After reviewing our guidelines below, please email submissions to submissions@inthesetimes.com.
Submissions will be considered for either the print magazine or for publication on InTheseTimes.com. We are particularly interested in submissions that focus on labor. Writers from marginalized communities are especially encouraged to submit.
An editor will review all submissions and contact authors directly if interested in working with you. We no longer accept mailed submissions.
With very few exceptions, we do not publish material that has already been published in print or online. If your submission has been published already, please detail exactly where and when. If this is a simultaneous submission, please note. Once your submission is approved for publication by an In These Times editor, exclusivity is assumed going forward. Exceptions are occasionally approved by the editor.
Please include a phone number where you can be reached with your submission. Thanks in advance for submitting your work to In These Times.
GUIDELINES
In These Times is a space for stories that expose the influence of corporations over our government and our lives, and that inform and advance movements for social, environmental, gender, economic and racial justice. All pitches will be reviewed through this lens.
Features
In These Times’ feature well is an eclectic space for investigations, reported stories and opinion pieces. Reported stories and investigations range from 1,200 to 4,000 words. Opinion and thinkpieces range from 800-1500 words. In addition to traditional features, we’re open to stories that lend themselves to nontraditional formatting: Q&As, photo essays.
How to pitch: Let us know what kind of feature you’re pitching (reported, investigative, opinion) and what your ideal word count would be. Give us a brief outline of any current developments/events you’d cover, and why such a topic is relevant and timely. Often, we’re looking for left takes on a topic that the mainstream media has either overlooked, misunderstood or not fully explored. To pitch an investigation, see below.
Investigations
Please visit the Leonard C. Goodman Institute for Investigative Reporting page for more information on pitching investigations, and to learn more about our Investigative Reporting Fellowship.
Dispatches
Think of this section as an inversion of The New Yorker’s “Talk of the Town.” Instead of write-ups of NYC happenings, we provide dispatches from around the country on events outside the mainstream media spotlight. This is where we showcase the many Americas that don’t get featured in the coastal media. Each story leads with a short vignette, scene or conversation, and then expands out into reporting or commentary. While the topic will often be local organizing, activism or politics, there’s room for eclecticism. You might lead with telling a conversation you had with someone in your life, a stockholders’ meeting, an exchange between two anchors on the local news.
How to pitch: Pitch a scene that has political resonance (whether overt or subtle) and explain how you would build a story around it. The event can be upcoming or recent, but should not be widely reported. You must be able to directly observe it, whether in person or by video/audio (no secondhand reporting). These are 750-850-word essays, first or third person. Please note if you require travel funding.
Up for Debate
In These Times prides itself on providing a space for conversation and debate on the Left. In our “Up for Debate” section, we host three distinct takes on a question of pressing strategic interest to progressives. Past topics have included, for example, whether to deny fascists a platform and the costs and benefits of wind energy.
How to pitch: Pitch your distinct take on a topic on which there are multiple, valid but conflicting points of view within the Left. A timely hook is helpful but not required. What we don’t want are flash-in-the-pan kerfuffles — the question must have lasting relevance. In These Times will evaluate the pitch in part based on whether we can assemble a dialogue around it. Suggestions for people you’d like to debate are welcome but not required. Lengths are typically 600-750 words.
Culture
Our culture section offers a space for idea-driven writing with a distinct, creative and authorial voice. That may take the form of a personal essay, creative nonfiction piece, historical piece, thinkpiece on a cultural or political trend, or a review that uses one or several books, movies or TV shows as a jumping-off point for your own argument. We believe that big ideas can be expressed in ways that are not lofty or ultra-academic, and that progressive cultural writing, at its best, relates politics to people’s lives and interests. Think Alice Walker, Studs Terkel or Kurt Vonnegut or (all former In These Times contributors). Essays that focus on the intersection of economic/racial inequality and culture are especially encouraged. Culture pitches should be emailed directly to Sherell Barbee at sherell [at] inthesetimes [dot] com.
How to pitch: Pieces range from 1,450−1,700 words. Pitch 1-3 months in advance of any time-specific hook — an anniversary, movie release, book publication, etc. We are unlikely to accept reviews of already published books.
Labor
In These Times is committed to covering workers’ struggles in America and beyond.
We’re looking for reporting on and analysis of underreported workplace struggles, whether workers are unionized, unionizing, or fighting wage theft, occupational hazards and other exploitative treatment. Labor pieces are between 700 and 1,200 words (longer pieces are occasionally published), and pitches should be emailed with a subject line beginning “Working ITT pitch.”
InTheseTimes.com
In These Times runs a range of reporting and commentary on our website. For stories reacting to breaking news, be prepared to file within a few hours of receiving the assignment and to provide same-day revisions. If your pitch is time-sensitive, please be sure to indicate that when submitting.
After reviewing our guidelines above, please email submissions to submissions@inthesetimes.com.