About the Magazine
Witness seeks original fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and photography that is innovative in its approach, broad-ranging in its concerns, and unapologetic in its perspective. The magazine blends the features of a literary and an issue-oriented magazine to highlight the role of the modern writer as witness to their times.
Our mission is to amplify extraordinary voices, feature writers from every part of the globe, and highlight pieces that speak to the present moment in an enduring and distinctive way. The magazine seeks to open up conversations surrounding oppression and transcendence, prejudice and compassion, fear and raw honesty. The editorial team is also proud to feature the work of emerging voices alongside that of established writers.
Reading Periods
Witness is published twice a year: a Spring print issue, and a Fall/Winter online issue. Please note: submission windows are subject to change based on submission capacity. Additionally, your submission may be considered for future issues--regardless of the submission window--depending on the volume and quality of work submitted in a single reading period.
General Guidelines:
- We do not accept previously published work. This includes material that has appeared online in any form or format, including personal blogs.
- We do not accept more than one submission per genre, though you may submit up to five poems and three flash pieces as a single submission. We work to respond to all poetry submissions within four months; response times for fiction and nonfiction may be six months or longer, depending on the volume of submissions.
- Simultaneous submissions are allowed, but please withdraw your work promptly if it is accepted elsewhere. If submitting multiple poems or flash, if any of your pieces has been accepted by another publication, please notify us directly by sending a message through Submittable.
- If Witness publishes your piece, we ask that you wait two years following your publication date before submitting to us again. We love our contributors, but seek to platform as wide an array of authors as we can.
- Graduates and current UNLV MFA/PhD candidates or other students affiliated with the university are asked to wait two years post-graduation before submitting work for consideration at Witness.
We pay our contributors $150 for prose and $75 for poetry, whether in the print or online issue. We suggest a reading fee of $3 for a general submission. If you have any questions or requests, please email witness@unlv.edu.
We are currently reading for our 2025 Witness Literary Awards. Contest entries are unthemed, so send us your best! We welcome work that declares and/or demands a new perspective to the everyday condition, and stories that contextualize the American experience, highlight issues of global concern, grapple with the relationship between the personal and the political (however defined), and/or keenly observe interior/exterior landscapes. We encourage you to take a look at some of our previous issues before submitting your work to this contest.
One winner in each genre will receive $600 and publication in our Spring 2025 Issue (print). Runners-up will receive $150 and publication in our Spring 2025 Issue (print). All contest entries will be considered for publication.
Our judge for the Award in Fiction is Alejandro Heredia.
Alejandro Heredia is a writer from The Bronx. His debut novel, LOCA, is out February 2025 from Simon and Schuster. He has received fellowships from LAMBDA Literary, Dominican Studies Institute, and currently serves as a Black Mountain Institute Shearing Fellow at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
Website: www.aleheredia.com/about
Special Message from the judge: "I am drawn to work that is invested in sentences, style, and form. Not experimentation for superficial purposes, but formal risks that expand or elevate what’s happening on the level of character, theme, or story. I’m also drawn to work with a special focus on place, be it a neighborhood, city, apartment complex, etc. How does place shape a character, and how does a character shape a place?"
Guidelines:
- Submit one, unpublished, self-contained story up to 7,000 words in Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx) or PDF format. Microsoft Word is preferred
- Work should be double-spaced, set in standard 12-point typeface, and include word count on the top/first page
- Please do not include any identifying information on the manuscript itself: all identifying/contact information should appear in your cover letter only. File name also must not include your name/info, only the story title
- Do not resubmit a previously declined submission unless substantial revisions have been made
- Entry fee is $8. We welcome multiple entries from the same writer, but each story should have a separate entry
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but we ask for immediate withdrawal upon acceptance elsewhere
- Writers associated with the judge, Black Mountain Institute, or UNLV are not eligible to enter
Thank you for adhering to our guidelines. Please contact us at witness@unlv.edu with any questions you may have. We look forward to reading your work!
We are currently reading for our 2025 Witness Literary Awards. Contest entries are unthemed, so send us your best! We welcome work that declares and/or demands a new perspective to the everyday condition, and stories that contextualize the American experience, highlight issues of global concern, grapple with the relationship between the personal and the political (however defined), and/or keenly observe interior/exterior landscapes. We encourage you to take a look at some of our previous issues before submitting your work to this contest.
One winner in each genre will receive $600 and publication in our Spring 2025 Issue (print). Runners-up will receive $150 and publication in our Spring 2025 Issue (print). All contest entries will be considered for publication.
