"Our language used to belong to all its speakers and readers and writers."

Except women.

Is "skreak" even a word? Who's raping the language now?

SarahMC beat me to it!

Language rapists. You mean like people who use made-up words like skreak?

As an editor, I hate having to use "he or she" because it is linquistically annoying (if he or she is annoyed, he or she must channel his or her annoyance in his or her own way), but that's because English has no gender-neutral alternative other than "it." Not because the feminists have messed everything up. I love that he blames the inadequacy of our language on people who just want a little respect.

Wait, I guess it is a word. A ridiculously obscure word used mainly by thesaurus-groping, mealy-mouthed dweebs, but a word nonetheless.

i sure do miss the golden age of WASM vernacular, when we could just call a mic a mic and an n-word an n-word! damn those super sensitive non white-male english-speakers for PC'ing up the language!

Oh ho ho! Language rapist. I see what he did there. That's so clever, since we're talking about feminists here. *rolls yes*

I'd hate to see what happens when the language evolves without his permission. Does text-speak bother him, or is it only when the word "man" is removed.

What an ass.

He should've used "language neuterers". Doesn't he know that that's what we mean feminists do instead of rape? Castrate things?

Cliché, perhaps, though the suggestion may be, maybe someone should mention to him that he could de-clutter his English if he just used "she" as his all-encompassing pronoun. Watch his face turn red! ^_^

One can't help but laugh at Gerlernter's article. Yes, the English language is more cumbersome now than it was in the past, but that is not feminists' fault. That is the fault of those English speakers who came before and created no gender-neutral pronoun for "person".

Now language is left again to catch up to the sociopolitical situation.

"writers who use 'he' in sentences referring to men and women..."

Whoa, I thought "men" was totally neutral, as in the phrase 'great men', which makes this phrase an abominable redundant monstrosity committed by language-rapists. It should read, "writers who use 'he' in sentences referring to men." Or possibly, "writers who use 'he' in sentences referring to male and female men." Any true lover of the English language would have written it that way.

Holy crap the world is ending because we are now able to include people other than white men into our language!

You know, whenever I read texts that refer to "people" as "man" or "mankind," and only use the pronoun "he," I never rethink the text with the idea that it applies to all people. I read it exactly as written. Because really that is in fact what texts like this are saying.

I read a book once where at one point the author got in a huff and insisted that "he" and "man" were gender neutral.
As in, the uses of those words immediately prior to our feminist castrations, not Old English or anything like that.
Quite possibly in the top 50 of Dumbest Beliefs Ever.

Reminds me of Hothead Paisan. "I AM SKINLESS GENDERLESS MAN!"

Ah, David Gelernter. He's a Yale professor of computer science who was injured by the Unabomber. He's pretty good when he sticks to matters about technology.

Unfortunately for him, he starts to sound pretty foolish when he veers off into right wing diatribes. This case is one of them.

HAHAHAHAH! What goes around comes around.

He says the English language is wrecked? I'll bet he's not losing sleep over all of the languages wrecked by English! What a pathetic loser.

How many English words have gotten sucked mercilessly into other languages?

I've heard it with my own ears too; Italians lament the creeping of English into their language, especially in technical areas like business.

HA HA HA. I guess there really is a Santa Claus.

People who make bullshit arguments like this are poor, unimaginative writers. Eliminating sexism is no bar to good writing. Here are some examples:

if he or she is annoyed, he or she must channel his or her annoyance in his or her own way

Anyone who is annoyed must cope with such annoyance individually.

You don't like "chairperson"? Use "chair"--which is, in practical terms what everyone I know does anyway. You don't like "humankind"? Use "humanity." Sexist language is not only offensive; it's the product of lazy writers.

hahhaha How much dumb could one article have in it?

I love when intellectuals/feminists/any part of this so-called "academic left" are denied access from classifications like "speakers and readers and writers." Why are we all the "other"? Shouldn't we be a part of them, and then, we're merely doing what he said the language "used to be about"? It's not like we have held guns to people's heads and told them to use more inclusive language. Yes, when they use exclusive language we might frown on it, just as when we use inclusive language they might cringe at our affront on pronoun machismo (I can hardly type that without giggling). But this is just taking ownership of our own words, just as assclown is suggesting readers and writers used to do before.

