Writing

Writing for public audiences requires the writer to think more about the audience’sexperience of reading the article. Academic writing often privileges rigour and precision over readability. Magazine writing has to be the perfect compromise between the two – and this can be quite challenging. Before sitting down to write, have a look at the articles that have already been published by EPOCH. You will get a sense of our preferred style and tone.

Here is some general advice on writing for us:

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• Decide what you are going to write about. Choose an element of your research that is important and interesting but is focused enough for you to do it justice with the word limit. 1,000-2,000 words will run out faster than you think: zero in on a particular contention, event, object, person, or idea.

• Begin with a ‘hook’. This might be an interesting fact, a narrative point, a question, or a controversy. Whatever you choose, it has to grab your reader and make them
  want to find out more.

• Choose your content carefully. Work out what your reader needs to know. It is tempting to tell them all the extraneous details because you find it interesting. Overwhelming a reader with information is a quick way to lose their attention. Finding the balance between intriguing detail and too much detail is important to the success of your article.

• Think about structure. You need to cover what’s important to your reader early on to keep them engaged. Those reading for pleasure don’t always want to wait for the conclusion – you need to keep them interested from the first sentence. Threading a narrative through the piece is a good way to do this.

• Write accessibly. This does not mean ‘dumbing down’ the topic but it does mean avoiding jargon that is unique to your academic field. It also means moving away from certain academic conventions – for instance, use statistics sparingly, avoid unwieldy vocabulary, and don’t get bogged down in historiography.

We encourage some accompaniments to your article, such as images and a ‘further reading’ list.
 

Images: Please insert any images into the text to show us where you would like them to appear in the published version. If doing this affects the resolution of the image, please also send it to your editor in an email. Images attract readers and, if your article is about something less well-known, can really help your reader’s understanding. Please include the caption you would like as well. Please note that all images submitted to EPOCH must be either in the Public Domain, have a Creative Commons licence or have any other licence that allows for commercial use, reproduction and remixing. We also allow copyrighted material should the necessary proof of license be obtained and shared with us. EPOCH does not have the resources to support the acquisition of copyrighted material.

Further Reading: We like to include a ‘further reading’ section of four to five books. EPOCH articles should make the reader want to find out more about a subject – this is your chance to point them in the right direction. Please note that these should be books that are readily available in public libraries or retailers. Please do not link to journal
articles. Please format these in MHRA style.

Author Bio: We ask all contributors to provide a few lines about themselves. Tell us where you studied/are studying, and what your current research is. If you work on any other projects, please tell us, and feel free to include any links.

Social Media & Links: We encourage all contributors to include a link to their social media. This is of course optional, but it is nice for readers and other researchers to find out a little more about you and your work. We accept links to X/Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. but do not recommend sharing Facebook or Instagram profiles. We also accept links to research profiles, like ORCID.