hepeat

Why this word is great

HEPEAT — [Verb] Of a man: to repeat something a woman said and take credit for her idea. A blend of 'he' (referring to a man) and 'repeat', coined in 2017 by friends of astronomer Nicole Gugliucci after witnessing the phenomenon in academic circles. Unlike 'mansplain' (which condescends) or 'plagiarize' (which steals indiscriminately), 'hepeat' captures the quiet theft of authority—the way a woman’s insight becomes a man’s brilliance simply by passing through his lips. It is the boardroom chuckle when he says it, the seminar’s sudden interest in a theory they’d ignored moments before, the email thread where his summary of her idea earns praise while her original draft goes unread. A small violence, repeated until it feels like the natural order of things.