English: A Sexist Language?

[Crazed Rabbit]

Simple question, simple answer; yes or no?

Now, I am not normally one to question such things, but an interesting (moronic) editorial in a college's newspaper I happened across from another school said that English was sexist. It was written by a woman (!).

Some of her main 'points':

The language is inherently sexist in favor of men. The linguistics of English continually devalue women.

Language is the basis of all communication. It is culture. It is society.

Language is society? Culture? Cretin.


It would not have killed my second grade teacher – and all other teachers, officials and purveyors of the English language – to have added a simple “she/he” so everyone could have felt included and not immediately left out due to deep-seeded inequality.

Well boo hoo hoo. Let's all go looking for every tiny thing that might offend us and say its part of some massive conspiracy to oppress our gender/race/country/heritage/ethnicity (sp?)


Because the English language was standardized by old, rich, white men, clearly they would create a language partial to their gender. However, this favoritism goes beyond subliminal small talk – it is written into the laws that rule this country.
Ah, the standard assumption of how are language came to be, and the assumed sexism of its creators. By her logic, we could assumer that language created by a woman would be sexist too.


The United Nations doesn’t ameliorate the situation, either. Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights reads: “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.

They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act toward one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” However, a “spirit of brotherhood” still denotes the omnipresent patriarchal tradition that denies women fundamental rights.
Just what fundamental rights are being denied? The right to have a bathroom pass that says he/she?


By simply becoming conscious of words that connote male superiority, linguistic culture can be changed to include all people and their differences.
Ah, the words, though generic references, connote male superiority. I love how she justs says this and provides no support.


Everyday usage like “man the table,” “one man show” and “man-made” verbally expresses male dominance and excludes females. Instead of these sayings, one could simply say “work the table,” “one-person show” and “synthetically manufactured.

Ah, here's the fundamental rights being denied. The right of women to have something man made be called 'synthetically manufactured', though I can think of many man-made things that would not fit such a stupid phrase. Anyone notice how its much easier to just say man-made?


Referring to women as “girls,” “chicks” and “ladies” is infantilizing and recalls the anachronism of women being the “fair sex,” the weaker of both sexes.

I hate to burst your bubble...but women are, physically, the weaker sex. And I refuse to see anything wrong with calling women 'ladies'.

But that's just me. I don't do the whole "I'm a poor victim who can't cope with a d***** thing"...thing.

Here's the whole stupid thing (the first line is interesting, and doesn't make sense):
The English language is suffering from a severe case of vagina envy.

The language is inherently sexist in favor of men. The linguistics of English continually devalue women.

Language is the basis of all communication. It is culture. It is society.

Language expresses awareness, emotions and thoughts. When the very words we speak intrinsically convey bias, we perpetuate inequality. We encode messages in daily interactions from incipient consciousness.

In elementary school, it always bothered me that the unisex pronoun – used mostly for permission slips and take-home announcements – is “he.” Substituting the masculine pronoun when referring to a group of mixed genders is lazy and inappropriate.

It would not have killed my second grade teacher – and all other teachers, officials and purveyors of the English language – to have added a simple “she/he” so everyone could have felt included and not immediately left out due to deep-seeded inequality.

And I’m sure dear Mrs. Schutte didn’t realize she was offending anyone by using the grammar rules laid out by the patriarchy. Because the English language was standardized by old, rich, white men, clearly they would create a language partial to their gender. However, this favoritism goes beyond subliminal small talk – it is written into the laws that rule this country.

The language that governs the United States is sexist. Not only does the United States not have an Equal Rights Amendment written into the Constitution, the ERA has been repeatedly voted down in congressional sessions. It is ridiculous that the very country that espouses the essence of democracy does not even have simple equality inherent in its foundation.

The United Nations doesn’t ameliorate the situation, either. Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights reads: “All human beings

are born free and equal

in dignity and rights.

They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act toward one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” However, a “spirit of brotherhood” still denotes the omnipresent patriarchal tradition that denies women fundamental rights.

By simply becoming conscious of words that connote male superiority, linguistic culture can be changed to include all people and their differences.

Everyday usage like “man the table,” “one man show” and “man-made” verbally expresses male dominance and excludes females. Instead of these sayings, one could simply say “work the table,” “one-person show” and “synthetically manufactured.”

Using generic masculinity to refer to society as a whole implies that women are not representative of humanity, even though women comprise 52 percent of the world’s population.

