This is interesting...

[Evelyn Lee Barney]

Well HMPH!

What does this say about how we are taught to write, and by whom?  About who decides what style is "best?"  Or, what does it say about the test?  I admit to being a bit of a hoyden, but I am decidedly female.  I took this test three times.  The first piece I plugged in was an essay on the uses of sound and silence in the classic Frtiz Lang film, "M" -- my score was overwhelmingly male.  Next, I tried part of an article I'm working on about the use of electronic portfolios for professional writers.  Again, overwhelmingly MALE!  Last, I found the piece I thought was perhaps the most "feminine" of anything I've done in the past few months, based on the subject matter, a defence of melodrama as an art form (a la Douglas Sirk).  Well, that one did come out female, by a mere 120 points.  The point spread on the other two was over 400 points.  Just as an FYI - each sample I used was between 550 - 620 words.  

Now I'm curious - have any of you played with this?  What were your results?

Ev

 
>
>> To see what kind of communication style (at least the
>> written part) you have, go here
>> http://bookblog.net/gender/genie.php and test out the Gender
>> Genie
>>
>> "Inspired by an article and a test in The New York Times
>> Magazine, the Gender Genie uses a simplified version of an
>> algorithm developed by Moshe Koppel, Bar-Ilan University in
>> Israel, and Shlomo Argamon, Illinois Institute of
>> Technology,