Writing for Public-Facing Digital History Publications: Some Tips & Tricks

8 July 2024

As discussed by contributors to our “Blogging the Past” Roundtable, producing content for digital publications with a public reach requires a slightly different approach than the traditional academic style many historians learn in graduate school. It requires balancing the kind of analytic rigor that is a mainstay of the profession with an approachability in content and style that builds bridges between the scholarly and the popular.

Drawing upon the considerable expertise of editors from History@Work, Insurrect! Radical Thinking in Early American Studies, Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective, The Panorama: Extensive Views from The Journal of the Early Republic, Picturing Black History, and Pieces of History: A Blog of the National Archives, we have put together a guide to help you think about framing, tone, and content as you develop scholarship for public-facing venues.

The Idea. Those with graduate training in history have the tendency to think in deeply complex ways. Communicating with a broader public requires nuance, to be sure, but also calls upon the author to approach a topic in a more straightforward manner. Consider the following:

- Who is your audience, is your idea interesting enough to appeal to those outside the confines of your narrow subfield, and what are the stakes of your topic? The most broadly engaging pieces are frequently timely, topical, or rooted in a kind of personal reflection that professional historians are usually trained to avoid.
- Can your topic be addressed adequately, with appropriate context for a general reader, in the condensed word count typically required by digital publications? You’ll need to distill complicated ideas into digestible chunks that a casual reader can easily consume.
- Does your subject require wading knee-deep into historiographical debates? These are rarely compelling to those working outside a particular historical subfield, so set those aside.

The Writing. Public work needs to be clear, well-organized, and free of jargon that would deter non-specialists. Keeping in mind your audience, try to:

- Write from scratch. Don’t take a piece from a dissertation or longer article, make some minor tweaks, and send it off. Take the idea from that larger body of writing and use it as the jumping off point for a brand-new piece.
- State your main point up front and stick to your topic. Lead with your hook, followed by what op-ed writers frequently call a “nut graph”—the paragraph presenting your argument.
- Keep paragraphs brief, making sure they express a single idea.
- Use short and simple sentences. Omit unnecessary words.
- Avoid jargon and technical terms (or be sure to clearly explain them if necessary).
- Tone and conventions can be very different from typical academic writing. First-person language is often ok, as are contractions.
- Write in a lively, expressive way. Show, don’t tell. Use active voice as much as possible. Take the advice of long-time Pano editor Will Mackintosh: think about how you would explain your work to friends or family members by “unlearning academic-speak and accessing your inner conversationalist.”

The Publication. Before you ever put pen to paper, it can be helpful to know the parameters of your target publication. Think about:

- Who is the primary audience of the publication and does your proposed topic speak to that body of readers in a meaningful way? Spend some time reading a variety of pieces on the site to see if your work might be a good fit.
- What are the goals, values, and objectives of your target publication? Read their mission statement or “about us” page. In combination with perusing a variety of articles on the site, it can offer significant insight into the topics (and approaches) they typically publish.
- Do they require a “pitch,” or can you submit a full, unsolicited piece? Most digital publications have author guidelines that can clue you into their editorial process, including not just how to submit, but what you can expect in terms of editorial review and revisions.
- What are their word count limits? If there is one guideline to be aware of, it’s the word count. Figure it out and stick to it!
- What style-guide does the publication adhere to? It is easier to know this up front and write to the style-guide than it is to go in after the fact and try to clean things up.
- When in doubt, send an email to the editorial team. Good editors are invested in publishing exciting, new material and are happy to answer your questions!

This last bit of advice certainly holds true for the editorial team here at The Panorama. Visit our “Write for Us” page for more specifics about our guidelines and for the editor’s contact information.

Additional Resources

Taking inspiration from op-ed pieces can yield great results.
- Shira Lurie’s “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Writing for the Public” presents a short primer on how historians can write opinion pieces for news outlets.
- The Op-Ed Project offers workshops for writers who are new to writing for a public audience and has a variety of other resources as well.
Insurrect! Radical Thinking in Early American Studies hosted a panel on “Writing History for the Public” with good advice about how to write history for the public.
For those evaluated professionally on the basis of scholarship, it’s worth considering how these kinds of publications do or don’t fit within that evaluation framework. The American Historical Association has developed Guidelines for Broadening the Definition of Scholarship that can be useful for jumpstarting conversations about this topic.
The Visionary Futures Collective offers a range of resources for humanities graduate students who are writing and organizing within and beyond academia; one resource in particular is Hannah Alpert Abrams’ “Finding Your Purpose,” which is helpful in terms of identifying who you want to write for and why.