Referring to women as “girls,” “chicks” and “ladies” is infantilizing and recalls the anachronism of women being the “fair sex,” the weaker of both sexes.

This usage is both condescending and blatantly discriminatory.

Qualifying careers or nouns with gender-specific titles – like the suffixes “-ette,” “–ienne” and “-man” – is condescending and implies the predominance of certain genders in occupations in which this may not be reality. This language advances the stereotypes and almost assuredly strengthens the gender barrier in these professions. Gender-neutral vocabulary is easily applicable to describe occupations and people.
Crazed Rabbit

[Keba]

Huh? :inquisitive:

We already have full equality established by law between the sexes ... what more do these people want?

I mean, come on, Enlgish being sexist? It's impossible to tell if the writer is male of female when reading a text, unlike other languages ... then what are those?

There really are crazy people all over ... :no:

[GiantMonkeyMan]

i think that english is actually quite unsexist if you consider some other european based languages, for example in french (correct me if i'm wrong please and all those french lessons in school must have been useless :sweatdrop: ) if there is a group of men it is ils, a group of women it is elles whereas if there is a mixed group it should take the male version...

and besides from that :dizzy2:

[InsaneApache]

Je nais c'est quoi?

[Brenus]

Well, French is divided in gender. We haven’t neutral. So, when you use a word, immediately it is a gender issue. France is female, for example… So the theory of all important names or words are masculine just collapse. The symbol of France, Marianne, is a female… A bridge is masculine but a Church is female. Some words can be masculine or feminine, and some change gender when change in number (amour (love) is masculine when one, feminine when several: un amour eternel, des amours eternelles):sweatdrop: .
So the pretend sexism is base on assumption. Except if you pre-suppose that a bridge is more important than a church. Or the French are degrading their country.:sweatdrop:

"Je nais c'est quoi?" je ne sais pas?I don't know?

[thrashaholic]

Because the English language was standardized by old, rich, white men, clearly they would create a language partial to their gender.

:laugh4: :laugh4: :laugh4: :laugh4: :laugh4:

Oh dear, that was just too precious... "standardized by old, rich, white men....". Sorry to break it to you, love, but English was largely standarised in the Early Modern English period (mid 1400s - 1800) when there weren't many non-whites in Britain to complain about it. In fact it was most of the standardising was done by William Caxton (who, for the greater part of his life at least, wasn't old either - I will grant him being male though) and his printing press, that's why 'standard' English is the southern English variety (he was from Kent you see). Of course the King James bible and so on had something to do with it too.

However, language is something that is 'possessed' by everyone who uses it and consequently is a function of the people who do use it. So, seeing as the division of men to women is roughly equal they both have an equal influence on linguistic development. In fact, seeing as, in the past, it was mostly likely mothers who taught the children language, women would have had a disproportionately large influence on the development of the language.

Interestingly too, in old English, 'man' used to refer to all of mankind, then there was 'wife-man' (the development to woman is obvious) that referred to women only, and then a separate word again for the male gender that meant 'sword-man'. Subsequently the 'sword' prefix was dropped leaving us with what we have today.

The stuff about ladies is pretty silly too, what about gentlemen? They both hark from the same era, both are used quite rarely these days, both are used to convey politeness. None of this gender hierarchy bollocks she's epousing. Far from it in fact, 'lady' donotes nobility, the same level hierarchically as 'lord', a word no-one uses for men anymore, so if anything its use is asserting female status in society.

In conclusion, I bet she doesn't have a boyfriend.....

[doc_bean]

Ancient Hebrew was sexist, every language is sexist. Get over it.

[AntiochusIII]

Ancient Hebrew was sexist, every language is sexist. Get over it.Not necessarily. I could think of a few other languages that aren't as fixated on gender and/or have gender-neutral pronouns.

That, of course, doesn't mean this editorial is somehow sensible. I have always taken the view that the meaning has more value than the semantics of a word. She's probably one of those individuals so fixated in a single particular issue as to fail to grasp the whole picture.

[L'Impresario]

Je nais

You are born right now? This is fascinating stuff:jumping:

Well, it's logical that most languages have a "bias" for the masculine forms, it's been established through centuries. The masculine is the standard form in most situations. when there are 2 or 3 pronouns (masculine, female, neutral), the masculine is used the most, as the gender isn't established by numerical superiority (in grammatically correct instances that is).

