sex-positive professional language services

Because sex geeking doesn’t pay all the bills, I make a chunk of my living as a freelance language professional. It occurred to me recently that if I made it easier for pervs and queers to find out about my services, I might get more language work of the type that really turns my crank! Read on if you want details about what I do.

I hold a BA in translation and have nearly 20 years’ experience as a professional writer, editor and French-to-English translator working in a wide range of fields. I launched a full-time freelance career in 2005 after working as an in-house translator and editor for six years with Cirque du Soleil. I excel in producing crisp, clear written materials in a style and tone appropriate to my clients’ message and target audience.

When it comes to language work, I’m a jack-of-all-trades. As an editor, I can provide substantive, structural, stylistic and copy editing, as well as research, fact-checking and proofreading. As a French-to-English translator, I’m very familiar with topic-specific jargon used by LGBT community organizations and in areas such as feminist studies, queer theory and sexuality studies, among others. As a writer, I have experience in marketing, communications, journalism, essays and feature writing, scholarly writing, short fiction and more. (Take a look at my writing portfolio!)

I know how tender it can be to show your personal creations to an editor. Rest assured I edit with the utmost respect for your creative work. I ask lots of questions to make sure I understand your intentions and I make suggestions only with kindness.

You can reach me anytime at veryqueer3 at yahoo dot ca for a quote or to discuss a project. I look forward to hearing from you!

If you’d like to get a sense of my wider professional work, check out my LinkedIn profile. Here are a few examples of the work I’ve done as a queer, sex-positive editor and translator specifically.

• Université du Québec à Montréal Testimonial Cultures team: I translated all the French-language text and edited all the English-language text for their 2017-18 exhibit of art by marginalized people featuring personal narrative (people living with HIV/AIDS, sex workers, intersex people, trans people and more). This included the exhibit website, the program of events, and the descriptive text used for the art pieces in the exhibit.
• Université de Montréal Sexuality and Gender: Risk and Resilience Research Team: I am the team’s go-to translator for scholarly research materials on homophobia in high schools, the LGBT population’s use of health services and other related topics. Materials have included surveys, web content, conference presentations, scholarly articles, research reports and more.
• Ottawa Sexual Assault Network: Translated their counselling services protocol guidelines.
• Leather Heights, Toronto, Canada ed. Youkali Youkali: I edited all the stories for Ms. Leather Toronto’s title year collection of Toronto-themed BDSM/Leather erotica.
• Various novelists, porn writers and essayists: I’ve worked with many queer, kinky and poly writers to smooth their stories before submission for publication. I have also edited video scripts and other projects. References are available upon request.
• TOPIA Journal of Cultural Studies: Before they changed publishers, I was TOPIA’s main copy editor, and had the privilege of polishing scholarly work to fit the journal’s exacting style guidelines in a range of areas dealing with sexuality, gender and many other topics.
• Various scholars from Concordia University, Université de Montréal, UQAM, Ottawa U, York and more: As a PhD student, I bring a scholar’s touch to editing academic texts, and have enjoyed working with professors from a range of fields to sharpen and perfect their work before it’s submitted to a scholarly press or journal. I work with people in the final stages of their dissertations as well – I love supporting queers and other weirdos in academia! I also translate primary source material from French for use in research work.
• Stella, l’amie de Maimie: I translated and edited the proceedings of an international conference on sex workers’ rights, as well as various brochures and articles intended for sex workers, for instance on safer drug use from a harm-reduction perspective. I also, for a few years, translated and edited their Bad Tricks List, a sex worker-led endeavour to keep each other informed about dangerous clients.