ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis) (05/20/85)
The Great Sexist Language Debate has continued on and off in net.women for years now. I'm as sick of it as the next person, but newcomers do keep arriving, and I cannot bear to see a reasonably good cause get trounced. Nonsexist language IS important, even if the topic has been beaten to death. For example, how is a woman to respond to such an ad: XYZ Corp. is looking for an ambitious salesmen with a knowledge of Cosmic Defrangibrators. Applicant must demonstrate his ability in the following areas: ..... Though such an ad can easily be rewritten to avoid the male references, the sad fact remains that such ads appear far too often. If I were a qualified woman, I'd certainly be hesitant to check out this job. The suggestion that only a MAN should reply is all too strong. Furthermore, most people, especially those in personnel departments, are aware by now of the controversy surrounding `he' and `man'. Should such terms continue to be used generically, the natural conclusion for a woman to make is that the company is run by sexist pigs, so why apply? A common misconception about nonsexist language appears below: >Not only that, but the whole notion of abolishing sexist (or racist, >or ageist or..) language has rather strange overtones of Orwell. Granted, >enriching our language so that we can avoid gender reference if we >care to is a good idea, but not at the sacrifice of losing useful >aspects of our language. When I see stuff like this in net.women, I cannot help but feel that this newsgroup should be renamed `net.conservative.attitudes'. What does Orwell have to do with anything, given that feminists are hardly in control of anything? And just what useful feature of our language is about to be lost? Please note: 1. Those who wish to use `man' and `he' as before are hardly being prevented from so doing. Such people will simply be perceived as insensitive to the women's movement, since they insist on using language that may ambiguously exclude women! The older language INVITES HYPOCRISY, as in `All men are created equal' (Did that mean women too? apparently not). 2. Conservatives who find newer language constructs awkward, but do not wish to offend women, are free to do as Marcel suggests by carefully rephrasing all sentences to avoid singular anaphoric pronouns, &c. 3. Those who are comfortable with the newer sex-ambiguous language constructs (they/person &c.) should be encouraged to continue using them. This is net.women, A FORUM FOR WOMEN"S ISSUES, and it astounds me that the rabid conservative male enginerd viewpoint has been allowed to predominate in so many debates. >Re: Perchild and other Stupidity > I will note, however, that I've heard just about every one of these >stupid constructs already; that like most jokes, their humor decreases with >repetion; and that they weren't \all/ that funny to begin with. -- Jym Dyer Amen! -michael
bing@galbp.UUCP (Bing Bang) (05/27/85)
i have sat through hundreds of articles on this subject and, for what it's worth, here are my thoughts. please refrain from flaming, as my asbestoes suit is at the cleaners... and my hapless ego is exposed... first of all, i think changing the language is curing the symptoms and not the problem. the real problem with words like "fireman" and "postman" is that the image they create in most people has a great sexual bias. i suggest changing these words so that they do not have "man" suffixes will not change this sexual bias. i can attempt to back my claim by asking which sex do most people think of when words like "taxi driver" or "cop" are used. the real problem is and always has been one of perception, not merely what letters a word is composed of. and the real cure is a change in the perception of the words, not the words themselves. in other words, if a word is perceived to stand for both sexes equally, then who cares how it is spelled? -- ---------- "Is anything really real?" ...akgua!galbp!bing
ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis) (05/29/85)
In response to Bing Bang: >first of all, i think changing the language is curing the symptoms >and not the problem. the real problem with words like "fireman" and >"postman" is that the image they create in most people has a great >sexual bias. Can you really separate `problem' from `symptom' in something so subjective as language perception? Maybe there are people who are not affected by their own language, but for most of us the very words we use reinforce or alter our future attitudes and perceptions. Language is both symptom and problem. I agree that a deeply prejudiced person will not be significantly affected by any language change. But the Orwellian mind engineering of determined chauvinists is hardly the purpose behind the proposed language constructs. The newer language is of greatest utility to those who support the women's movement, in such cases as the wording of nondiscriminatory jobs or laws. For instance, a job ad for a `repairman' is more likely to discourage a qualified women than one for a `repairperson'. If you are a fair-minded employer, using the newer language makes this point clear at a minimum expense of words. >i suggest changing these words so that they do not have "man" suffixes will >not change this sexual bias. I disagree. The word `chairperson' certainly does not carry a strictly male image in my mind. >i can attempt to back my claim by asking which sex do most people think of >when words like "taxi driver" or "cop" are used. True. But after 50 or 100 years of women cops and taxi drivers, this perception will vanish. `Repairman' will still contain the same stem as {manly, mannish, men's room}. >the real problem is and always has been one of perception, not merely what >letters a word is composed of. and the real cure is a change in the >perception of the words, not the words themselves. in other words, if a word >is perceived to stand for both sexes equally, then who cares how it is >spelled? The trouble with `man' is one of MEANING, not spelling, as you suggest. `Man' has two meanings, one, as in `men's room', the other as in `all men are created equal'. And the problem is permanent, or will remain as long as `man' can be perceived as `male, not female'. Do you propose convincing people to use some other word in the phrases below? for men only a man's deodorant a man's point of view a manly pursuit a mannish woman men's room men's clothes ... -michael
