Please direct general inquiries to eic@firstpersonscholar.com 

“Is this an essay or a commentary?”

The eternal question. The alpha and omega. There isn’t really a strong difference. In fact, there’s a lot of overlap. Broadly speaking, however, if your idea more strongly emphasizes a theoretical bent with a lot of citation, it’s probably best suited to essays. If your writing is more experiential or experimental, try Commentaries. It’s also ok to pick one and ask! The section heads will talk and find the right home for your work.

“How can I be an editor for FPS?”

We are a group of current graduate students who are earning degrees in Canada. Did ya know we’re Canadian? Now you do. If you want to work for us, you need to be a graduate student based in Canada (international students at a Canadian University, you’re eligible! But not Canadians studying abroad–sorry expats). Editor positions are for one academic year, although if you’re doing well in your program and your supervisor isn’t chasing us with a torch and pitchfork for distracting you, you’re welcome to renew a position or ask for a different one. You can also quit after a year, but we will be sad, unless you are leaving us for another heckin’ cool job, in which case we will be sad but also proud. We accept applications from PhD or MA students each August-September for vacant positions.

“Do editors get paid?”

While we had grants that allowed us to offer funding in the past this is no longer the case. We are sad, sorry, and are trying to find alternative funding sources to bring this back but for now we are no longer paying contributors or editors. We are fully volunteer run.

“How often can I publish with FPS?”

We like working with familiar folks as much as we like new faces. You’re more than welcome to send something our way in the future, but we ask that you limit your submissions to one per academic year; we want to make sure we can include as many different voices as possible.

“How long does it take to finish a piece?”

That’s really up to you. We’re flexible and can schedule revisions around your needs.

“Are you peer-reviewed?”

I mean, in the sense that a group of peers is reviewing your paper? But for the traditional metric of academic currency, no. We aren’t a journal and if you need journal publications for tenure, applications, grants, scholarships, etc., we probably don’t check that box.

That being said, we’re super cool and we have a wide international readership across academic, journalistic, and industry spheres. Our stuff is regularly cited by academics in our discipline and frequently shows up on course syllabi. So there’s that.

“When is the soonest I can get published?”

We usually have between 3-6 months of articles prepared or in the works at any given time. We’re faster than a journal, but it does still take a bit. Occasionally, something happens and we might have a hole in our publishing schedule. In that case, we’ll contact you and ask if that date works for you. Alternately, we publish special issues from time-to-time, or may otherwise need to shift our publishing schedule around a bit. In these cases, we will reach out to confirm revised publishing dates with you. You won’t be “surprised-published.”

“How do I pitch a special issue?”/ “How can I collaborate with FPS?” / “I want to help fund FPS” / “I have an opportunity for FPS”

Email the Editor-in-Chief! We’re always excited to hear about collaborations, grants, joint-publication efforts, special issues, and more.

“I have a response to an article already published on FPS.”

Cool. We treat these as regular submissions and they go through the same process. Just don’t be an asshole to the original author. We won’t publish dunk pieces. We will publish critiques that punch nice and high up (but then it’s not really a dunk piece, is it?). We live by the rule that all research starts with people; treat your responses accordingly.

“I have an idea for a video/multimedia submission.”

We are primarily a print publication (with occasional podcasts, interviews, and even games), but we have accepted submissions in other forms in the past! A good approach in most cases is to treat non-print stuff as a support or supplement to a print submission. Don’t put a hundred hours into editing a video essay or game and cold-submit it to us, because that’s just going to be more work for you when we ask for revisions. Start with the print version first, and when we’re happy with that, then start putting the multimedia component together.

“I’d like to collaborate on a cross-promotional/paid post.”

No.

“bUt WhAt AbOuT eThIcS aNd GaMeS jOuRnAlIsM?”

Heck off, buddy.

“How often do you deal with trolls like the above, but unironically?”

It does happen. We try to keep an eye on known hotbeds for trolling/harassment and keep our contributors apprised of the situation. Seriously, we have an editor who checks the Bad Parts of the internet weekly to make sure we’re in the clear. We take the security and safety of our contributors seriously; you’re part of the team, too. We will only ever publish contact information that you specifically give us permission to publish.

We know we don’t work like a traditional journal. We’re very proud of that. But since it’s a different process, we wanted to explain how it usually goes. Our editorial pipeline usually works on shorter timescales than, say, an academic journal, but we are also grad students. Delays happen, but we will do our best to communicate and keep you updated. Don’t hesitate to email us if you have a question.

• Step 1: You send us something cool!
• Step 2: You should receive a quick email from the section head saying they got it. Depending on our schedule, you may also receive an estimate on how long it will be until they are able to return your draft with feedback and comments.
• Step 3: Submissions are reviewed by a team of at least two, including the section editor as well as an associate and/or assistant editors. Many of our contributors are publishing for the first time, and our feedback emphasizes helping you polish your arguments and ideas for an online venue.
• Step 4:  You will receive your draft back with a proposed date to return it to the editorial team. We usually suggest two or three weeks for a revised draft, but it’s something you can talk to with the editor. We want the timing to work for you.
• Step 5: Repeat Step 3 and Step 4, usually 2-5 times. We work in small writing iterations and not large-scale, all-suggestions-at-once “Reviewer 2” style. You might do more than five revision cycles, you might do just one or two. It all depends on the needs and schedule of both you and of the editorial team. You’ll be kept in the loop the whole time, though.
• Step 6: Once we’re happy with the piece, we’ll set a tentative publication date and your submission will move to copy-editing for final review. Copy editors just look for typos or small errors and make sure all the links work.
• Step 7: Your article is published on a Wednesday at noon thirty. We disseminate our articles on Facebook and Twitter.
• Step 8: Bask in your accomplishment, you awesome human-being. Coerce your friends, colleagues, and family into sharing and retweeting your article.
• Step 9: Your section editor should send you some forms to fill out at the time your piece is published. That’ll help ya get paid for your work. Because you should be paid for writing, academic, journalistic, any form of professional writing is labour!
• Step 10: We hope you enjoyed working with us and keep reading. We welcome repeat submissions, but we try to limit submissions from one single person to about once per year.

Follow the guidelines above for how a piece is structured  and send an email to the appropriate section head.

If you are still unsure about the piece but have an idea, send a pitch to eic@firstpersonscholar.com!

Here’s what we are looking for in a pitch:

• Tell us in a paragraph or so what you want to write about. We are happy to help you refine your ideas (this is a collaborative process, after all) but you should have a more refined idea at this point than just what game you want to write about–ideally you have a specific argument. Book Reviews are an exception–it’s enough to know what book you’d like to review for us, especially if we are sending you a copy.
• Things to ask yourself as you’re pitching: has this idea been done before? Is it important to you? How are you going to get that idea across to our audience? Are you inadvertently perpetuating the exclusionary and gatekeeping practices that presently pollutes gaming in all of its spheres? Think hard on that last one.

Here’s what we are looking for in a partial or full draft:

• We ask that submissions have been proofread by their authors before sending it our way.
• A draft should have some kind of clear argumentative thesis (early on in the work, please!)
• Please do not send us work that is already significantly over the word limit–you can send us 2,200 words, for example, but not 10,000 words with the hope we’ll cut it down for you.
• If you are referencing the intellectual work of someone, cite it. We accept MLA or APA, and please don’t use footnotes or endnotes.

You don’t need to send pitches to the EiC–they’ll just send you along to the appropriate section head. And if you’re not sure which section head to email, pick the one that sounds the most interesting to what you want to write.

We’re happy to work with you from whatever stage you are in, but please take a look over your submission before sending it our way–it helps us get you published more quickly.