Submissions open – Griffith Review 61: Who We Are
Submissions are open for Griffith Review 61: Who We Are
Edited by Julianne Schultz and Peter Mares
Published 30 July 2018
Deadline for pitches: 1 December 2017
Deadline for full submission: 1 March 2018
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull celebrates Australia as ‘the most successful multicultural nation in the world’. This is a grand claim and important to a sense of identity and belonging, but at times it seems that multiculturalism is more an article of faith than a work in progress. What it really means in the twenty-first century is the focus of Griffith Review 61: Who We Are, which will examine both the opportunities offered and the complexities involved.
The nation’s population has virtually doubled since 1975, and in recent years the rules around migration have been altered significantly. Those who have chosen to make their home here in the past have changed Australia, and waves of new arrivals continue to transform the country. Yet the apparent certainties of Australia as a permanent settler society are giving way to the precarious churn of temporary migration.
This edition will give voice to this changing reality, explore the big issues of belonging, citizenship and participation, and tease out how contemporary Australia might evolve. This is a rich field, replete with policy questions and personal narratives. It is a success story, but the full picture is complex, and past achievements no guarantee of future results.
The nation’s boundaries are imaginary as much as physical, and constantly contested by an unsettled history and a shifting present. Renewed assertions of national identity run parallel to the increasing globalisation of opportunity and threat, as if the more fluid the world becomes, the greater the urge to hold onto something fixed and stable. Yet do we really know who ‘we’ are? Where does Australia begin and end? Who can claim to belong and who can be legitimately excluded?
Griffith Review invites submissions of essay, memoir, biography, reportage, fiction and poetry that demonstrate Who We Are. Full submissions and pitches welcome via our Submittable page.
Peter Mares is an independent writer and researcher. He is a contributing editor with the online magazine Inside Story and a senior moderator with The Cranlana Programme. Peter was a broadcaster with the ABC for twenty-five years, serving as a foreign correspondent based in Hanoi and presenting national radio programs. He is the author of the award-winning book Borderline: Australia’s Response to Refugees and Asylum Seekers in the Wake of the Tampa and has written about migration for many media outlets including the Age, Australian Financial Review and Griffith Review.
Writers are encouraged to read our writers’ guidelines and past editions of Griffith Review, which are free to access online, to familiarise themselves with style, tone and word length. We are now accepting complete pieces of any form (essay, memoir, reportage, fiction and poetry).
(Image: Yo Photography, CC-BY-ND 2.0)