Language does reveal societal norms and trends. Patriarchical communities definately had a serious impact on the form of the language and this is not a recent development. It wasn't a random choice to have the masculine version of most ranks, positions, jobs etc as their standard appellation, but it isn't a grand masterplan neither.

English though isn't any more sexist than any other languages with similar societal standards, and sometimes it's genderless adjectives (not being subject to declination as well) make it appear as a fairly PC language.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

English does lack a set of gender neutral third person pro-nouns. By convention we use the male, as we have to use one or the other and we can't keep switching it.

Its not so much sexist as deficiant.

Not that its exactly what I'd call a problem

[Sasaki Kojiro]

It would not have killed my second grade teacher – and all other teachers, officials and purveyors of the English language – to have added a simple “she/he” so everyone could have felt included and not immediately left out due to deep-seeded inequality.

Wait. "she/he"?? Doesn't she realize that this places women before men, connoting female superiority, creating an omnipresent matriarchy, and denying men their fundemental rights? This deep sided inequality will have these 2nd graders grow up believing men to be inferior. Think of the children!

[Crazed Rabbit]

Brillant, Sasaki.

Crazed Rabbit

[Justiciar]

I say we burn our trousers in protest!

[Ironside]

Well, most of it is ramblings but there's a few points (works for Swedish too).
The man - mankind connection and the ´words that follows from this.
Gender based professions (works the other way too, like nurse).

And the only point I actually care about. The lack of a genderless word for persons. In those rare cases when you have to use a he/she wording, it would be soo useful.

CR the first sentence is a reference to "penis-envy", but I don't know enough of the term to know how accurate her use of it actually is.

[Blodrast]

eh... I've never met/heard of a feminist who wasn't fanatical about it.
Maybe she exists out there somewhere, who knows.

I never understood people who can be so anal and fascist about such minor, trivial things. I am sure they could achieve greatness had they chosen to channel their energy and zeal for better purposes...

As for the lady (sic!) in cause, thrashaholic's last phrase sums up my opinion of her, although I would have put it in much, much less PC terms... stupid *****...

[GoreBag]

Language is society? Culture? Cretin.

That's actually an excellent point. Language barriers are most important and prevalent in maintaining the perception of a distinct and united culture. Your language is your culture, inescapably, the same way as religion is. Of course, the article is drivel and sociology doesn't seem to be her strong point, but your comment didn't seem to address that much either.

[rory_20_uk]

One classic I heared some time ago was another raving feminist who thought that Physics was sexist:

This obvious fact is bourne out as fluid mechanics is so much harder to model than that of a straight beam. Fluid is of course from a female's menses, and a straight beam is a penis...

People with that mentality will find these issues. In the case above, blame the Creator (I think that the true problem was that Men were making the fluid mechanicsharder on purpose).

I've yet to hear any men declaim how primary school teachers are mostly women, as are the majority of Paediatricians (and Psychiatrists I think). It seems men are able to accept women are better at some things, and leave it there.

~:smoking:

[Crazed Rabbit]

That's actually an excellent point. Language barriers are most important and prevalent in maintaining the perception of a distinct and united culture. Your language is your culture, inescapably, the same way as religion is. Of course, the article is drivel and sociology doesn't seem to be her strong point, but your comment didn't seem to address that much either.

Language is certainly part of society and culture, but it is not the whole of either.

Crazed Rabbit

[Scurvy]

I'v never really thought of english as being a genderised language (i always found learning french really difficult because of the masculine and femenine tenses - which is all they actually teach you in secondary school)

a language definately demonstrates the culture and characteristics of the speakers, but i think it is possible to have many cultures cultures speaking the same language,

[GoreBag]

Language is certainly part of society and culture, but it is not the whole of either.

Crazed Rabbit

Ahem: Cretin.

[Crazed Rabbit]

So are you suggesting language is all of society and culture, that nothing else matters when taking into account these two besides language?

Crazed Rabbit

[rotorgun]

I find it incredible that this is even an issue. After all, most of us are taught how to speak properly by our mothers before we even learn the mechanics of the language. My dear mother never tried to tell me that it was sexist to utilize gender specific words, nor did she feel inclined to say he/she everytime she spoke of "all mankind" etc. It would not surprise in the least me if we discovered that women invented languge to begin with.

What's the beef!

[Reverend Joe]

So are you suggesting language is all of society and culture, that nothing else matters when taking into account these two besides language?

Crazed Rabbit
I think he's saying "Cretin."

