Legacy, the English Department’s literary magazine, is now taking submissions for its annual writing competition under the theme, “Identity.” Students will be able to submit pieces of poetry, creative nonfiction, short fiction and, for the first time this year, photography. Those who enter can be awarded first, second and third place cash prizes for each category.
Senior English major, Sierra Correia, is the editor for Legacy. This year, in an effort to resonate with her peers, the theme is “Identity.”
“Given our age, identity is something we grapple with,” she said. “This is what our college experience is about — discovering who we are outside of our families, outside of where we came from. I’m asking the question, ‘Who are you?’, out into the void and seeing what comes back.”
This year, the English Department got together with the School of Journalism and Communication (SJC) to add photography submissions. The SJC will supervise the photography portion of the competition, while the English Department will continue to oversee the creative writing aspect.
Associate professor in the SJC, Stephen Ruf, encourages students to look at their photos as a guide to help find a connection with the theme.
He said, “It’s not just maybe looking through your photo archive, but it might inspire a photographer to say, ‘Okay, that’s the theme. I got an idea,’ and to go out and actually shoot an original picture, one just for the contest.”
The requirements for photo submissions are that pictures must be in JPEG format, finalists should keep original files for verification and the maximum file size must be four megabytes.
“Our hope is that more students on campus will participate because this isn’t really just for English majors,” said Clarise Nixon, assistant professor in the English Department. “This is for anybody on campus who likes to write and who likes to take pictures.”
The 33 editions of Legacy can be found on the library’s website. According to former Legacy editor, Nicole Dominguez, “Editing other people’s work, especially creative works, is sensitive. You never know if something is a typo or a creative choice that changes the entire work.”
Senior mass communication major Joseph Hyde, said regarding the inclusion of photography this year, “I believe it is good for departments to connect because it allows students to branch out and possibly meet new people. When you are a certain major, you tend to only socialize with people of your same major. This will help people change that.”Students can submit their work to englegacy@southern.edu.
