Get Unruly is a Lagos-based cultural media & publishing platform documenting culture as it is lived, shaped, and remembered. We publish features, essays, cultural commentary, dialogues, and archival work rooted in African and diaspora creative life.
If you are thinking about pitching to us, this page will tell you what we are looking for, what we are not, and how to reach us. Read it carefully before you send anything.
Our editorial territory is African culture: the people making it, the traditions behind it, the conditions shaping it, and the ideas moving through it. That means we are interested in music, fashion, film, art, design, architecture, food, identity, creative practice, and the cultural histories that sit underneath all of those things.
A story belongs at Unruly when it is rooted in a specific person, place, tradition, or moment, and when it has something genuine to say about how culture is being made, experienced, or understood. The best pitches we receive are specific, culturally grounded, and built around an argument or a point of view rather than just a subject.
We document and archive. We do not advocate or campaign.
Not every content type is open to external contributors. This section explains what each format is, who it is open to, and what we need from you.
Features
A feature is a reported piece anchored in a subject, a person, or a cultural moment, built outward into a larger argument. Features run between 900 and 2,000 words.
Features are commissioned by the editorial team. We do not accept completed, unsolicited features. What we accept is a pitch: a clear description of the story, the argument you are making, who you plan to speak to, and why you are the right person to write it. If we like the pitch, we commission the piece and work with you from there.
Essays
An essay is an argument-led piece written from a clear point of view. It engages with a cultural question directly and arrives somewhere specific. Essays run between 1,000 and 3,000 words.
Essays are open to external contributors. Send us a brief describing what the essay is about, the central argument, any subjects or references it engages with, and why you are the right person to write it. If the brief is a strong fit, we will ask to read the full piece. We do not accept completed essays without a prior brief exchange.
Cultural Commentary
Cultural commentary is shorter, more immediate, and more opinionated. These pieces respond to something happening in the culture right now and live primarily on our Substack. They run between 500 and 1000 words.
Cultural commentary is open to contributors with an established point of view and relevant context. Pitch the angle and the argument, not just the subject.
Dispatch
Dispatch is a photography format. It is a curated set of images from a specific moment or event, published as a standalone visual with no accompanying written story. The images carry the documentation on their own.
Dispatch is open to photographers. We are looking for work shot from an observer perspective at moments with genuine cultural weight: craft-centered, creative-centered, African-centered. A photographer at an event shooting what they found interesting, not fulfilling a brief for the organizer.
We do not accept images shot on assignment for an event or brand, press or promotional images, or anything supplied by a PR team. The images must be your own original work, shot independently.
To submit dispatch work, share a link to a folder containing your images alongside the following for each image or set: where it was taken, when, what we are seeing, who is in the frame if known, the camera used, and your photographer credit with a link to your work. Submissions do not guarantee publication..
Unruly Magazine
Unruly Magazine is our print publication, released twice a year. Each volume is built around a central theme and anchored by a series of in-depth profiles, essays, and photography produced over a dedicated production period. The magazine is the most considered expression of what Unruly is documenting and why.
Magazine contributors are selected and commissioned directly by the editorial team. The magazine is not open to unsolicited pitches. If your work is a strong fit for a future volume, we will find you.
Dialogue
Dialogue is Unruly’s extended conversation format with practitioners in culture and creative life. Subjects are selected by our editorial team and are not open to external pitching. You cannot pitch yourself or someone else for a Dialogue.
We receive a significant number of pitches from people who want to be featured, or who want to nominate someone else for coverage. This section explains how we evaluate those.
When we consider a feature subject, we are looking for a combination of the following:
- Uniqueness of practice: They are doing something rare, specific, or not widely recognised as a serious discipline.
- Uniqueness of approach: Their method is distinctly their own, built from observation and iteration rather than received convention.
- Documented evidence of the work: There is a body of work we can go and read, watch, or engage with elsewhere. Not just claims about what they have done, but actual evidence of it: published work, built projects, recorded performances, verifiable output with a track record behind it.
- A story that deserves to be in the archive: The subject does not need to be the most famous or the most widely covered person in their field. They need a genuine, specific story that earns its place in a permanent record of this culture.
We are not looking for the most popular, the most followed, or the most connected. We are looking for work with a specific story that earns its place in our record of this culture.
If you are pitching a subject (yourself or someone else), send us: a description of who they are and what they do, links to evidence of their work, and a sentence on why you believe this story belongs in Unruly’s archive. We will take it from there.
We are not a promotional platform. We do not publish press releases, product launches, brand announcements, or any content whose primary purpose is to market a person, product, or company.
We do not accept completed, unsolicited written pieces for formats we commission. Send a pitch first.
We do not accept event coverage pitches. If you attended an event and want to write about what happened, that is not a format we publish. If you were at an event and photographed something worth documenting, that is a different conversation: see Dispatch above.
We are also not a political or policy publication. When our essays engage with systemic conditions, governance, or social structures, the argument is always rooted in how those conditions shape creative and cultural life, not in policy recommendation or political analysis.
We do not cover road infrastructure, public safety, urban planning, technology policy, education policy, or geopolitical analysis as primary subjects.
A decline from us is not a judgment on the quality of your work. It is a question of fit.
A good pitch tells us: what the story is, what the argument is, why it belongs at Unruly, and why you are the right person to make it.
For feature subject pitches: a description of the subject, links to their work, and a sentence on why they belong in our archive.
For dispatch submissions: a shared folder link with the images and the required metadata listed above.
Include any relevant clips or published work. If you are pitching a reported feature, tell us who you plan to speak to and what you already know about the subject.
We read every pitch. We try to respond to all, but prioritize the ones we want to develop further. If you do not hear from us within three weeks, the pitch is not the right fit for this cycle.
All pitches should be submitted via our contact form, selecting Story Pitch as the reason for contact.
Get Unruly has a specific editorial identity. Not every strong piece of writing belongs here, and a decline from us is not in any way a judgement on the quality of your work. It is a question of fit. We encourage you to read the publication before you pitch, because the best pitches come from people who understand what we are building and want to be part of it.