It never fails to amaze me how victimized people feel by a request to stop using offensive, marginalizing language. I love when they classify it as a physical violence against themselves, because usually the people who downplay actual physical violence against the truly marginalized. *sigh*

Feministing, can we have a few more light-hearted posts to ease up some of the friction being caused by the election cycle? More bad ass humor like Tina Fey plz :( I find this site and most of the left blogosphere lately to be such a downer, and it's sad I'm forced to laugh at this post, which at any other time of year, might be enough to make my blood boil (with the use of a rape metaphor to describe positive linguistic progress, for example). I'm becoming desensitized by all the misogyny and anti-feminism and anti-racial justice stuff and I hate that. :( Note: This is not to say you shouldn't be posting on all the serious stuff going on (particularly election related and the attacks on reproductive rights). But I think this time of year requires like a 1:1 ratio of fun posts and posts that make me want to walk around wearing a blindfold and earplugs, so as to avoid facing the heartbreak that the current news is causing me. Here's my contribution to the fun outlets for your brains:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=aeF9BLjNYfk

"...I have to go castrate some sentences before my day is through."

If you were a proper language rapist, you'd strap on a big one and fuck him a new bunghole... Oh. I guess you just did. :-)

[i]It never fails to amaze me how victimized people feel by a request to stop using offensive, marginalizing language. I love when they classify it as a physical violence against themselves, because usually the people who downplay actual physical violence against the truly marginalized.[/i]

"You feminists want to know about persecution? We men can't say "anchormen" anymore!

Or the n-word!

WE SHALL OVERCOME!!!!11!!"

Amazingly, I'm an English Major and a feminist and I have never seen a problem with using more gender neutral language. I think it allows women more power, which is really the problem this guy has with it in my opinion.

The English language is changing. It does that; it would not have lasted as many centuries and even millenia if it did not have the ability to adapt and change. Hell this is like straight out of my class this semester on the history of English. English changes that is why it has remained when so many other languages have died or killed by English.

Just how long would the good professor feel if the original use of the word were...more "feminine"...chairwoman to chairperson?...would he be so against the changes in the English language? Of. Course. Not.

Those damn feminists the are responsible for all the bad in the world, even the distruction of the English language.

EG is my clarity hero.

I agree with like, everyone here...

SarahMC...you're totally right. our language used to belong to all readers and speakers... and now.. in an effort... to include.. more people... it no longer belongs to everyone? i can see where he messed up his math there.

and cheekykitten, i agree with you too...it's not feminists' or anyone else's fault that the language didn't start off with any gender neutral pronouns...it started off biased towards men which is precisly WHY were trying to change it.

And its not like feminists caused some big outrage, screaming and protesting in the streets that our language needs to change...what could've been a simple request was turned into a catastrophe not by us, but by the people (mostly men) who wanted to keep the old "mankind"-"he"
system in place.

And how terrible of a professor is this guy that he said this:
How can I teach my students to write decently when the English language has become a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Academic-Industrial Complex?

Really? This attempt to make language more inclusive is hindering your ability to teach? I can just picture those students sitting there with pens in their hands like "uhh... uh... AHHH!!!!" and their heads exploding cuz they can't learn to write with all these crazy new words.

Now honestly...if we're willing to make words like "bootylicious" and "blind" part of the English language, I don't see how "chairperson" can hurt anyone.

I totally agree with him.

We need to keep the English language traditional.

We need:

Hwæt! We Gardena in geardagum,
þeodcyninga, þrym gefrunon,
hu ða æþelingas ellen remedon.

Or at least:

For oute of olde feldys, as men sey, Comyth al this newe corn from yere to yere; And out of old bokis, in good fey, Comyth al this newe science that men lere.

YES, margaret, i was going to comment on that... if we're going to say we need to keep it traditional, who's going to define traditional? i personally would like to use Shakespearean English...who's in??
i mean really...did he just decide to call the language he grew up with "traditional" because its the easiest and most appealing to him? jerk.

I have a solution!

Let's make "men" gender neutral again.

As for the boys, we just call men "wermen", like in Old English. And we ladies can revert back to "wifmen".

Problem solved! Thank you ancient Europe!

...or, if anxious masculinity proves to be too much of a hurdle, how about "he-men"?

What 80's-nostalgic fella could resist saying "I'm a he-man who [fill in the blank]!"

Margaret and Genetic Mishap, you are officially my heroes.

Beowulf and Man as gender-neutral for the win!