As for the question at hand: No. Plain and simple. Language does not subvert one's thinking, and if it does, then you need to reasess your mental malleability.

[Papewaio]

I think she is confusing quantity with quality and general with specific.

Man-- could be a specific as in a singular male, or it could be used in the general and apply to all as in mankind. While woman get a specific term just for themselves without it being used in the general sense... they get special treatment.

I am sure if the shoe was on the other foot and English had woman for a singlular female and then used womankind for everyone the authour would complain that woman where a second class citizen as they didn't get a specific pronoun only for themselves.

Also she seems to confuse the number of times something is mentioned with the quality. Even then she is focused on the trival issues and not the real underlying problems.

In short she is a PC Princess.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

There is a lot of discussion out there on the nexus of language, thought, and culture.

Ochs work on "primary orality"

Saussure's work with sign - signifier - signified

Lyotard's thoughts on the differend

Habermas's construction

Agar, and a large batch of other anthropologists

Korzybinski


The three concepts are so intertwined that it is hard to separate them effectively and impossible to study one without impinging on the others.

Does this mean that it is valid to argue for that a change in language must occur if there is to be a chang in culture? Almost certainly. To a goodly extent, the automatic presumption of masculinity is an expression of cultural value -- at least as a holdover -- and some change in language must accompy a change in culture. The tough part is the assumption that if you force people to change the way they speak, that will lead to the cultural change you seek....there is a lot less solid ground on that side of the issue.

Does this mean that if we neuter English entirely there will cease to be any difference between men and women? Not likely -- because biology may be described in language but cannot be ignored.

[Lemur]

What's wrong with being sexy? (http://www.moviewavs.com/php/sounds/?id=bst&media=WAVS&type=Movies&movie=This_Is_Spinal_Tap&quote=sexist.txt&file=sexist.wav)

[Tachikaze]

So I guess it's up to me to disagree with everyone here and more-or-less side with the author.

First of all, language and culture are intimately intertwined. Language influences culture as much as the culture influences language. I think only a person who is determined to find fault with her writing would think she means they are completely synonomous.

She was wrong, though, when she said language was the basis for all communication.

The author never said English was more sexist than other languages. It's not important whether they are or not. The topic is English. However, it can be helpful to study other languages that have everyday examples of more gender-neutral syntax.

Japanese is, in many ways, more gender-neutral than English. Pronouns may change with the gender of the speaker (usually due more to the level of politeness than prescribed pronouns for man and women), but not the gender of the subject or objects of their sentence. Hito and kanojo are used for "person" and "she or he", respectively, regardless of gender. San is used where English-speakers say "missus", "mister", "miss", or "ms". The suffix -jin (added where English adds "-man") is gender-neutral.

English does need a gender-neutral third person singular pronoun. They works pretty well, especially when the number of people is not important. I hate "he/she" or "he or she". Another one, "s/he" works OK in writing, but not in speech.

I wish also that the words man and human were reversed. Then man would be the root of both woman (female man) and human (male man--not mailman). The WO prefix would be for females, the HU prefix for males.

The author didn't mention that on forms the male checkbox is almost always listed before the female one. Why? F comes before M in the alphabet.

Men did standardize English, not in speech, but on paper. Almost all writers during the early development of English were men.

"Spirit of brotherhood" is an example of exclusion. If it said "spirit of sisterhood" I'll bet all you male forumers would have something to say. I don't agree with her that it excludes women from the rights provided by the Declaration.

If you need an example of how male-centered language can affect women's rights, you need not go any farther than the US Constitution. An amendment had to be made to ensure that women could vote.

"Girls" and "chicks" are, indeed, demeaning terms. I don't agree with the author that "ladies" is any worse than "gentlemen". Those two words don't carry the meanings they once did.

I think the tone some of you are using is disgusting. It's not that you have to agree with her statements, but to say that women aren't demeaned, disparaged, belittled, repressed, objectified, and ridiculed--and that language doesn't reflect that--is blind. I am shocked what I hear men say about women when women are not around (and sometimes when they are). In this day in age, I would think they have gone beyond that. I'm not talking about the criticism. Women criticize men just as much. I'm talking about the words they use to label them.

The author makes several good points, even if many of them are rather cliché. Some of you just want to attack her. Maybe you are being defensive or insecure. Maybe she has struck a nerve. I don't know. But I think the responses help support her point about male repression or chauvinism.

