Calling all molecules!

Good enough to make the cut? The Molecule loves your questions. Send us art, writing, photography or design that makes our skin tingle. The more questions you make us ask, the better. We want something so profound it will make our heads hurt and our hearts swell. Shake us to the core. Give us culture on a platter.

Urban Molecule wants its pages tasty to the last morsel so before you submit think about what culture consumption means to you. We’ve got a few general categories to get you started:

• Society: Works of, reviews of, or articles about fiction, creative non-fiction (including academic stuff), poetry, photography, art, design, and film that explore material important to our mission.
• Cult: A mysterious and sometimes unsavory realm of fetish, unexplainable phenomena, and the dark underworld of the human psyche. It should be noted that we’re not necessarily trying to celebrate or glamorize these diversions from the mainstream, but to simply omit or ignore them wouldn’t be very molecule-like. We don’t want to ruin our diverse cultural landscape, do we?

The Molecule prefers electronic submissions, but we’ll consider hard copy as well. Keep in mind that hard copy submissions take more time to review, and we’ll try to get the word back to you as soon as possible. Either way, we try to reply to submissions within one month of receiving. You’ll get a reply, but chances are you won’t get your work back so make sure you have your own copy before sending.

Replies from UM might go straight into your trash or spam folder (yikes!) so keep a lookout to make sure you’re not throwing away your chance to shine! Spam filters to watch are @hotmail.com, @excite.com, and @aol.com. White list umjournal@gmail.com when you see it.

If you’re not sure what genre your work belongs in, don’t worry. Send it and we’ll figure it out. Besides, listing things in a genre isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

Alright, the skinny:

• Submit your work by clicking here
• IMPORTANT: Download, complete, and return the contributor agreement form (PDF) with your submission. Any submission without a signed agreement will not be reviewed.
• Text: If it doesn’t require a lot of formatting, you can drop it in the body of your email. Otherwise, send it in MS Word format.
• Images: Send low-res versions of JPG or GIF format. Once we decide, we’ll get back to you for the large resolution versions.
• Sound: MP3 format is nice. Please ZIP your files before sending, and keep your sound submissions to 6 minutes or less.
• Include a short bio of yourself in the body of your email or with your contributor agreement.
• We only accept original work that hasn’t been published elsewhere. Your blog or personal website doesn’t count. Copyright is yours. The only thing we ask is first serial rights (worldwide electronic dissemination), as well as the right to publish your work in any print anthology later on.
• If you send your submission to another publication simultaneously, please let us know.
• Remember that reviews of works are published here, too, as well as essays and reactions to specific works, events, or exhibitions.
• If you’re unsure about something just email the editor.

Join the UM network

Joining the network is easy. Once your first work is published at the site, the Molecule will provide you with your very own contributor page, where your friends and fans can leave their comments. We’ll post your bio and picture there too, along with links to your current projects, websites and whatever else you’d like to show off. Feel free to leave comments on your own contributor page as well. How cool is that?

Alright, ready? GO FOR IT