yuletide | Sep. 16th, 2017

Hi fellow Yuletiders! Noms close in less than 24 hours (or maybe they've already closed by the time this is approved?) and as we move into signups and writing and reading, freneticfloetry and I wanted to give a small reminder/invitation (ok honestly, it's a copy/paste job with minor edits... #efficiency) to participate in the Misses Clause Challenge*.

Now in its seventh year, the Misses Clause Challenge was created to promote the inclusion, expansion, and celebration of women in fanfiction. We'd like to challenge you all to think about the ways women are represented in fanworks, and write fic either centered on female characters or fic within a fandom with a rich and diverse cast of characters that includes valuable and important female voices.

Participation is easy! Initially, the challenge set out to include more female characters in fic using the Bechdel Test as a barometer. But honestly, plenty of sources can (and do) successfully pass without putting female characters anywhere near the forefront. So the general rule for participating in the Misses Clause Challenge is simple:

Write women.

That's it! Write women who are celebrated, who are unsung, who are the heroes of their own stories or the unfortunate victims of circumstance. Write women talking, fighting, saving the day, or just going about their business. Write women of all ages, shapes, sizes, races, creeds, sexual orientations, mental and physical abilities, or moral fiber. Write women, full stop.

Easy enough, right? So if you’re willing, and we hope you are…

· Write a Yuletide assignment or treat with one or more women as the focus. Femslash, female POV, ensemble fic, whatever works for you — as long as there's a female character front and center, your fic fulfills the challenge.
· Tag your finished fic with "Misses Clause Challenge".

There is still maybe time to nominate women, if you're so inclined. And there is definitely time to think about requesting prompts that feature female characters so that the letters post is full of options.

From there, search out those that request women, maybe bookmark one for later, or even start a treat. There's a lot of female characters nominated annually and a number of requests will coincide with that. Maybe one of the letters might start or keep the creative juices flowing.

And to all of those who have taken up the challenge, or who are considering doing so this year, I just want to say, on behalf of both myself and freneticfloetry, Thank You. We try to keep this very low key with absolutely no pressure to participate, and yet we're continually blown away by the support and the number of folks who take on the challenge as well as the types of awesome fic that you guys create year after year. So, thank you, again, for your participation, your openness to the challenge, your totally legitimate concerns and critiques. Here’s to Yuletide 2017, and another great wave of new Misses Clause stories.

Sincerely,

G (hauntedd) & Court (freneticfloetry)

*The challenge name was meant to be a punny play on the fic season and a bad movie, and was not meant to be exclusionary in any way. (And yes, the "e" was intentional.)

ps. If you're looking for femslash, also consider Femslash Festivus.