All approved essay contributions will appear in The Propagandist and the best essay wins $1000. Strike a blow for freedom and get paid.
Here are the contest rules and guidelines.
Essay Submission Deadline
Essays must be submitted by midnight on Monday, October 10, 2011 on Columbus Day. The essay winner will be announced on Thursday, November 10, 2011 in the week of Remembrance Day.
How To Submit Your Essay To The Propagandist
Contact us at info [AT] propagandistmag [DOT] com
Put “Essay Contest” in the Subject Line.
Multiple Submissions? Fire away
Multiple contest submissions are accepted. Regular contributors who submit articles to The Propagandist are advised to send an email noting which essays they would like to have entered in the contest.
The Propagandist welcomes essay contributions from anyone over the age of 18 living anywhere.
Essay contest participants are also invited to join The Propagandist's growing list of regular contributors, which already includes writers, journalists, activists, analysts and authors from around the world, including the USA, UK, Canada, Israel, South Korea, Brazil and elsewhere.
Participants must write under their own names. Pseudonyms will only be allowed in extremely rare exceptions where the anonymous writer may reasonably fear persecution, torture or death upon publication.
Essay Theme
While the scope of essay topics is unlimited, guiding themes might include the fight for freedom, overcoming challenges to modernity and the universality of human rights. However, contributors are invited to write on any theme consistent with our Propaganda Sections.
Essay Style
The Propagandist is a political magazine, not a literary journal. Essays should have a journalistic style touching on events happening now, not 50 years ago. Avoid an academic feel.
There is no limit on word length. Essays longer than 1000 words may be broken up into parts and published as a series at the discretion and mutual consent of the writer and The Propagandist's Editor. For judging, the parts would be combined into a single submission (though the writer may choose to submit other essays as well).
The Propagandist Essay Contest Judging Criteria
The winning essay will have the following :
- A Powerful Argument.
- Clear Writing
- Popularity
Popularity? Yes, that is a factor in how we will choose our finalists for this contest. A bold thesis and perfect syntax will get you far, but to get to the final stage, you'll probably need some buzz.
An essay that gets lots of comments, receives more web traffic, gets more web links into The Propagandist site from other sites, exploits Facebook, Twitter, Digg and other social networks and generally creates a "buzz" is more likely to make it into the Top Ten Essay Finalist stage.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with essayists and fans promoting a high-quality piece of work. In fact, essayists who want to win this contest are highly encouraged to do so. This also adds an incentive for contest participants to get in their contributions as early as possible. The earlier you submit your essay, the quicker it gets published and the more time you have to promote your essay through your social networks, blogs, etc.
Popularity comes with a qualifier : The Propagandist reserves the right to not publish any submitted essay that does not meet our editorial standards. Thus, certain unethical nerds who want to swamp our magazine with poorly written off-topic junk and then spam the hell out of it to generate fake buzz will not be allowed to game the system.
Contest Rules Disclaimer
The Propagandist reserves the right to change these contest rules at any time without notice (though we probably won't -- it's just a disclaimer we had to include in case we need to improve clarity for participants).
The Winning Essay for The Propagandist Essay Contest
The Editor of the Propagandist will choose the top ten essays based on the criteria outlined above. These essays will be then be given to a judge on the board of The Free Thinking Film Society for final review. The winner announced on Thursday, November 10, 2011 will be sent a check for $1000 (CDN funds).
Good luck to all competitors. May the best essay win.
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