Language is a living thing and belongs to ALL who use it. It will continue to evolve to suit the needs of those using it to communicate. Many new words have been coined by writers in their attempt to most acutely express their ideas. Shakespeare made up all kinds of words that had never been used the way he used them and some of them stuck.

My only objection to the manner in which the English language in changing (in terms of gender-neutral language) is the proliferation of masculine suffixes. The media was playing with replacing 'actress' with 'actor' for a while (still not sure which won out) and 'poet' completely eliminated 'poetess'. Yet again the masculine form of a word is considered somehow gender-neutral.
Why has this been generally considered a positive step?

Genetic Mishap: Amazing. I love it!

I think more threatening to the English language here is his superfluous use of cheesy similes...

margaret - that made me chuckle.

Oh, yes. Because words like "chairperson" and "humankind" are so much worse than "lol brb".

I find it amusing that both Shakespeare and Austen, who he mentions as examples of good writers whose English was untainted by feminism, actually used gender neutral language before it was cool.

Personally, when I read an old work that uses "men" where today one would use "people," I read it as "men and their womenfolk."

In my sociolinguistics class, we discussed the rising use of the singular "they" as a gender-neutral pronoun, as in, "If someone calls, tell them I'm not home." Most English teachers do not accept it as correct grammar, but there is a literary precedent, including William Shakespeare: "God send everyone their heart's desire!" (Much Ado about Nothing).

Well, amateurlinguist beat me to it by one minute!

This rant reminds me of a argument I had with a professor during my sophomore year. He kept using the term mankind, and referring everything to 'he,' and 'him.' I asked him why he didnt use humankind being that every professor I had studied under used humankind and she/he guy/gal and gave examples in multiple genders (i.e. shes an astronaught). He said it was because men created everything (asserting that everything is to be attributed to the almighty dick) and when women become more prolific in office we could ask them (ie men) to change that. My face burst into flames. I went straight to the department head (who was a woman) and told her about the comments. She was a little unsure of how to handle the situation and sought council from the other professors in the political science and womens studies program. Every class I would argue with the teacher when he used the word. In one instance he ranted about 'oh...this is something you crazy feminists created' and pointed to himself and said that he was not a misogynist. Eventually I dropped the class (I wasnt paying for sexism). The next semester when my poli sci female professor heard about it she sounded surprised 'youre the one making all the noise....' She said she thought it was interesting and wanted to know more about the story. The department head said she was sorry I had to drop the class. In one instance the professor (the asshole) stopped me in the hallway after I'd seen the Department Head and said that he just told me not to attend the class, not drop it...which is stupid because if I'm not attending, why would I pay for it!

He's an ass that drives a crap vehicle. I smirk to myself everytime I get in my little sportscar-so much for sexism making $$.

Waah! I've been writing the same way ever since I learned how to hold a pencil and now I'm supposed to change everything just because some whiny bitches interpreted the deletion of their entire half of the population from the written language as somehow implying that they were less than human!

This guy must be the shittiest teacher in the profession. He ain't the writer he thinks he is, either. That article is a mess. He's so in love with what he's saying that he just keeps repeating it in as many different words as he can think of. I hate writing like that; it's always three times as long as it needs to be and completely disorganized. And then there's the compulsive use of "ideologues" and "lying" and "the Establishment." That tinfoil hat need replacing, Dave?

"whenever I read texts that refer to "people" as "man" or "mankind," and only use the pronoun "he," I never rethink the text with the idea that it applies to all people. I read it exactly as written."

Me too! Thats one of my problems reading "The Second Sex." Simone Beauvoir (or the translators) use mankind or him for everything-even in a book about sexism! It boggles my mind!I always have to re-read it, because my mind says, well...mankind!

What do you call all women: womankind! What do you call all men: mankind! What do you call both genders: HUMANkind!

I prefer the spelling humynkind though.

I have trouble with reading stuff written to the male default too. It really can be jarring sometimes. I remember being twelve or thirteen and finding "If --," by Rudyard Kipling, in my English book, and being thrilled with it, thinking, Wow, cool, this really is universally applicable advice; I barely take issue with any of it, and it's the least obnoxious hundred-year-old moral polemic I've ever read -- he hasn't even said anything about Christianity yet, and I don't think he's going to! And then I reached the very last line, "And, which is more, you'll be a Man, my son!" Well, fine, then, Kipling, fuck you too. Of course, I now know that Kipling's life and work provided us all with many more reasons to tell him to go fuck himself, but I think that was the first thing I'd ever read by him, and I still resent that he grabbed that poem right back out of my hands at the last minute. I'll never be able to read it the way I did that first time, before he told me it wasn't meant for me.

