Twitter eng recently shared that we would be making the language in our code, docs, and configs more inclusive. I want to speak on how we got here and what we’ve done so far. https://www.cnet.com/news/twitter-engineers-replace-racially-loaded-tech-terms-like-master-slave/

I was inspired to start this work when I saw an email come through to our eng org with the line "automatic slave rekick.” Seeing it was infuriating. I’ve been used to seeing the word “slave” throughout my CS education but this was different.

I was still only 3 - 4 months into my first full-time engineering gig, I spent our upcoming hackweek and the months following creating a linter for exclusionary language with lots of help along the way. I had a proof of concept but didn’t know how to gather company-wide attention

Luckily, at the start of this year, @kevino had the idea to work on something similar and we connected. He’s been at Twitter for a while and could help guide structural changes in an organization with thousands of people.

We got to work on some tenets for our orgs, Platform and Cortex, to start. We wanted to create an initial list of terms to replace with inclusive ones in code, docs, or configs.

Keeping in mind that there are many different perspectives on inclusive language, we reached out to folks from our business resource groups for help.

We settled on the following. It’s good but not exhaustive, and intentionally so. We've created a process around this list so anyone can propose changes. This isn't just about language choice in code. Our words matter in meetings, conversations, and the documents we write too.

I’m excited to see where this goes. We know there’s much work to be done and this is just the start.

Our goal here is to apply this language to all of eng, and eventually adopt inclusive language across Twitter. I know this is a small step, but it’s one that keeps us on the path to improving the industry.

special shout out to @cacoco @milawilson_ @ajmccree_ @heatherGrey_ @Remy_D @alanbato @tylardw and so many others