Activehistory.ca welcomes thoughtful proposals and blog post submissions that bring historical perspectives to pressing issues. Historians, graduate students, and anyone engaged in historical work—inside or outside of academic institutions—are invited to submit. Please send your completed posts or ideas as a Word document to activehistoryinfo@gmail.com.
We seek submissions addressing any period or place, provided they are grounded in research, engage with critical issues facing society, and are written in accessible language for a general audience. While we especially encourage posts focusing on Canadian history, connections to current events, or historical teaching and research practices, we also welcome topics from any geographic region given our global readership. We publish predominantly in English but encourage French submissions to our partner website: HistoireEngagée (Visitez notre partenaire francophone, HistoireEngagée). Posts should demonstrate how historians or aspects of the past connect with the general public, the media, and policymakers.
All posts should meet the profession’s ethical standards and best practices including, where applicable, research ethics protocols such as the Tri-Council Ethics guidelines, research agreements, and opportunities for comment from living individuals or institutions named in a post.
Submissions should be clean, polished drafts written in an accessible style for a general audience, use hyperlinks or Chicago Manual of Style endnotes over footnotes, and be between 700 and 1500 words. When submitting a post, please include:
- A short list of accessible resources
- Five keywords (geographic, temporal, thematic, etc.) to help readers find your article
- At least one or two images you have permission to use, with appropriate captions and bibliographic information
- Any pertinent ethical considerations (e.g., positionality statements, research involving sensitive subjects)
- Your name, email address, social media handles, and institutional affiliation
- A short biography of one or two sentences
We display the first 2-3 paragraphs of each post and one image on the homepage, with a “continue reading” link. Your opening paragraphs should stand alone and captivate readers. Your title should also convey the topic clearly while capturing a general reader’s attention.
When you submit your piece, you will be assigned an editor from the Active History Editorial Collective to ensure your work meets our publication guidelines. From submission to publication, the process typically takes a few weeks before your post appears on the site.
Image courtesy of Graphic Garden from Usplash
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Blog posts published before October 28, 2018 are licensed with a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Canada License.