edhall@randvax.UUCP (Ed Hall) (05/31/85)
> i suggest changing these words so that they do not have > "man" suffixes will not change this sexual bias. i can attempt to > back my claim by asking which sex do most people think of when words > like "taxi driver" or "cop" are used. Well, having been driven by a few taxi drivers in my time who were women, I really don't conjure up a person of a particular sex when someone uses the term. ``Cop'' is a little different, though as I encounter more women working as police officers I suspect this will shift, too. (And ``police officer'' is already an unsexed term for me... curious...) > the real problem is and always has been one of perception, not merely > what letters a word is composed of. Exactly. But as a higher and higher percentage of the taxi drivers and cops I see are women, I'd sure like to be able to *talk* about this without having to fight a prejudice built into the terms I use. And when my children see a woman working as a police officer, I'd rather they not think of her as some sort of anomoly because they'd only heard of policeMEN. > and the real cure is a change in the perception of the words, not the > words themselves. The REAL cure is complex, and involves work in a large number of areas. Language is only one of many. > in other words, if a word is perceived to stand for both sexes equally, > then who cares how it is spelled? Using new or clearly gender-neutral terms is a lot easier than waiting generations for our preconceptions regarding generic pronouns or the suffix -man to fade. > ...akgua!galbp!bing -Ed Hall decvax!randvax!edhall
bing@galbp.UUCP (Bing Bang) (06/01/85)
In article <> ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis) writes: >In response to Bing Bang: > >>i can attempt to back my claim by asking which sex do most people think of >>when words like "taxi driver" or "cop" are used. > > True. But after 50 or 100 years of women cops and taxi drivers, this > perception will vanish. `Repairman' will still contain the same stem > as {manly, mannish, men's room}. my point exactly. don't you think after 100 years of women repairman, the perception for this word will change also? or am i being too idealistic? > >>the real problem is and always has been one of perception, not merely what >>letters a word is composed of. and the real cure is a change in the >>perception of the words, not the words themselves. in other words, if a word >>is perceived to stand for both sexes equally, then who cares how it is >>spelled? > > The trouble with `man' is one of MEANING, not spelling, as you suggest. isn't the meaning of a word the same thing as how it is perceived? i guess my real suggestion was that in certain context and words 'man' must loose it's reference to the male sex. This is the real change in perception that is needed. > `Man' has two meanings, one, as in `men's room', the other as in `all > men are created equal'. > > And the problem is permanent, or will remain as long as `man' can be > perceived as `male, not female'. the english language (perhaps unfortunately, perhaps not) is full of contra- dictions. i don't think it is too far fetched to suggest that 'man' be perceived as 'male' only in certain context, and not automatically. > > Do you propose convincing people to use some other word in the phrases > below? > > for men only > a man's deodorant > a man's point of view > a manly pursuit > a mannish woman > men's room > men's clothes > ... of course not. in all of your examples above, it is (or my point is that it should be) clear in what context 'man' is being used. > >-michael -- ---------- "Is anything really real?" ...akgua!galbp!bing
debray@sbcs.UUCP (Saumya Debray) (06/01/85)
>>the real problem is and always has been one of perception, not merely what >>letters a word is composed of. > > The trouble with `man' is one of MEANING, not spelling, as you suggest. > `Man' has two meanings, one, as in `men's room', the other as in `all > men are created equal'. > > And the problem is permanent, or will remain as long as `man' can be > perceived as `male, not female'. > Gad! I wonder what I'll do with my Walkman! :-) (Sorry, I couldn't resist ... flames to /dev/null, please.) -- Saumya Debray SUNY at Stony Brook uucp: {allegra, hocsd, philabs, ogcvax} !sbcs!debray arpa: debray%suny-sb.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa CSNet: debray@sbcs.csnet
mccolm@ucla-cs.UUCP (06/03/85)
>the real problem is and always has been one of perception, not merely >what letters a word is composed of. Exactly. >and the real cure is a change in the perception of the words, not the >words themselves. The real cure is to EFFECT the change in perception. Somehow. >in other words, if a word is perceived to stand for both sexes equally, >then who cares how it is spelled? >---------- >"Is anything really real?" >...akgua!galbp!bing Sometime in the past, "nigger" disappeared, to be replaced by "black". Why? The problem was peoples' perceptions of the meaning of the word. Changing the word that refers to someone is a convenient way to notify people that the meaning has changed. And people must then build a new association to the new word. The problem with "him" is it lingually includes the possibility of "her", but is perceived to imply a male. Bringing in a new word that means "either male or female, but who cares" won't add anything fundamentally new to the language (other than a pronoun and some other stuff), but will have the effect of forcing people to reassess the way they refer to people. --fini-- Eric McColm UCLA (oo' - kluh) Funny Farm for the Criminally Harmless UUCP: ...!{ihnp4,trwspp,cepu,ucbvax,sdcrdcf}!ucla-cs!mccolm ARPA: (still) mccolm@UCLA-CS.ARPA (someday) mccolm@LOCUS.UCLA.EDU "Brevity is Wit; Politics is Obscenity; Relativity is Maddening."