Our judge for the Award in Nonfiction is Monica Macansantos.
Monica Macansantos is a Filipino writer from Baguio, and a 2024-2025 Shearing Fellow at the Black Mountain Institute in Las Vegas. She is the author of the forthcoming essay collection about grief, home, and belonging, Returning to My Father's Kitchen, to be published by Northwestern University Press/Curbstone Books in May 2025, and the story collection, Love and Other Rituals, published in 2022 by Grattan Street Press.
A former James A. Michener Fellow at the University of Texas at Austin, her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Colorado Review, The Hopkins Review, Bennington Review, River Styx, Electric Literature, Literary Hub, and Katherine Mansfield and Children (Edinburgh University Press), among other places. Her work has been recognized with residencies from Hedgebrook, the KHN Center for the Arts, the I-Park Foundation, Storyknife Writers Retreat, and Monson Arts.
Website: https://www.monicamacansantos.com
Special Message from the judge:
"I love being startled by vivid, lyrical prose that invites me to look at the world in a different light. I am particularly drawn to writing that holds a generous sense of wonder, which asks me to slow down and ponder over everyday instances that open up necessary lines of inquiry. I’m always looking for writing that marries intellectual rigor with emotional vulnerability."
Guidelines:
- Submit one, unpublished, self-contained piece of nonfiction (up to 7,000 words) in Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx) or PDF format. Microsoft Word is preferred
- Work should be double-spaced, set in standard 12-point typeface, and include word count on the top/first page
- Please do not include any identifying information on the manuscript itself: all identifying/contact information should appear in your cover letter only. Filename also must not include your name/info
- Entry fee is $8. We welcome multiple entries from the same writer, but each piece of nonfiction should have a separate entry
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but we ask for immediate withdrawal upon acceptance elsewhere
- Writers associated with the contest judge, Black Mountain Institute, or UNLV are not eligible to enter
Thank you for adhering to our guidelines. Please contact us at witness@unlv.edu with any questions you may have. We look forward to reading your work!
We are currently reading for our 2025 Witness Literary Awards. Contest entries are unthemed, so send us your best! We welcome work that declares and/or demands a new perspective to the everyday condition, and stories that contextualize the American experience, highlight issues of global concern, grapple with the relationship between the personal and the political (however defined), and/or keenly observe interior/exterior landscapes. We encourage you to take a look at some of our previous issues before submitting your work to this contest.
One winner in each genre will receive $600 and publication in our Spring 2025 Issue (print). Runners-up will receive $150 and publication in our Spring 2025 Issue (print). All contest entries will be considered for publication.
Our judge for the Award in Poetry is Wendy Chen.
Wendy Chen is the author of the novel THEIR DIVINE FIRES (out May 7, 2024 from Algonquin Books) and the poetry collection UNEARTHINGS (Tavern Books). Her translations of Song-dynasty woman writer Li Qingzhao are forthcoming from Farrar, Straus & Giroux in 2025 in a collection titled THE MAGPIE AT NIGHT.
Chen is the recipient of prizes and fellowships from the Academy of American Poets, MacDowell, & elsewhere. Her writing has appeared widely in prestigious venues such as Freeman's, A Public Space, & Mid-American Review. Her work has been translated into multiple languages and adapted into musical compositions. She has taught and spoken at colleges, universities, and arts organizations such as the Academy of American Poets, Poets & Writers, Poetry Foundation, & Yale University.
She is the editor of Figure 1 and associate editor-in-chief of Tupelo Quarterly. Previously, she was the poetry and translation editor of Denver Quarterly. She earned her MFA in poetry from Syracuse University and her PhD in English from the University of Denver. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
Special Message from the judge:
"What does it mean for poetry to serve as witness or testimony in our present time of crisis? I'm looking forward to reading work that is interested in crossings, intersections, and openings that speak to the complications of our time."
Guidelines:
- Submit 1-3 poems in a single Microsoft Word document (.doc, .docx) or PDF file. Microsoft Word is preferred
- Please do not include any identifying information on the manuscript itself: all identifying/contact information should appear in your cover letter only. Filename also must not include your name/info
- Entry fee is $8. We welcome multiple entries from the same writer, but each submission should have a separate entry
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but we ask for immediate withdrawal upon acceptance elsewhere
- Writers associated with the judge, Black Mountain Institute, or UNLV are not eligible to enter
Thank you for adhering to our guidelines. Please contact us at witness@unlv.edu with any questions you may have. We look forward to reading your work!