What is Thoughtfox?
Thoughtfox is a non-partisan, non-ideological, non-remunerative platform for those who have something substantive, critical, and/or imaginative to share with the wider world. Our publications comprise commentaries, analyses, and reports that have not—and probably could not have—found a place in broad, popular media narratives; and could not have been expressed effectively or completely in conventional terminology alone. These publications sometimes include English translations of pieces originally published in other languages, write-ups in a series (leading up to a book), and visual essays.
Thoughtfox contributors—frequently independent researchers or university-based academics—are committed to objectivity, to the pursuit of truth and justice; they do not opine without appropriate evidence, and they always do so crisply and evocatively. We nevertheless recognize the fact that victims or witnesses of injustices are not always armed with evidence—or with evidence for each instance of the type of injustice that they may have sought to highlight; moreover, there are always newer, emergent forms of injustice about which we may all lack clarity in the present. With that in mind, we also accept subjective narratives and reports based upon their argumentative rigour; authenticity and credibility of their writers; and verifiability of relevant circumstantial facts. When we put out such narratives, we pre-identify them as first-person accounts—and ensure that their writers undertake to bear full accountability for their claims.
There is yet another space in Thoughtfox that does not view evidence as the holy grail of non-fictional writing that is otherwise worth-reading, informative, and intellectually stimulating. This is the space for futuristic proposals intended to solve or resolve any of our existential concerns—be they at the level of the individual human, some other creature, or some system; and even if they fall outside the atmospheric confines of the biosphere itself. This is the space for articulating radical, positive alternatives: radical inasmuch as they are offbeat, but positive inasmuch as they aim to show a way out. Publications within this space may be entirely original—or they may be journalistic synopses of some ongoing research project (including a book) that is only a step or two shy of its culmination. What qualifies a submission to be published in this section of Thoughtfox is predominantly its theoretical rigour, imaginative ambition, and workability as a blueprint.
Generally speaking, Thoughfox contributors maintain a distance from language that reinforces any untruths or injustices that they otherwise aim to expose or attack through their submissions. Prospective contributors are wherefore expected to be extremely alert to the vocabulary that they employ: That a term enjoys widespread acceptance, even popularity and prestige, does not mean that it is either consistent or based in fact—or that it should be used for pursuing or reflecting truth or justice (or even excellence of expression). At any rate, Thoughtfox is not fundamentally an advocacy outlet; our contributors thus usually maintain an analytical distance from what they observe and report or narrate.
When feeling creative or fanciful, Thoughtfox contributors turn to an occasional section called Unreal—which publishes poetry, fiction, and fantasy.
Stylistically, Thoughtfox leaves it up to the contributor to use generic “American” or generic “British” spellings—or even a mix of the two; submissions, however, are copyedited for readability. Generally speaking, we celebrate worldwide idioms and innovation in the English language.
If you wish to write for Thoughtfox, then please first request our section-specific writing guidelines here.