[Kanamori]

"Spirit of brotherhood" is an example of exclusion. If it said "spirit of sisterhood" I'll bet all you male forumers would have something to say.

Probably something along the lines of, "I don't really care." If it carries the same meaning, the only differnece is in the squiggles that make it up. Culture makes the connotations, and language is a way of communication. The words only have meaning that they are given in the social context. Anyway, more people would be apt to say that the culture is biased.:balloon2:

Having a language that excluded such an obvious grouping as sex would be simplistic and boring.

It also should be said that the language of rich white men is typically different than language of the other 'classes', and often each 'class' has peculiarities.

[naut]

What an idiot.

[Duke of Gloucester]

I will dissent too, and agree with her up to a point. I think her diagnosis is correct, but her prescription is wrong. Language certainly reflects culture, and in this case lags behind culture a certain amount. In the past women were discouraged from entering certain jobs and professions, and were seen as inferior to men in terms of decisions and opinions. Our language reflects that difference. We have words like man-made, man on the street and others. There has been some linguistic change, so we now talk about fire-fighters instead of firemen.

Does it matter? It is impossible to say, but I think not. There would be two reasons why it might be a problem. One would be stereotyping. If we refer to something as "man-made", so long as it does not discourage girls from entering chemical engineering and manufacturing industries there is no problem. My judgement would be that the reasons fewer girls choose these professions has other causes, and that this problem should be addressed by working in schools and colleges, encouraging girls and providing role models. Indeed working to change the language may distract from actually solving any problems relating to real inequality.

The second reason might be offence. My position on this is that offence is in the eye/ear of the receiver, and that if someone tells us that terminology is offensive we should avoid it. Hence, if significant number of women are offended by the term "man-made", I am happy to say something else. However, I have not come across this opinion so I continue to use the term.

In short, where inequality exists, it is better to address the real causes of the inequality, rather than attacking the language that reflects it.

[AntiochusIII]

Actually, I would say that Japanese is actually more formal than English in many ways, and the expression of gender is quite more relevant than English. Then again, the concern about gender-specific in Japanese is only a small part of an entire language quite fixated on proper uses of suffixes that are obscure to foreigners. The significance of the many forms of "you," and who would use it how and when, in which gender and social position come into play; the suffixes -san, -kun, -chan, -sama, -sensei, and others and their specific uses; these alone would give any language learners a headache, and these are just starting points.

Japanese is a good demonstration to how language reflects culture, so is English; however, it would be quite a stretch to assume that the reverse is true, primarily, which is where the argument truly falls apart.

I'd argue that her editorial isn't the best example of where feminism should throw its efforts upon. Pure semantics are worthless in face of the practical reality; and her demands are outright unrealistic.

I still maintain that this is just a rant.

[L'Impresario]

Then again, the concern about gender-specific in Japanese is only a small part of an entire language quite fixated on proper uses of suffixes that are obscure to foreigners.

Not really, try messing up -kanaa and -kashira and you 'll raise a few eyebrows even from completely non-pedantic persons.


Japanese is a good demonstration to how language reflects culture, so is English; however, it would be quite a stretch to assume that the reverse is true, primarily, which is where the argument truly falls apart.

The question of culture and language is not easily dismissible, and it brings into the forefront philosophical, psychoanalytical and anthrolopological motifs. At the same time, the issue of sexism not only appears as a manifestation of certain strictly verbal elements and the vocabulary of a language, but it seems to have a quality of its own in a more sociolinguistic context. So in some cultures women are expected to follow certain norms, and what would be a perfectly normal pattern of expression for a male becomes annoying or even totally unacceptable for a female. Naturally, some inherent differences between the genders will be reflected in such situations, but their extent is up to debate, and here we have the eternal debate of nature or nurture.

[Duke of Gloucester]

Naturally, some inherent differences between the genders will be reflected in such situations, but their extent is up to debate, and here we have the eternal debate of nature or nurture.

Very few, if indeed any physical differences between the sexes justify different treatment. If we take a the statement in the original post:


I hate to burst your bubble...but women are, physically, the weaker sex.

If we look at averages, this is true, but it does not mean that all women are weaker than all men. Thus any decision which differentiates between men or women on the basis that women are weaker than men is both unwise and unfair to strong women and weak men. Decisions where strength is relevant should be based on strength alone.

