diff --git a/doc/changes/0.23.inc b/doc/changes/0.23.inc
index 2f4cfa910bc..349f1f65f67 100644
--- a/doc/changes/0.23.inc
+++ b/doc/changes/0.23.inc
@@ -12,6 +12,13 @@
    like this (where xxxx is the pull request number):
    - description of enhancement/bugfix/API change (:gh:`xxxx` **by new contributor** |Firstname Lastname|_)
 
+.. _changes_0_23_2:
+
+Version 0.23.2
+--------------
+
+- Fix bug in shim for ``contextlib.nullcontext`` for Python 3.6 (by `Eric Larson`_)
+
 .. _changes_0_23_1:
 
 Version 0.23.1
diff --git a/mne/_version.py b/mne/_version.py
index 162f52d90c0..baffb73fad0 100644
--- a/mne/_version.py
+++ b/mne/_version.py
@@ -3,4 +3,4 @@
 #
 # License: BSD (3-clause)
 
-__version__ = '0.23.1'
+__version__ = '0.23.2'
diff --git a/mne/fixes.py b/mne/fixes.py
index 3caed995e1f..20c5d1a6c38 100644
--- a/mne/fixes.py
+++ b/mne/fixes.py
@@ -1080,6 +1080,11 @@ def mean(array, axis):
 except ImportError:
     from contextlib import contextmanager
 
+    @contextmanager
+    def nullcontext():
+        yield
+
+
 def _is_last_row(ax):
     try:
         return ax.get_subplotspec().is_last_row()  # 3.4+
diff --git a/mne/tests/test_import_nesting.py b/mne/tests/test_import_nesting.py
index 18cce60ef81..a1db6bd00b8 100644
--- a/mne/tests/test_import_nesting.py
+++ b/mne/tests/test_import_nesting.py
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@
 
 # check scipy (Numba imports it to check the version)
 ok_scipy_submodules = set(['scipy', 'numpy',  # these appear in old scipy
-                           'version'])
+                           'version', 'sparse', 'misc'])
 scipy_submodules = set(x.split('.')[1] for x in sys.modules.keys()
                        if x.startswith('scipy.') and '__' not in x and
                        not x.split('.')[1].startswith('_')