Call for Submissions: Spoken Word

On November 9, 2026, the Quebec Writers’ Federation (QWF) will award one to three prizes totalling $3,000 to honour excellence in spoken word. All finalists will also be invited to perform at a Words and Music Show in the fall.

To submit an eligible piece, an artist must submit the following by July 8, 2026: 

• A completed submission form
• A video recording of the performance of the piece
• A written copy of the piece

Eligibility Criteria

1. The prize is open to Quebec-based spoken word artists, storytelling artists, and literary performance artists working in English in any form of oral performance art.
   1. Oral performance art includes poetry, story, monologue, hip hop, dub, sound poetry, and experimental and interdisciplinary work.
2. The submitted piece must include a video recording of the artist’s performance of text that the artist originally wrote.
3. The video must be recorded between January 1, 2025, and July 8, 2026 (“the eligibility period”).
4. The submitted piece must be primarily in English.
5. The submitted piece must be no longer than ten minutes.
6. The submitted piece may be an excerpt from a longer work.
7. The submitted piece must not have been previously submitted to the QWF Awards.
   1. A previously submitted piece that has since been rewritten, expanded, or otherwise altered may be eligible only if QWF deems it a new piece. 
8. The submitted piece will have only its text and performance evaluated.
   1. The jury will be instructed to disregard sound quality, lighting, and other visual features.
   2. The jury will also be instructed to disregard the work of artists from other disciplines, including musicians and dancers, if the entry features collaborators.
9. The submitted piece must be written by one artist.
10. The artist must have a history of public presentation that includes at least three performances of different texts in front of a live audience, in person or online.
    1. The submitted piece does not have to be one of these previously performed texts.
11. At the time of submission, the artist must be alive, must have a residence in Quebec, and must not have lived exclusively outside Quebec for the past five years. 
12. The prize will be awarded to the artist.
    1. If a winning artist is deceased, the artist’s estate will receive the prize the artist would have received if the artist were alive.
13. An artist may submit only one entry per year.
14. The QWF Awards were created to recognize the merit, voice, and originality of work by living authors. As such, pieces written by generative AI are not eligible.
15. Artists who are unsure about the eligibility of their pieces must contact QWF by June 15, 2026.
16. QWF reserves the right to determine the eligibility of any submission at any stage of the competition and to disqualify any entry found to be ineligible. 

Submission Requirements and Deadline

A piece may be submitted by its creator. The submitter is responsible for ensuring that QWF has received all required materials by 5:00 p.m. on July 8, 2026:

1. A completed submission form via Submittable. 
2. A video recording of the artist performing a piece the artist wrote.
   1. The video must be no longer than ten minutes.
   2. Types of eligible videos include the following:
      1. A recording of a live performance before an audience
      2. A recording of an online performance
      3. A self-made recording made in any location, with or without an audience
   3. The video must be in one of the following formats:
      1. .MP4 (MPEG-4 Video File)
      2. .AVI (Audio Video Interleave File)
      3. .3GP (3GPP Multimedia File)
      4. .WEBM (WebM Video File)
      5. .WMV (Windows Media File)
      6. .MKV (Matroska Video File)
      7. .MOV (Apple QuickTime Movie)
      8. .MPG (MPEG Video File)
      9. .FLV (Animate Video File)
      10. .M4V (iTunes Video File)
3. A PDF of the written version of the submitted piece.
   1. If a submitted piece is an excerpt from a longer work, the PDF must include only the written version of the excerpt. 

After Submission

1. If fewer than six entries are submitted in a given prize category, that prize will not be awarded this year. The submissions will be automatically entered into the next competition in 2027.
2. QWF will process the entry and review its eligibility only after receipt of all required materials by the appropriate deadline.
3. QWF will notify the submitter once all required materials have been received.
4. QWF will notify the submitter of an ineligible entry on the action QWF will take.
5. QWF will appoint an independent, three-member jury to evaluate all eligible submissions.
6. QWF will announce a shortlist of up to eight finalists in mid-October.
7. QWF will feature all shortlisted artists in QWF Awards Gala materials and publicity. Shortlisted artists are encouraged to support these publicity efforts.
8. QWF will organize a Words and Music Show featuring the shortlisted artists.
9. QWF will provide each shortlisted artist with two complimentary VIP tickets to the QWF Awards Gala, where the winners will be announced.
10. QWF will offer each shortlisted artist a complimentary one-year QWF membership.

For inquiries, please send an email to info@qwf.org or call (514) 244-9088.