Oh no! The language is changing! It's absolutely never done that before! How will we all manage? English is doomed, I tell you! Doomed! By the end of the century, we'll all just be communicating in grunts and hand gestures!

... wow, this annoys me both as a feminist and as a linguist. Double points!

(oh, and Misspelled, I had exactly the same feeling about that poem as a kid. "Oh. A man. Right. I see. Thanks.")

He seems pretty hung up on the -ess suffix. This is what my dictionary has to say:

-ess (suffix) forming nouns denoting female gender
Origin: from the French -esse, via late Latin from Greek -issa
Usage: The suffix -ess has been used since the Middle Ages to form nouns denoting female persons, using a neutral or a male form as the base (such as hostess and actress from host and actor). Despite the apparent equivalence between the mail and female pairs of forms, however, they are rarely equivalent in terms of actual use and connotation in modern English (consider the differences in meaning and use between manager and manageress). In the late 20th century, as the role of women in society changed, some of these feminine forms became problematic and are now regarded as old-fashioned, sexist, and patronizing (e.g., poetess, authoress, editress). The 'male' form is increasingly being used as the 'neutral' form, where the gender of the person is simply unspecified.

Also, did anyone else notice just how many times this guy uses really poor metaphors like "language rapists", and how skewed his word choices are (not that they'd be neutral, of course)?

* "bashing into surrounding phrases like bumper cars" (because women can't drive)
* "feminism had already got America in a chokehold" (let's get some domestic violence in there, too)
* "elbow her way like a noisy drunk ... Throw the bum out."
* "hit-and-run vandalizing" (did he already suggest that women can't drive?)

* "ugly", "grotesque", "nonsensical", "logic has never been a strong suit" when referring to feminist writers/writings;
* "purest, freshest, clearest", when referring to E.B. White; "hero" referring only to men.

"I have to go castrate some sentences before my day is through."

I was going to emasculate some subject-verb agreement. To each her own. :)

I love the absurdity of a Yale professor bashing the "Academic-Industrial complex." On principle, I'm going to instruct my students to call me professoress from now on.

Oh, heck, if you're still looking for substitutes for "he and she," there's still "one"!

Ugh, I hate that he's sticking up for something that has made me-- and I'm sure, tons of women-- feel excluded from just about everything that's writen down.
This is actually the reason I got interested in feminism; I was reading a textbook in my freshman year of college and every single "neutral" pronoun was He.
"When the experiment does such n' such, he can be sure of his results by..."
And I felt like that subject, which was already hard for me, totally excluded my existence.
But hey, without that lovely little patriarchal exclusion, I may never have stopped being afraid of the f-word.
And yeah, "he and she" can get cumbersome, but like Clare said, one can always use 'one'! Or just rotating pronouns. Hope the men don't go crazy being anonymously called she 50% of the time...

Thats one of my problems reading "The Second Sex." Simone Beauvoir (or the translators) use mankind or him for everything-even in a book about sexism!

It's most likely the translation. The English translation of The Second Sex is notoriously awful. The publisher got a guy who was a zoologist by trade--they thought they were getting a female version of The Kinsey Report, and so they hired some fool who had no background in existentialism or philosophy at all, who not only mutilated de Beauvoir's text in the translation, but cut around two or three hundred pages. And now the publisher doesn't think it's worth their effort and money to commission a new English translation, so those of us who aren't fluent in French are screwed until the English-language publisher's exclusive rights expire, some decades from now. It's pretty appalling.

Oh, and since there is an ungendered pronoun in French which means roughly "people" ("on"), I'm sure it is the translator's fault rather than de Beauvoir's.

To add to my earlier comment about rotating gendered pronouns:
In his article, Gerlenter says using a "neutral she" causes a train wreak that stops the reader in HIS tracks.
Well, yeah. He doesn't think it's the same for women who read a long passage about how a person can do anything HE sets HIS mind to? "He" is only a neutral pronoun in the eyes of men. To me, if I read any story, article, etc, about a "person," I generally assume she's female, unless the actions of that character prove me wrong.
And that happens so often; the white males who are the majority in the business and political world see Neutral People as white males, because they are, and don't stop to think that everyone else's view of a "neutral" person may be different. To me, this is the major problem facing social equality today. Generally, in western society, the laws and rules are set up for equality, but the social exclusions make it pretty damn impossible.

