One of my facebook friends mentioned a website that analyzes word choice to predict if a text sample was written by a man or a woman. Since my WIP has a male protagonist, I was eager to try. I pasted the first 300 words into the box and got weak female. Okay, that was disappointing, but the project still needs work, so I checked the first 300 words of TAoCBS (male protagonist) and got weak male. Better. Third time’s the charm. I pasted in 300 words of CBL (female protagonist) and again got weak female. Phooey.
As a former scientist I felt compelled to test the system. I tried a couple posts from this blog and got male. Uh oh. Then I pasted in several posts from other people’s blogs, and they all came out male – no matter who wrote them.
Fiction is different than blogging, so I have a favor to ask. Will you test 300 or so words of your fiction here and post the results in comments? Just say whether your protagonist is male or female and if the gender guesser agreed. Thanks.
(I’m secretly hoping the results will be meaningless.)
First Pages
15 hours ago
6 comments:
Hi Ann,
I assume you were looking at the Formal box only.
For Troll Hunting, the very first page, 315 words:
Genre: Formal
Female = 243
Male = 526
Difference = 283; 68.4%
Verdict: MALE
I added more words to this same sample, for 542 words, and got:
Genre: Formal
Female = 458
Male = 810
Difference = 352; 63.88%
Verdict: MALE
Then I tried 557 words from the beginning of Once a Giant
Genre: Formal
Female = 229
Male = 503
Difference = 274; 68.71%
Verdict: MALE
I reckon I am a manly writer!
-- Tim
My blog writing: Weak female.
Longer sample of blog text: Male.
Fiction: Weak Male -- could indicate European.
Ha!
Protag is female.
I'm female.
I admit I was a bit confused because there were two different boxes. In the Informal one I got Weak Male. In the formal one I got Male.
Here's the difficulty, the section I cut and pasted in (about 400 words) included dialog between both a girl and a boy. The narrator was a girl.
European????
TimInMich: We knew you were a manly writer before you tried the gender guesser.
Ruth and Amy: Shall we decide the analysis is flawed?
1600 words of my YA showed up as a "weak male" in the "informal" analysis, and "weak female" in the formal one.
I'd agree it's flawed. My protag is female.
This was fun, Ann. Thanks!
-April
I used 1300 words from my male protag novel manuscript and got:
Genre: Formal
Female = 2271
Male = 1640
Difference = -631; 41.93%
Verdict: Weak FEMALE
Then I took a sample from later in and got:
Genre: Formal
Female = 460
Male = 1156
Difference = 696; 71.53%
Verdict: MALE
This does not bode well for consistency of voice in my novel!
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