To be honest, I have never really thought about if my gender influences my writing. I have sometimes thought, in the past, about why all my main characters from my fiction are girls- and why I just never, ever think of a story that centers around a boy. I can think of male side characters aplenty, but no matter how in-depth they are, they are never the main characters.
But that is as far as I have ever gotten in pondering how my gender influences my writing.
After reading the texts and discussing them in class this week, I realized that much of my writing does fit into the stereotypical women’s writing; that is, I tend to focus on relationships and personal connection, and less on individuality and frustrated adventures (as is often seen in texts by men).
In the end, I don’t know if it really matters, if I don’t want it to. It is actually hard to think of more specific ways that my gender affects my writing- at least for right now. There are other things that influence my writing a lot more, or that I intend to influence my writing: for example, my relationship with Christ, both languages that I speak, where I grew up, and the family dynamics with which I grew up. All of these have influenced my writing a lot more (both intentionally and unintentionally) than my gender has. While I’m sure that my gender has influenced my writing more than I realize, I don’t think that it matters as much as the other things I do want to influence my writing.