[yesdachi]

I say we burn our trousers in protest!
I should have taken mine off first. ~D

It is not the language that is sexist it is how it is used. The author should have attacked a specific person (grade school jock/bully?) or group (men who think girls are prettier than her?) rather than the entire language. Its like saying guns kill people when it’s really people using them who kill people. Blaming a tool because she is ticked at someone is a cop-out, if she is pissed at someone (ex-boyfriend?) maybe she should confront that person (her dad maybe?) rather than lash out at all men and the language our mom’s taught them.


Geek reference – I believe all D&D books refer to the player/character as a female.

[Husar]

I hate to burst your bubble...but women are, physically, the weaker sex.
http://www.posedown.de/specials/2003/2003-05-annett-wittig/pics/IMG_0459.jpg

Also, I lately noticed a sign at a supermarket saying something about "Kassiererin", the german female form of cashier, should the guy who served me at the cass feel opressed now???
He didn't look like he had a ny problem with it.:dizzy2: :inquisitive:

[Tachikaze]

Also, I lately noticed a sign at a supermarket saying something about "Kassiererin", the german female form of cashier, should the guy who served me at the cass feel opressed now???
He didn't look like he had a ny problem with it.:dizzy2: :inquisitive:
Maybe if it happened to him everyday, everywhere he went, all through his life, he would get tired of it. Suffering through one instance doesn't put him on par with what females go through.

[Tachikaze]

It is not the language that is sexist it is how it is used. The author should have attacked a specific person (grade school jock/bully?) or group (men who think girls are prettier than her?) rather than the entire language. Its like saying guns kill people when it’s really people using them who kill people. Blaming a tool because she is ticked at someone is a cop-out, if she is pissed at someone (ex-boyfriend?) maybe she should confront that person (her dad maybe?) rather than lash out at all men and the language our mom’s taught them.
Language can't be separated from use. Use is language. Conversely, what is not used is not language.

Language is a big part of what determines how people think. If that were not true, politicians and commercial advertizing wouldn't study the convincing (even brainwashing) effects of language so much. If someone hears something enough, they will believe it.

Females are subtly positioned into an inferior position to males by the small elements of language that accumulate over time. They are constantly reminded of their inferior position. This is every bit as effective as making laws that lower women's status. In fact, it is even more effective, since it also convinces the women themselves that they are inferior.

The English language portrays man as the norm and woman as secondary. Even this small nuance puts men in the center and women on the periphery.

It's kind of funny how much men resist altering the language to be more neutral. If they truly feel the two genders are equal, why don't they show it in their language?

[yesdachi]

Language can't be separated from use. Use is language. Conversely, what is not used is not language.

Language is a big part of what determines how people think. If that were not true, politicians and commercial advertizing wouldn't study the convincing (even brainwashing) effects of language so much. If someone hears something enough, they will believe it.

Females are subtly positioned into an inferior position to males by the small elements of language that accumulate over time. They are constantly reminded of their inferior position. This is every bit as effective as making laws that lower women's status. In fact, it is even more effective, since it also convinces the women themselves that they are inferior.

The English language portrays man as the norm and woman as secondary. Even this small nuance puts men in the center and women on the periphery.

It's kind of funny how much men resist altering the language to be more neutral. If they truly feel the two genders are equal, why don't they show it in their language?
Language has been used for many different purposes and regrettably for women who care, the English language has been used most commonly for purposes towards men. Men who have traditionally been the ones responsible for making purchases, being educated, reading newspapers and in general just being out in public. As women’s roles change from Suzy homemaker to more outside the home roles where they become more of a consumer or active part of society so to will the language change to accommodate them. Although there are fewer men than women, men are still the decision makers in most financial matters around the home and in business. When language is being used it is still usually being used towards men.

You said it yourself that advertisers and politicians study the convincing effects of language and obviously they have concluded that they should still be directing their words at men. It is just the way the world is today, women are (more considerately that in the past) positioned as less important to men but we are already seeing that change especially over the last few years with advertising and programming on TV becoming more female friendly (a woman president on TV and network TV loosing Monday Night Football to ESPN due to ratings). It is a slow change that may not ever see women as equal despite all the laws and political correctness efforts but if society changes and elevates women to an equal status to men we will know by listening to advertisers or when salesmen stop talking to men first or servers at restaurants stop bringing the bill to the men.

Women have been second chair to men since recorded time and just because they have started to become more independent lately (relativity speaking) doesn’t mean society should misrepresent language to make a small minority of women feel equal. If more language is being directed at women, the way language is being used will reflect the change.

