News and Events

Resources to help you plan for the fall semester

We know this fall’s going to be a weird one. We’re here to help with your classroom (or home school) planning! 

Here’s one thought: 

Give your students a break from the screen by putting print issues of The Common in their hands– just $20/student: 

Two issues for each student, free desk copies for teachers (that means you too, parents!), as well as sample lesson plans and related readings. You can also schedule a Zoom visit with the Editor in Chief, providing students a window into the world of editing and publishing. Or, we can facilitate a virtual visit with one of our contributing authors. 

Resources to help you plan for the fall semester
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Amplifying Black Voices on TC Online II

This is the second installment of an online series highlighting work by Black authors published in The Common. To read  The Common’s statement in support of the nationwide protests against anti-Black racism, white supremacy, and police brutality, click here.

 

Amplifying Black Voices on TC Online II
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Amplifying Black Voices on TC Online

This is the first installment of an online series highlighting work by Black authors published in The Common. To read  The Common’s statement in support of the nationwide protests against anti-Black racism, white supremacy, and police brutality, click here.

Amplifying Black Voices on TC Online
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Call for submissions from the Arabian Gulf

Calling All Gulfie Kids!

Did you grow up in the GCC countries? If so, The Common wants your work for its Fall 2021 Issue, which will feature a portfolio on migration, disorientation, and complicated relationships to “place” in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Oman. 
 
 

Airplanes over a map of the Arabian gulf

Call for submissions from the Arabian Gulf
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Solidarity and Support

Dear friends,

We at The Common are ashamed by this country’s injustices and support the nationwide protests against anti-Black racism, white supremacy, and police brutality. 

Our mission has always been to serve as a public gathering space for the exchange of observations and ideas. Now more than ever we apply ourselves to the work of soliciting and amplifying voices that illuminate.

Solidarity and Support
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 The Common Among 2020 Literary Magazine Fund Recipients  

The magazine to be awarded $8,000 via Amazon Literary Partnership grant  

Amherst, MA, May 282020 – The Common, the award-winning literary journal based at Amherst College, is one of 13 2020 Literary Magazine Fund Grant Recipients, awarded in alliance with the Amazon Literary Partnership. Since 2017, funding from the Amazon Literary Partnership has helped further The Common’s mission of publishing and promoting emerging and diverse authors who deepen our individual and collective sense of place.   

 The Common Among 2020 Literary Magazine Fund Recipients  
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The Common Young Writers Program

The Common Young Writers Program is a two-week (Monday-Friday) online creative writing program for high school students (rising 9-12). Taught by the editors and editorial assistants of Amherst College’s literary magazine, the summer 2020 course will focus on the short story. Through writing exercises and contemporary reading assignments from The Common, we will introduce students to the building blocks of fiction (scene, character, plot, image) and guide them through the process of writing and revising their own short stories.

The Common Young Writers Program
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“To Be Led from Behind” Chosen for 2020 Best Small Fictions Award Anthology

Mohammad Ibrahim Nawaya’s story “To Be Led from Behind,” translated from the Arabic by Robin Moger, has been chosen to appear in Sonder Press’s 2020 award anthology The Best Small Fictions. The anthology, now in its sixth year, presents one hundred and twenty-­six pristinely crafted pieces from an array of authors. It features micro fiction, flash fiction, haibun stories, and prose poetry.

The Bath Flash Fiction Award writes “[T]he beauty of an anthology such as this, pulling together the best of the form, is that you will always encounter something new, something different, something that pushes the boundaries of flash further than before. If this anthology proves nothing else, it is that small fiction in all its forms continues to go from strength to strength, as does the series itself.”

Congrats to Mohammad! Read “To Be Led from Behind” here, or check out other pieces from our Issue 17 portfolio of Arabic stories from Syria,.

Browse more of The Common’s prize-winning pieces here

“To Be Led from Behind” Chosen for 2020 Best Small Fictions Award Anthology
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Literature and Creative Writing Resources for Your Remote-Learning Needs

During this difficult time, we want to take the opportunity to highlight a few educational resources we offer that are readily available for at-home learning. Even while stuck at home, you can use works from The Common to connect your students to new voices and perspectives from around the world, while also deepening their own sense of place. Several recently published web features will also offer students examples of how literature can help us to reflect upon the present moment.

Literature and Creative Writing Resources for Your Remote-Learning Needs
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