Mission Statement

The New Polar Times is an independent research and arts publication with a focus on the history and cultural impact of the “Heroic Age” of polar exploration. Founded in 2024, the New Polar Times (“NPT”) hopes to provide a platform for students, artists, independent scholars, and others to showcase the work they have done in advancing polar humanities as an inter-discipline. We are a majority-LGBTQ+ organization with board members from a diverse array of backgrounds, and we are committed to amplifying marginalized voices within an academic environment which has historically suffered a dearth of diverse perspectives.

In light of the current political climate, it is important now more than ever to reaffirm the inclusion of these marginalized groups within academic spaces, to preserve the work that is being done to incorporate these perspectives into the broader cultural narrative surrounding the Heroic Age, and to ensure the continuing accessibility of historical information so that this work may continue. As such, there are several core values and tenets on which our mission is built:

1. We believe that there is much to be learned from studying the Heroic Age and its history that is relevant not only to current social and political discourses but also to our understanding of Western imperialism throughout history. We maintain that studying the Heroic Age as a microcosm of late- and post-Victorian imperialism can provide much insight into the motivating factors behind colonial expansion and allow us to better understand our own relationships with Western cultural imperialism in the present day. 

2. We oppose the gatekeeping of any and all historical sources, and we support free and open access to educational and academic resources. We believe that all sources should, where possible, be digitized and made freely available to the public regardless of academic affiliation.

3. We believe that history does not exist in a vacuum and that a myriad of academic and creative perspectives is required to understand the full context in which the Heroic Age is framed in the public consciousness. We do not believe that any one field or discipline - arts, humanities, STEM, social sciences, etc. - has a greater claim over the study of the polar regions than any other and that the key to solving the social, historical, and environmental challenges of the poles is in the synthesis of these approaches.

4. We believe that no one should be excluded from academia based on social, cultural, or economic factors. We strive to uplift those who struggle to access traditional academic resources and we are committed to allowing these so-called “outsiders” a seat at the table.

5. We believe the unauthorized, uncredited use of the work of others is inherently alienating as it divorces the work from its intended context and effectively silences its author. We are therefore categorically opposed to the use of generative AI, which we view as a form of plagiarism due to a fundamental lack of acknowledgement or compensation for the creators on whose works these models are trained.