I stand by my comments that the language isn’t sexist but the people who use it are, and are on purpose in many cases, perhaps mot because they are sexist but because they are not addressing women.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

So I guess it's up to me to disagree with everyone here and more-or-less side with the author.

First of all, language and culture are intimately intertwined. Language influences culture as much as the culture influences language. I think only a person who is determined to find fault with her writing would think she means they are completely synonomous.

She was wrong, though, when she said language was the basis for all communication.

The author never said English was more sexist than other languages. It's not important whether they are or not. The topic is English. However, it can be helpful to study other languages that have everyday examples of more gender-neutral syntax.

Japanese is, in many ways, more gender-neutral than English. Pronouns may change with the gender of the speaker (usually due more to the level of politeness than prescribed pronouns for man and women), but not the gender of the subject or objects of their sentence. Hito and kanojo are used for "person" and "she or he", respectively, regardless of gender. San is used where English-speakers say "missus", "mister", "miss", or "ms". The suffix -jin (added where English adds "-man") is gender-neutral.

English does need a gender-neutral third person singular pronoun. They works pretty well, especially when the number of people is not important. I hate "he/she" or "he or she". Another one, "s/he" works OK in writing, but not in speech.

I wish also that the words man and human were reversed. Then man would be the root of both woman (female man) and human (male man--not mailman). The WO prefix would be for females, the HU prefix for males.

The author didn't mention that on forms the male checkbox is almost always listed before the female one. Why? F comes before M in the alphabet.

Men did standardize English, not in speech, but on paper. Almost all writers during the early development of English were men.

"Spirit of brotherhood" is an example of exclusion. If it said "spirit of sisterhood" I'll bet all you male forumers would have something to say. I don't agree with her that it excludes women from the rights provided by the Declaration.

If you need an example of how male-centered language can affect women's rights, you need not go any farther than the US Constitution. An amendment had to be made to ensure that women could vote.

"Girls" and "chicks" are, indeed, demeaning terms. I don't agree with the author that "ladies" is any worse than "gentlemen". Those two words don't carry the meanings they once did.

I think the tone some of you are using is disgusting. It's not that you have to agree with her statements, but to say that women aren't demeaned, disparaged, belittled, repressed, objectified, and ridiculed--and that language doesn't reflect that--is blind. I am shocked what I hear men say about women when women are not around (and sometimes when they are). In this day in age, I would think they have gone beyond that. I'm not talking about the criticism. Women criticize men just as much. I'm talking about the words they use to label them.

The author makes several good points, even if many of them are rather cliché. Some of you just want to attack her. Maybe you are being defensive or insecure. Maybe she has struck a nerve. I don't know. But I think the responses help support her point about male repression or chauvinism.

Language was written the way it is by chauvinistic men sure, and women are still being repressed belittled what have you. But I don't think language today reinforces that. We say "men and women" and "boys and girls" for the same reason we say "lewis and clark" "law and order" and "nook and cranny". That's just how we've always said it. I'm sure you've said "Lewis and Clark" several times in your life, why do you insist on belittling clark? Lewis isn't more important than clark and law isn't more important than order and I couldn't define cranny if I tried. Language is somewhat arbitrary, I'm supposed to say "Tachikaze and I" instead of "Me and Tachikaze" even though they mean the same thing. You have to put one before the other though.

Telling me that whenever I refer to "mankind" or a "spirit of brotherhood" I'm trampling the rights of women is going to put me on the defensive. It's just what I was taught, when I say that I'm simply trying to communicate. That's why this is a timewaster of an issue, or at least the examples she brought up are. If she wants to denounce the use of the word slut I would be right with her; that one is used as often by women though so perhaps she doesn't have an issue with it. It's only the she/he womyn quibbling that I find silly.

[Husar]

Maybe if it happened to him everyday, everywhere he went, all through his life, he would get tired of it. Suffering through one instance doesn't put him on par with what females go through.
If women are confronted with so much suffering every day, why are many of them still pretty happy?
You sound like this is unbearable suffering, worse than slavery...
Language is changed by the people qwho use it everyday and I oppose attempts to change it by force just because someone thinks it's better that way.

[Don Corleone]

I actually think she has a valid point. Language is the abstraction by which we share our thoughts with the outside world and receive others' in return. Language does shape perception.

