To anthology editors | Nalo Hopkinson:
Make a list of names of writers from whom you’d like to see submissions. You probably know that your list needs to be way longer than the number of stories you can publish. Fitness clubs have been getting rich on this principle for decades; they sell far more memberships than their facilities can hold, because they know that at most, only about 20 percent of those who pay for memberships ever enter the building a second time. Your list should include the non- (or not as) marginalized writers, but make sure you have 2-5 times more marginalized writers. Because of all the current and historical barriers to our participation, it’s going to take at least that many to get a representative sample of submissions.
Don’t know the names of that many marginalized writers? Ask around. Ask readers, other writers, editors, listserves, educators, Twitter, Facebook. People will be happy to clue you in. Get contact information for the writers they name. While you’re at it, ask them where you should be putting your call for submissions (if you’re doing a public one) in order to have a better chance of it being seen by writers from a diversity of communities. Because if you only publicize it in the usual places, you’ll only get – say it with me – the usual suspects.
Write your call for submissions. Be explicit about wanting to see submissions from writers from a diversity of communities. I would go so far as to suggest you be explicit about which communities you mean. Now, a weird thing will sometimes happen when you do this; the minute you say that you want to hear from everybody, some (usually) straight, (usually) white writers will decide you’re saying that you don’t want stories from white people. To them, “inclusivity” means “I hate white people.” It’s un-freaking-believable. I frankly don’t go out of my way to reassure those people. There’ll be plenty straight, white writers who don’t have that chip on their shoulders. There’ll be another group of non-marginalized writers who will tell you they don’t want to submit stories to you because they don’t want to take up a slot that could go to someone whose voice mightn’t otherwise be heard. Those people’s hearts are in the right place, but the zero sum game is exactly the kind of thing you’re trying to change. Remind those folks that you’re the editor, and they should leave the editorial decisions up to you. Some of them may still wig out and opt out, but not all of them will.
Contact the writers on your list; marginalized writers first, non-marginalized writers next. Personally invite them to submit stories. I always like to remind everyone that an invitation to submit is an invitation to have their work considered, not a guarantee of publication. Writers who’ve been doing this in the mainstream forever will probably know that. Writers who haven’t been part of the mainstream may not. If I’m doing a closed call, I ask the writers I’m inviting to let me know about any writers they think I may have missed. When I’ve done this, recommendations have sometimes netted me great submissions from writers I’d never have heard of otherwise (yes, white writers too), or who wouldn’t have thought to submit to the kind of anthology I edit. Everybody wins.
If you’re doing an open call for submissions, post the call now, in all the expected places as well as the ones that have been recommended to you.
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