Call for Submissions on Theme of "Rage"; Michigan Quarterly Review Mixtape

 

MQR Mixtape is currently accepting submissions for MQR Mixtape: Rage, an issue guest edited by Sahara Sidi.

Submission deadline: April 22, 2024.

“We are dismissed as emotional. It is enough to make you emotional.”

—Sara Ahmed

Many scholars and artists have remarked on the importance of anger in art and everyday life. In her 1981 keynote presentation to the National Women’s Studies Conference, Audre Lorde delivered the indicting line “anger is loaded with information and energy,” reminding us that such anger should not be considered a source of shame, but evidence of the injustices that “brought that anger into being.”

This issue seeks to hold space for the “ugly feelings” we are often told to tame, to clean up, and to quiet: our rage, our annoyance, our frustration. We aim to honor the wisdom of unruly emotions. We understand that feelings cannot be boxed and separated from one another, and we acknowledge the muddling of it all. Rage with a side of grief? Anger with a dash of paranoia? Vexed yet anxious? We get it. Rage comes in different forms, tempos, and decibels and we want to amplify it!

For this issue, we are looking for pieces that seek to express the complexities of such a charged emotion. We welcome expressions, critiques, and meditations on rage in a variety of forms: poems, visual art, essays, comics, short films, and short fiction. We encourage perspectives that contextualize the social, cultural, and political realities of anger. Who is allowed to express their anger? How, and when, is rage a symptom of our social conditions and dispositions? What forces attempt to stifle such a resistance? We are looking for work that seeks to reorient our understanding of emotions and their function in “polite” society.

For this issue, please submit: 

Prose: up to 4,000 words
Poetry: up to four poems
Visual art/photography: up to five works (if 3D, please provide multiple angles/references)
Short films: no longer than 20 minutes

Hybrid forms such as multi-media works, comics, collaborations, erasure/black-out/found poems, collages, and much more are welcome.

Only previously unpublished work will be considered. Simultaneous submissions are permitted, but please notify us immediately if your work is accepted by another publication. Please send only one submission per window; subsequent submissions will be rejected automatically. 

MQR Mixtape pays all contributors.

Submission link here.