About Marginalia Forums
Our forums aim to provide non-experts with accessible specialist writing on the selected topic or book, and we invite scholars to contribute essays that foster interdisciplinary scholarship and public understanding of the book’s importance.
Each essay brings the contributor’s scholarly expertise and specialization to the general reader, and, in some cases, the contributors do reference one another internally. If the forum concerns a book, we also invite a response from the author(s) of the book.
We would like essays of 1,500 – 3,000 words, from an average of 4-8 contributors for each forum. If the forum concerns a book, we also invite a response from the author(s) of the book. We ask contributors to omit footnotes or the scholarly conventions of academic articles. We want scholars to explain to interested readers—other academics, journalists, and general readers—why their topic matters.
Forum examples:
Send pitches to [email protected]
Please CC: [email protected] and [email protected]
NOTE: You may query the executive editor if you do not receive a response within three months of your pitch. | Forums are typically published 6-12 months from the time all the copy is received, and all contributors can expect to enter our editorial process. The forum organizer is responsible for ensuring all copy meets our guidelines and are expected to help facilitate revisions. Additionally, all publication decisions about layout (especially images), order, and titling rest with the senior editors.
About Publication
The essays will be published online, but authors will retain copyright of their material. One of Marginalia’s forums, Defining Israel, was published in 2018 with Hebrew Union College/University of Pittsburgh Press as a volume entitled Defining Israel: Sources and Reflections on the Nation-State Law.