WisCon will be considered, even if not linked directly to social justice issues.

"Please submit essays, personal remembrances, poetry, short fiction for consideration by September 30, 2015 to mcbride@uoregon.edu."

WisCon Chronicles, Vol. 8-- an update

I've been pretty much off-line for the last month. But now I'm back, and my first post in this long while must be an announcement:

 Farah Mendelsohn has found it necessary to withdraw, regretfully,  from the editorship of the next volume of the WisCon Chronicles. This is sad news, but the show must go on, right? And so I'm happy to say that longtime WisCon attendee Rebecca Holden, who co-edited Strange Matings: Science Fiction, Feminism, African American Voices, and Octavia E. Butler with Nisi Shawl, is stepping up to take her place. Rebecca has asked me to put out a call on her behalf to anyone who might be interested in contributing pieces in the usual forms (essays, panel notes, poetry, and fiction) or even in unusual forms. If you attended WisCon this year and have something to say about it, please query or contact her for further information on deadlines and word counts etc at rebecca (at) holdens.net.