What I would object to is the anger, the vitriol and the assumption that there's a conspiracy afoot. Lighten up. You'll certainly steer more people in your intended direction by calmly, rationally explaining that older language reflects older thinking then jumping up and down and screaming that you're a victim of a rampant patriarchy and something so fundamental as our language must radically change immediately, to purge all hints of the evil plot. :dizzy2:

Language and culture move like glaciers.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Language and culture move like glaciers.

Not always, Don C, but I agree that you are describing the general trend.

My point of concern, which I think should be considered, is one of practicality -- a practical concern which your post touches on.

Is forcing people to change their language use going to change their thinking or the thinking of the next generation any more effectively then the changing culture itself? I am skeptical that changing the language by fiat will actually result in the desired cultural change.

I am actually fairly scrupulous about avoiding "sexist" language -- I worked and published in academe for more than a decade and you will NOT get pubbed if you write using such language -- but I always thought the concern was putting the cart before the horse. LOTS of womyn/women/XX chromosome-types were already excelling in academe when the push to change the language was made. So was changing the language changing the culture or -- as it seemed to me -- did a changed culture change the language to suit itself?

In academe, the charge was spear-headed [they'd perjuratorially refer to that phrasing as an example of phallologocetrism by the way] by radical feminists in English departments, any number of whom thought most of the writings of the great dead white guys should be tossed in favor of literature that emphasized a "diversity of voices."

Effecting cultural change is rarely as simple and never as controlled as those who seek to change it wish it could be. If it were, all of those "re-organizations" you experience at work would actually succeed instead of being ignored by people who keep doing things the way they've always done them.

[Tachikaze]

I don't have time now (time for bed!) to respond to all the posts back to me. But they are very good and intelligent. Maybe I can take this up tomorrow.

The one I will address briefly is Sasaki. I would not complain about the word order of "men and women" in a sentence. That is not important enough to worry about. I did mention male before female on forms. That does show some male bias because there is no valid reason to put male first. Alphabetical ordering would put female first. It's one of those small reminders that men are the standard.

[Duke of Gloucester]

It's one of those small reminders that men are the standard.

Irrelevant but interesting point: Biologically, women are standard and men are deficient in the sense that they have an incomplete chromosome.

[naut]

so we now talk about fire-fighters instead of firemen.

I still call them firemen.

[Duke of Gloucester]

I still call them firemen.

Fine. As long as you are not telling my daughters they can't be firefighters if they want to.

[Incongruous]

Actually at our school some of the guys are getting fed up with the female orientated English programme (not the language I know), interesting no?

[Husar]

Fine. As long as you are not telling my daughters they can't be firemen if they want to.
I edited it a little bit.:2thumbsup:
I think it is rather easy, once firefighters contain more or close to 50% women, people will probably recognize and come to the conclusion that firemen might not fit anymore, thus starting to use another term. Doesn't language usually try to put reality into words? The term firemen probably comes from most of them being men for whatever reason and it should change by itself once enough people recognize that there are women doing the job.

Maybe I'm too optimistic, but that's the way I see it. If we don't like the history of our language, we can just as well rewrite history books to reflect medieval women in a better way.

[Fragony]

Let's just call it men and wombmen. Problem solved.

[Red Peasant]

The feminist attacks are ideologically motivated and will only result in impoverishing the language and obscuring meaning. When that happens then it is not only wrong but wrong-headed. Changes to usage in received language should improve it not bastardize it; anything that impedes clarity and understanding in the written text should be avoided and resisted at all costs.

Languages such as Latin, Greek, German and Malay which possess a single word for 'human being' of a neutral connotation in any context are not noticeably any less sexist than speakers of, say, English and French, who lack such a word. So, I find it difficult to follow their logic.

That said, it is a good thing to be sensitive to the sensibilities of your audience and not willingly to cause offence if it can be avoided, but if the changes confuse or repel then it is best not to adopt them at all.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Let's just call it men and wombmen. Problem solved.

Scamp.

[professorspatula]

I bet the author of that little rant about the English language uses one of those completely non-sexist women only insurance companies for her car cover.

You can find fault in anything if you try: those left-handed tin openers discriminate against the right handed majority! It seems these days more and more people have a chip on their shoulder and demand we see and act upon their issues, no matter how trivial. Of all the things to worry about and feel so strongly about when countless generations of women have just got on with things. What a waste of time and energy. Besides, if you want action, we all know you need to throw yourself under the king's horse before anyone takes notice. Writing is just rubbish! She's no women's lib hero. Waste of space really.