Rules for Submitting Work

English translation

AI-assisted English translation. The Japanese original remains authoritative.

Originally published: 11 January 2020.

These are the historical submission rules published in 2020. The formats, length limits, screening fees, eligibility conditions, and guidance and referral services reflect that publication. They have not been confirmed as current submission requirements or currently available services.

Rules for Submitting Work

All work is reviewed only after the membership procedure has been completed. Submitted work will not be returned. Submissions must be in digital form. Always make a backup before submitting. In the event of an accident, we will endeavour to restore the material, but cannot accept liability for compensation. Costs for the publication period will be calculated in advance. Where membership fees cannot cover them, we may have to collect additional charges on the principle that users bear the costs.

Basic Conditions

• All work must be written horizontally and must be your own completed, original work.
• It must not expose private matters, constitute plagiarism or partial plagiarism, or offend public order or morality.
• Please submit by email attachment to [email protected].
• Always make a backup before sending.
• Submissions are subject to review in subsequent years as well as in the first year.
• Accepted work is published online. Revisions to parts of a work may be requested.
• For tanka, haiku, and other short poems, the annual screening fee covers up to ten works. Additional short-form poems cost ¥1,000 each. Initial submissions are outside this provision.
• Publication of longer works, including essays, fiction, criticism of civilisation, and research papers, follows the internal rules.
• Below your name, always give your membership number, city, prefecture, town, and contact details. Contact details will not be published online.

Reviewers are artists with published work, knowledgeable specialists, and qualified people with experience as professors in university doctoral programmes.

Accepted works are published online.

A contribution towards costs may be required for their later inclusion in the time capsule; such inclusion is not guaranteed.

1. Research Papers

Submissions are accepted only from members. Join before submitting. Except for short poetic forms, long works are first selected on the basis of an abstract, which should therefore be attached. Always make a backup before submitting. Submission is on the understanding that the Academia cannot accept responsibility for damage or loss caused by negligence or an electronic accident. English-language papers are also accepted. Use MLA style, including references and notes.

1. Only your own original manuscripts are eligible. Do not submit work whose content resembles or follows a conventional pattern taken from other work, has unidentified sources or errors, or copies another person's work: such material is ineligible.
2. Acceptance or rejection is decided through peer review. Papers whose themes are unsuitable for the Academia are declined regardless of their quality. The stated length is at least twenty sheets when converted to four-hundred-character manuscript pages, and no more than eight thousand characters. Reviewing work such as undergraduate or master's dissertations with corrections takes considerable time, so an instruction fee applies.
3. Research papers are often unsuitable for inclusion in the Online Manyo-shu and will be published separately. If inclusion in the poetry collection is strongly desired, only an abstract may be included there, with the paper published in a separate volume.
4. Master's dissertations, doctoral dissertations, and English-language papers may be published online at the author's request, but only after permission has been obtained from the principal examiner. Long works incur higher publication costs, to be borne by the user.
5. For online publication, handling charges and costs for the publication period are calculated in advance. Costs that membership fees cannot cover will be collected from users.
6. Consult us separately about searching for outstanding papers.
7. You may follow the format required by your university, including its conventions for notes and references. English-language papers should follow the MLA style sheet and use horizontal writing. Very long Japanese-language papers may be published online if this is physically and financially possible. The standard length is around twelve thousand characters. Handwritten papers are not accepted: submit digital data, together with an A4 printout for review. The same applies to English-language papers.
8. If a fatal flaw is discovered after publication, the paper will immediately be withdrawn. Examples include plagiarism, inadequate identification of sources, and excessive reliance on secondary or tertiary sources.

Email attachments to [email protected]. For enquiries, telephone the Academia secretariat on 090-2735-7495.

2. Creative Work: Poetry

1. We look for work with a philosophy of its own and an understanding of the Romantic spirit. Ideas from postmodernism may also be included.
2. The work must be the member's own original creation. Send it to the secretariat as an email attachment. To avoid submissions becoming mixed up, always place your membership number, home prefecture or region, and mobile telephone number below your name. The mobile number will not be published online.
2. You may submit work for the Online Manyo-shu at the same time as applying for membership, but must attach a curriculum vitae and a list of achievements, to help prevent plagiarism and malicious submissions. Review begins after payment of the membership fee, screening fee, and other charges has been confirmed.
3. Poetry: haiku and tanka are brief but densely concentrated. Original work with concentrated content or a rich sense of humanity is preferable. Romantic passion is an important element.
4. All publication takes place online, but excessively immature work will not be published merely because it has been submitted. Please ask if you would like some correction or guidance.
5. We will announce which submissions are to be included in the Online Manyo-shu. Even work not initially selected may be included later if it has depth. Work found to be formulaic will be disqualified.
6. In composing poems, literary Japanese is preferred. Observe the fundamentals of tanka composition. This does not apply rigidly to work of outstanding content even when its grammar departs from convention.
7. The Academia values an elevated style in literary Japanese. Comic kyoka and senryu are treated as those forms, rather than as tanka. Work that departs markedly from the Romantic mode or merely reproduces an existing pattern is unacceptable. Allusive adaptation of an earlier poem, or honkadori, is also unacceptable when it is too similar to the earlier work. Please do not resubmit previously published work.

3. Fiction, etc.

1. Short fiction must likewise be original. It is judged on prose, theme, plot, and structure. The length should be no more than about twenty four-hundred-character manuscript pages. Longer work follows a separate-volume arrangement, with only an abstract included. Handwritten manuscripts and copies of work already published in magazines are not accepted.
2. Submissions of lyrics, television drama, short plays, farces, and similar work are also accepted. Collaborative work must be identified as such. Previously published work is, in principle, ineligible.
3. The Academia welcomes enterprising people who wish to submit work to DAM or JOYSOUND. We can introduce trustworthy production companies; please consult us on 090-2735-7495 before submitting.
4. Even a single line using the same expression as another work may lead to a complaint after online publication and cause serious difficulties for other members. Do not do this. The Online Manyo-shu takes an extremely strict position on this point. Never submit work whose originality is already in doubt.
5. Reviewers may comment on acceptance or rejection, but a work may be declined because it is ordinary as a whole even when no particular fault can be identified. If you are disappointed, please regain your spirits and devote yourself to creating another work.
6. For essays, we welcome a Romantic spirit rather than simply an appreciation of everyday life. Please refrain from submitting an account that merely describes your experiences and impressions, since this will not be enough to engage readers.

4. English-Language Work: Papers and Poetry

1. The work must be your own original creation.
2. It must have undergone thorough checking by a native speaker until you believe it to be complete and faultless.
3. Its overall conception must be appropriate to Romantic literature.
4. It must follow MLA style, with the works cited and notes also following the latest MLA conventions.

5. General Remarks

There are many so-called famous people among writers, playwrights, screenwriters, and scholars. In my experience, however, the more famous or highly placed a person is, the more often their submitted work is unreliable. There have even been cases in which, after publication, most of a work proved to follow the very paradigm of another person's paper. Such cases are far too numerous, and I do not want to accept this kind of fakery in selecting material for the Online Manyo-shu. Whether the author is famous or unknown, and whether or not they possess authority, I want to scrutinise every work and insist that unacceptable work is unacceptable. The same applies to work by people who are still developing their skills. Please continue to make every effort and send us good work.