the whole pie approach

Sometimes people ask, or wonder without asking, why we publish only women at Switchback. I have about half a dozen different standard answers for this, but two of the most common are:

1. Our definition of "women" is really broad, so we're working to open up that definition, rather than shut down the types of work we're interested in.

2. Since we know the women-to-men ratio is not 50:50, by publishing only women, we're doing our part to increase the number of women poets published overall, across presses. Adding more deliciousness to the whole pie.

If you'd like to see a picture of this pie, then of course VIDA: Women in Literary Arts, an organization I'm a small part of, too -- send me your women's literary events for the calendar! -- is the place to go. VIDA's just released its latest count, of the Best American anthologies. See below how imbalanced Best American Essays has been over the years, and check out the rest of the results here, as well as an accompanying conversation between Amy King, Erin Belieu, Danielle Pafunda, Cheryl Strayed, and Adrienne Su here.