femgenficathon

I decided to wait until April 9 to start FemGen VI. A great many ficathons are starting, finishing or posting right now, so I thought it best to delay a bit so that we wouldn't be lost in the shuffle. Also, this being a holiday weekend, I know that a number of people will be away with family and friends. So it seemed better, overall, to wait a week.

But we will definitely start next Friday.

And now, a poll:

[Poll #1546819]

Keep in mind that there are only 160 prompts (well, 161, but the odd one out is for me), so when they're gone, they're gone.

Also, every year we get a few people who want to sign up when the prompts are all taken. What would you think about letting these people pick one of the existing prompts?

In a few weeks--April 2, 2010, to be precise--it'll be time for Femgen yet again. (Femgenficathon VI. Six years. That's a long time on the Internet.)

A couple of things are changing this year.

1) I think that six months is just too long a deadline. People forget about what's due, forget that they signed up, lose inspiration and enthusiasm, etc. So I've cut the posting dates. The first date that you can post will be July 15; the last date will be July 31. That still gives people three months to write, and a month to two months if you have to worry about things like term papers and finals.

2) Second, I've thought a lot about this for a long time, and I've decided to alter one of the definitions in the ficathon. For the purposes of the ficathon, I've decided to define women as canonically female characters (cis or trans). (Bree from Transamerica, Wanda from Sandman, and so on.)

Disguises, canonical or otherwise, do not count. If the character is, for example, a cop or private detective dressing up as a woman as part of an undercover operation--no. If a boy who, in canon, has to dress up as a girl to attend a certain school because that's what his grandfather wanted--no.

Curses, spells, one-time bodyswap, alien intervention, etc., that involuntarily transform a male character IN CANON into a female form do not count for Femgen unless the character subsequently chooses to embrace this female identity for the duration of canon. If the character is still striving to break the curse and/or turn back into a male--like Ranma, for example--this character is ineligible for Femgen.

If the character alternates IN CANON between representing as a male and representing as a female, this character is not eligible.

Genderswapping male characters into female ones so that you can write about them in this ficathon is absolutely not allowed. Don't bother asking. The answer is NO.

If you have any questions about the character you're interested in that you don't don't feel were covered by the above, please e-mail me and we can talk about it.

Finally--and this is not a change, given that I've been posting quotations from women as prompts for the past five years--I'm hoping that some of you can suggest names of women of color whom I could quote. I'm particularly interested in finding quotable Hispanic or Latina women, quotable Native American women, quotable Asian and Pacific Islander women, and quotable Middle Eastern and African women. I'm looking for people from all times and all areas of the world. I tried to do this last year, but this year, if possible, I'd like to have a richer variety. So I'm asking for suggestions, because it's quite likely that some of you know names that I don't.

***

Crossposted to gehayi

So here's the sign-up post for the femgenficathon.

The ficathon is multifandom. It is also an open ficathon. You can write in any fandom you like, about any canonical woman you like. I hope this will make it easy on the participants.

(Also, I have a feeling that a lot of stories never get written because no one ever asks for them in fic exchanges. This is your chance to to write the story you've thought of writing--maybe DREAMED of writing--but that no one ever requests.)

There will be prompts. More about that after the rules.

What's acceptable and what's not are both spelled out in the rules.

The due dates--first and last--are both mentioned in the rules.

Here are the rules. Read them carefully before you sign up.

( RULES )

***

Now. Prompts.

This year I did something a little different. I realized this year that I didn't really know who a lot of the women being quoted were. So I started doing some research in order to include some information about them with the quotations. I checked websites belonging to some of them, fansites about them and their work, sites on particular subjects (like early aviators, Nobel Prize winners, women scientists, ancient history and medieval history), art museums, online copies of medieval books, letters and operas, a plethora of quotation sites, Uppity Women of Medieval Times, Uppity Women of the Renaissance...and yes, Wikipedia and Wikiquotes.

To get these hundred and fifty-one quotations, I researched five hundred names, if not more. I learned a lot. I found women of every time, place, nationality and race, ranging from women of the twentieth and twenty-first century to Chinese artists and Sumerian priestesses. I found women I'd never heard of before, and I quoted them. I found many, many women who had done a great deal in life, but who--regrettably--had left no words behind, let alone translated or quotable ones.

And in almost every case--whatever the location, whatever the era--I found women who accomplished not only one thing, but many things.

So here is the list of numbers. Pick a number and get a quotation. I won't be closing the list until all the quotations have been chosen.

But bear in mind--these are the only quotations. Once these are gone, they're gone. I don't have any backups.

***

( List of Prompts )

If you have any questions, ask them in the comments, and I will do my best to answer them.

Good luck to all of you! I hope that some excellent stories come from this!

Updated September 23, 2009 1:27 PM EDT--adding links to the prompts with completed stories.

Here it is--the Master List!

Yes, I'll be adding stories to this; I know that some people will be submitting late. But these are the stories that are in so far, and they're superb, every one of them. And what a lot of new and rare fandoms there were to read this time!

Wonderful, magnificent job, all of you. Thank you for making this ficathon such a success. I feel both honored and flattered.

***

( Master List for Femgenficathon 2008 )

This took ages, but it is finally DONE.

My congratulations and thanks to all those who participated. I'm still doing catch-up on the comments. I've read and re-read all of these stories several times already. You did brilliant jobs, all of you. You can be very proud.

( Master List for Femgenficathon 2007 )

So here's the sign-up post for the femgenficathon.

This year, like last year, the ficathon is multifandom. It is also an open ficathon. You can write in any fandom you like, about any canonical woman you like. I hope this will make it easy on the participants.

