Whoa, who left this blog here? *waves away cobwebs*

No one really cares why I haven’t been blogging (it’s because life), so let’s just skip straight to the reason for this resurrection: I’d like your help.

Rhiannon Root and I will be giving a presentation at this year’s ACES conference in Las Vegas about how to spot and fix sexist language when it’s a little more subtle than, say, Bill “There must be some downside to having a woman president” O’Reilly. What I’d like from you, my beloved, neglected readers, is real-life examples of sexist language. This can be something you encountered at work, if you’re an editor, or something you read, or a trend you’ve noticed that you think is troublesome. I’d like to limit this to examples from edited writing, or at least from professional writers, so something from a blog post at the Atlantic is great, but something your insensitive cousin said on Facebook is less helpful. If you did fix the problematic language, or if you have an idea for how to fix it, I’d love to hear that too! But don’t hesitate to submit even if you have no idea how to de-jerk-ify the writing—Rhiannon and I will puzzle it out.

Any length of submission is great. It can be a word, a sentence, a paragraph, a passage, a whole article, although maybe not an entire novel. It can be something that’s easy to pinpoint, like using “female” as a noun, or it can be something a little harder to explain, like the way an article is framed.

To submit, leave a comment (first-time commenters go to moderation, but I will release you!), email me at copycurmudgeon [at] gmail [dot] com, or leave your entry in the contact box below. In exchange for your submission, you’ll receive my undying gratitude and high five if we ever meet in person.