Recently, one of the journal's editors contacted each of us individually to review a newly submitted article.
Here's the invitation to me:
Dear Ms. Ada Lovelace,
The following paper has been submitted for publication at Our Fantabulous Journal. Can you review it?
Thank you,
Journal EditorYet, here is the invitation to my fellow grad student:
Dear Dr. Charles Babbage,
The following paper has been submitted for publication at Our Fantabulous Journal. Can you review it?
Thank you,
Journal EditorI am intrigued. Why am I a "Ms." but he's a "Dr."? Is this one of those cases where the editor saw my colleague's name as second author and assumed he was the "senior author"? Even still, for a two-author publication, I'm not sure one can automatically assume the first author is PhD-less and the second author is PhD-full.
I guess this is better than the editor assuming I'm male.
Funny thing, though - a different (female) editor at the journal recently corresponded with us on another matter, and addressed me as "Professor Lovelace," and didn't address my co-author at all. We both found this highly amusing.