NEW CONTRAST GENERAL GUIDELINES
• Preferred file formats: DOC or DOCX.
• For images: Submit JPEG files with a minimum size of 2MB.
• Poetry submissions: Submit 1-3 poems, with a maximum of 65 lines per poem.
• Alternatively, you may submit one piece of short story, non-fiction, or a novel extract (up to 4,000 words)
• Please submit a review, memoir, essay, criticism, or reflective/opinion piece (up to 1,500 words).
• Cover letter: Every submission must include a cover letter. Tell us a bit about yourself and your work, and please include a 50-word author bio written in the third-person.
• Email: Please ensure your email address is included somewhere in the document.
• Simultaneous submissions: If your submission is being considered by another publication, please mention this in your cover letter or email.
NC x Ethics Lab Call for Submissions
New Contrast is inviting submissions for a special issue, in partnership with the Ethics Lab at the University of Cape Town. We’re looking for previously unpublished African speculative fiction that grapples with the ethical questions of living alongside new and emerging technologies.
This submission call will be open to all writers across Southern Africa, and will run from April 15th to July 15th 2026.
What are we looking for?
We welcome original speculative fiction, poetry, essays, creative non-fiction, artwork and critical reviews, and are accepting submissions in English, Afrikaans and isiXhosa. We’re especially interested in work that explores the relationship between the human experience and emerging technologies.
Submissions may engage with, but are not limited to, the following key themes:
- Afrofuturism, Africanfuturism, and Technological Ethics: How does African speculative fiction imagine futures shaped by AI, biotechnology, and cybernetics? What happens when technology isn’t neutral, but tied to power, identity and resistance? What kinds of futures emerge when these stories are told from the African perspective?
- Indigenous Knowledge Systems and the Future: What if the future isn’t shaped by the past, but built from it? How can ancestral wisdom shape our understanding of technology today? How might indigenous approaches to knowledge and ethics reframe global discussions on automation, biotechnology, and digital consciousness?
- Climate Futures, Solarpunk, and Survival: How do African writers imagine life in a changing climate? What does survival, adaptation and resistance look like in these futures?
- The Body, Enhancement, and Identity: As technologies like genetic editing or neural implants become more real, how do they change what it means to be human? How might African stories explore questions of identity, autonomy and transformation?
Your work doesn’t have to fit neatly into any of these categories. These questions are simply prompts to help you get started. Surprise us! We’re interested in work that takes risks, plays with form and imagines something new.
Guidelines for Submissions
We’re calling for work in English, Afrikaans and isiXhosa, in the following formats:
Fiction (1,500–3,000 words)
Poetry (up to 3 poems per submission)
Essays and creative non-fiction (1500–3,000 words)
Critical reviews (Up to 1500 words)
Graphic novel/comic (up to 4 pages)
Illustrations/artwork (up to 3 images per submission)
*If you have work that falls outside of any of these formats, please don’t hesitate to submit. Just motivate why you think it should be considered in your cover letter.
How to submit:
Please submit on Submittable
All submissions require a COVER LETTER & BIO.
This submission call is open to all writers across Southern Africa (South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Namibia, Lesotho, eSwatini).
Please give our editorial team up to two months, post the final submission date, to get back to you regarding your submission.
No email submissions will be considered.