[net.nlang] genderless usage

bts (07/08/82)

Discussions of how language ought to be are interesting, but
standard  usage is  the real authority.   How many genderless
substitutes do you hear in everyday speech.   In Chapel Hill,
many restaurants refer to  their servers as "waitpersons". (I
know several places where it is spelled that way on the menu.)
Is that common  anywhere else?   What other examples can you
provide?
			Bruce Smith, UNC-Chapel Hill
			(...duke!unc!bts)

vhm55611 (07/09/82)

OK, here's a question for everyone... Why is it that occupational titles
such as "butcher, baker, candle-stick maker, doctor, lawyer" etc., etc.
are accepted as being non-gender-specific, but "actor, waiter" and a few
others are assumed in our language/culture to be specifically male?
I can see a problem with "mailMAN, chairMAN" etc. when we wish to be careful,
but where did "actRESS, waitRESS" come from, while "butchRESS, bakRESS"
sound totally ridiculous? "MailMAN" can easily be interpreted as 'a MAN who
does something relating to the mail' or something like that, and "baker"
means, by the normal rules of construction, 'someone who bakes.' Why
has "waitER" come to mean ' a MAN who waits' rather than simply
'someone who waits'? Obviously the implication is often there in English,
because of the existence of the words "waitRESS" and "actRESS". The question
is, why are these two necessary while we seem to get along fine without
a specifically feminine form of baker, doctor, etc.?
 'ch/WOMAN' => 'chairPERSON', OK, no problem   (OK fine, fer sure, fer sure...)

 'actOR/RES' => 'actPERSON', no, I don't think so...

anyone have any comments or better suggestions?

{I suppose it's suicidal to make a statement like that last one, since I'm
sure lots of people in netland have comments. Oh well, it's too late now.}
	-Vic Mitnick
	 ...ihuxk!vhm55611
	 BTL Indian Hill South
	 (312)979-1621

lambert (07/09/82)

I think the answer to Vic's question is that all the professions
which have genderless names (butcher, baker, physicist, doctor, engineer, etc.)
were, until recently (say 25 years ago) almost exclusively male professions, whereas
those professions which have long included both sexes have separate names
for men and women, i.e., actor/tress, waiter/tress.

This works in the opposite direction, too.  How many people, when they know
a man who is in a job that has been traditionally held by women, must specify
that he is a man.  Thus, the title of "male nurse".

This would explain the apparent inconsistency of professional names such
as mailMAN, policeMAN, etc.  That is to say that even those professions
which don't have the word man in the title were still presumed to be all-male
until fairly recently (25 yrs.).
Thus, until women started to enter the professions on a large scale,
all those names which are now non gender-specific did indeed carry
with them the connotation of gender.
Greg Barton

jdd (07/10/82)

I know several "actresses" who call themselves "actors".

Cheers,
John DeTreville
Bell Labs, Murray Hill

bstempleton (07/12/82)

The only reason terms like actor and waiter got feminine forms is because
those jobs were commonly held by women as well as men in the early days
of women in the labour force.  There are no 'bakeresses because there were
no female bakers when the names were invented.