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Our WorkThe Feminist WordSubmission Guidelines

Submission Guidelines

As a feminist research institute, CRIAW-ICREF publishes original work that is free from all forms of discrimination (non-sexist, non-racist, non-homophobic, pro-choice, etc.). We accept submissions from young women aged 15-35 from across Canada and internationally.  

Types of Submissions

Art and Photography: We accept visual and digital art in various mediums, including photography. Please ensure all images submitted are of high quality.  

Articles/Essays: We accept personal, academic, and creative essays and articles that are 700 words or less for individual authors, and up to 1400 words for collaborative pieces with 2 or more authors. Word counts do not include footnotes or references. Written pieces must comply with our plagiarism guidelines below.  

Poetry: We accept poetry submissions of up to 700 words. We accept free form, structured, dynamic or unique personal styles of poetry. 

Short stories: We accept short stories that are 500-1000 words. 

Comics: We want to encourage our readers to submit comics that are political, funny, witty or creative in any way that aligns with topics about women’s issues or the theme of the current edition.  

Mixed-Media: We accept mixed-media submissions that combine written work with art forms. Please ensure any combined submissions give credit to all authors involved in the piece.  

Plagiarism Guidelines

Citations

As a research institute, CRIAW-ICREF requires that written submissions must appropriately cite any referenced materials and/or use reference materials to support your analysis. Any ideas, statistics or words that are not your own must be cited, and any claims made throughout the piece must be evidence-based and supported with appropriate resources. Any literature and statistics cited in the piece must be used accurately.  

We acknowledge that different types of sources can provide information for readers; however, we encourage authors to use reliable sources of information. This includes sources, that have undergone rigorous editorial review and fact-checking, and/or peer-reviewed scholarly sources for academic or research-based essays and articles. Social media sites (TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, etc.), Wikipedia, and personal blogs may provide valuable information for your written submission, and/or may be the topic of your submission, but these sources must be used carefully, and not as the sole source.

For the purpose of creating uniformity in the magazine, we ask all contributors to use Chicago Style citation, that uses footnotes. Please ensure all sources in the footnotes and bibliography follow this citation format.  

Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

CRIAW-ICREF acknowledges the increasing use of AI in magazines, journals, and other print and digital publications, and the potential for AI in these spaces. However, we prioritize human voices, creativity, and critical thinking in all of our publications, including the F-Word. If AI must be used for a submission, we encourage the responsible and ethical use of AI, and full disclosure. 

CRIAW-ICREF requires that contributors disclose any, and all, use of artificial intelligence used in the development of their pieces (e.g. ChatGPT, Midjourney, DALL-E, or Copilot, among others). We have added space in our submission forms for you to let us know if you have used AI and in what capacity. For example, if you have used AI to edit your grammar, to generate ideas for your piece, or to locate sources, let us know in the available text box and indicate what AI tool you used. We encourage original works that are representative of your own ideas and thoughts. We will not accept submissions that are wholly created through AI.  

Contributors should be aware of the potential risks for plagiarism, inaccurate sources and false information. For visual art pieces, please be aware that AI draws on and can plagiarize the work of existing artists.  

CRIAW-ICREF reserves the right to refuse any submissions at any point in the publishing process that we feel do not align with our values, mission and research principles. Please read our plagiarism guidelines carefully, and any questions can be directed to fword.efem@criaw-icref.ca. 

Review Process and Timeline

Editorial Committee: We are a small team at CRIAW-ICREF and we collaboratively review any submissions received for the F-Word.  

Editorial Process: Our review process time can vary as we work collaboratively with the contributors to edit any pieces. Contributors are usually given five days to edit their pieces, and some submissions may go through several rounds of edits. We aim to publish two editions of the F-Word per year, with each edition taking approximately six months.  

Conditional Acceptances: As the review process takes time, any pieces we accept are conditionally accepted and contingent on the author’s ability to incorporate any changes required by the editorial committee. We appreciate contributors working with us to refine their piece, and we value the contributor’s time during the review process as well. Unfortunately, some pieces may not be published even after rounds of edits. If any works cannot be published, we encourage contributors to consider resubmitting their work for subsequent editions.