(Also, I have a feeling that a lot of stories never get written because no one ever asks for them in fic exchanges. This is your chance to to write the story you've thought of writing--maybe DREAMED of writing--but that no one ever requests.)

There will be prompts. More about that after the rules.

What's acceptable and what's not are both spelled out in the rules.

The due dates--first and last--are both mentioned in the rules.

Here are the rules. Read them carefully before you sign up.

( RULES )

***

( About the prompts )

( List of Prompts )



***

If you have any questions, ask them in the comments, and I will do my best to answer them.

Good luck to all of you! I hope that some excellent stories come from this!

Here is the Master List.

There are a number of stories that are going to be posted after today. I'll add them to this list as they're posted. I'm also going to draw up a Master List for last year's stories, because that's only fair.

I'd like to thank all of you for participating. While I don't know many of these fandoms, I'm awestruck by how much love and effort you poured into the stories. Thank you a thousand times.

( Master List for Femgenficathon 2006 )

Hi. This is your friendly mod speaking.

I'd like to ask you all to do something when you post your stories. I know I didn't specify this before--the truth is, I didn't realize how much of a problem it was going to be.

Could you please have the header look like this?

Title:
Author: [your LJ name, and your pen name if the two are different]
Rating: [currently we still use MPAA ratings - G, PG, PG13, R]
Fandom: [insert name of fandom here]
Warnings: [if applicable. warn for violence, swearing, etc. You shouldn't have to warn about kinks or squicks because this is genfic.]
Prompt: The number of the prompt, the prompt itself, and the author's name. Please do this even if you end up not using the prompt to create the story.
Summary: [including author's notes and credit, a short description of the fic]

I'd like to archive all the stories from a single fandom together. Likewise, I'd like to tag all the stories from the same fandom (or multiverse) so that they can be found together. And right now...well, I'm having a hard time figuring out what character belongs to which fandom.

(This has nothing to do with anyone's writing ability. It has to do with the fact that there are more fandoms I'm unfamiliar with than fandoms I'm familiar with. I didn't anticipate this.)

So--for the sake of the community memories and the tagging--could you please add that line to your story headers?

Thank you very much.

So here's the sign-up post for the femgenficathon.

I asked people in my own LJ what they wanted in this. Things were divided fairly evenly between folks wanting characters assigned to them and folks wanting freedom to choose characters. I thought about it, and remembered times when I had signed up for a particular ficathon...and then the idea didn't pan out and I was profoundly stuck. So, in view of that, I'm opting for, "You can write about any character you like." That will make it easier for participants, I hope.

There will be prompts. More about that after the rules.

What's acceptable and what's not are both spelled out in the rules.

The due dates--first and last--are both mentioned in the rules.

Here are the rules. Read them carefully before you sign up.

( RULES )

***

( About the prompts )

NUMBERS ALREADY TAKEN

1 -- xellas
2 -- kylegirl
3 -- furiosity
4 -- minerva_fan
5 -- jadis31
6 -- swatkat24
7 -- a_t_rain
8 -- readerravenclaw
9 -- lareinenoire
10 -- rosefyre
11 -- scela_letifer
12 -- parallactic
13 -- rubytuesday1313
14 -- dora_the_nymph
15 -- memlu
16 -- ranchangrnl
17 -- pen_and_umbra
18 -- ciela_night
19 -- laurus_nobilis
20 -- amberthefool
21 -- rawles
22 -- silent_fey
23 -- sasha_davidovna
24 -- jezzabe
25 -- dearladydisdain
26 -- fluffyllama
27 -- anaid_rabbit
28 -- livii
29 -- thistlerose
30 -- cygna_hime
31 -- refche
32 -- bluekarma42
33 -- xjestx
34 -- texasmagic
35 -- archie_costello
36 -- limyaael
37 -- tinkerpixy
38 -- parcae
39 -- nextian
40 -- cutekeeper
41 -- emeraldserpent
42 -- persephone_kore
43 -- rosewilliams
44 -- netbyrd
45 -- snegurochka_lee
46 -- b2wm
47 -- perseph
48 -- nellie_darlin
49 -- tangleofthorns
50 -- sophia_helix
51 -- adelynne
52 -- bantha_fodder
53 -- lazy_neutrino
54 -- eyesofachild
55 -- nokomis305
56 -- alliterator
57 -- valorgrl
58 -- apostrophet
59 -- gehayi
60 -- dmcourt
61 -- snorkackcatcher
62 -- the_portkey
63 -- elucreh
64 -- erised1810
65 --
66 -- _sachi
67 -- akahannah
68 --
69 -- imadra_blue
70 -- addicted2ewan
71 -- lucie_p
72 -- magnolia_mama
73 -- katmaxwell
74 -- thelastgoodname
75 -- churri_arashi
76 -- chthonya
77 -- dawnzabini
78 -- _luned
79 -- wildestranger
80 -- ignipes
81 -- corvidae9
82 -- rynne
83 -- aphoenix2007
84 -- marprelate
85 -- unrequitedangst
86 -- bohemianrose
87 -- slinkiestumble
88 -- bloodrebel333
89 -- newredshoes
90 -- aramley
91 -- cloudofcalm
92 -- eudaimon
93 -- dragonclaws
94 -- knitmeapony
95 -- lupinslittlesis
96 -- rosie_red73
97 -- mazily
98 -- rosedemon
99 -- snowballjane
100 -- petulantgod

***

Good luck to all of you! I hope that some excellent stories come from this!