Margaret, I just laughed my ass off. Perfect. We should all write him letters, and they should all be in Old English. Perfect.

In consequence we have all got used to sentences where puffed-up words like "chairperson" and "humankind" strut and preen, where he-or-she's keep bashing into surrounding phrases like bumper cars and related deformities blossom like blisters; they are all markers of an epoch-making victory of propaganda over common sense.

I'm sorry. He lost me at "chairperson."

The English language has, indeed, gone to shit in some ways, but NOT because we use gender neutral terms. If Gelernter is so upset about the "rape" of the English langauge, why isn't he so pissed off about the invention of new offensive slang, such as "that's so gay"? Or "you're such a pussy", meaning weakness.

Why is it that offensive slang is more acceptible? No one should be so upset about the changing of words as a result to show respect to all people.

Oh no, how dare a language evolve! Maybe Mr. Gelernter should take up Latin so he doesn't have to worry about it being "raped". And it even has a gender neutral pronoun! But then again, that won't allow him to a chauvinist...

DG: Thou clay-brained guts, thou knotty-pated fool, thou whoreson obscene greasy tallow-catch - thy brain is as dry as the remainder biscuit after voyage. Methink'st thou art a general offence and all should beat thee.

You know, this guy could avoid having a hernia and just use the word 'fireman'. He'd stop whining AND make it easier for us to know which people to publicly ridicule.

I'm only bothered by the language alterations and ridiculous neologisims that can, in fact, be directly blamed on feminists.

Things such as "womyn" and "herstory".

I mean, becuase those DO rape the English language, because they ignore the history and rules of the words involved.

Seeing someone type "wimmin/womyn/whatever" makes me want to smash my head into the desk because of how blatantly incorrect it is. Assuming that the "man" in "woman" means "male" is ignorant.

Same with assuming that the "his" in history is a genitive pronoun, when it most certainly isn't, also induces a headdesk. It would have to be "hisstory" for that.

Things like that bug me. For the most part, neutering words and phrases does not.

Except the whole "mail carrier to letter carrier because mail sounds like male" debacle. I won't give reference here, just look it up. It's sort of infamous.

And manhole to maintenance opening, because it's needlessly cumbersome, and I don't like to waste vocalizations.

those DO rape the English language, because they ignore the history and rules of the words involved.

Yeah, that's not "rape" means, even metaphorically. I loathe the use of the word "rape" to mean "do something I don't like" in the same way that I loathe the use of the word "Nazi" to mean "someone who's strict." It's a way of effacing brutal violence against disempowered groups.

I have a soft spot for "womyn" and "herstory" when they're used by college students who have just come to an understanding of feminism; they've served their purpose, made their point. But they're wrong.

"Things such as "womyn" and "herstory".

I mean, becuase those DO rape the English language, because they ignore the history and rules of the words involved."

Actually Mild Ennui, I am fairly sure they are responding to the history of the words. According to the American Heritage Dictionary, "man" in its origin meant "human being". But it also means male. The implication is sort of that males are the default human being, don't you think? That is what the alternative spellings to "womyn" are seeking to address.

Similarly (although less strong of a point, I'll grant you) history comes from "histor" which is Greek for "wise man". Again, a gendered term.

The implication is sort of that males are the default human being, don't you think?

Heh, Nina. I always subscribed to an alternative interpretation: because "man" is only about half of the full word "woman," the language is clearly telling us that "woman" is the full human being and that "man" is merely a crude, not fully formed, primitive being.

I guess the only response I have for you then is that I don't find creative spelling of words to be particularly more offensive than creative interpretations of words.

That was humorous, Nina. Or it was supposed to be, which is why I prefaced it with a chuckle.

In all seriousness, I do dislike "creative" spelling. I always correct it on papers.

Well, and as an undergraduate I've come to decide that the traditional institution of academia is as a whole one of the enemies of the people -so there you go =P

the traditional institution of academia is as a whole one of the enemies of the people

We are many. Sadly, academia is one of the lowest-paying enemies of the people.

Also, we can't catch a break from our fellow enemies of the people, as academics and academia are constantly being pilloried by right-wingers for being bastions of evil leftism and feminism. So for all aspiring enemies of the people out there, I must recommend that you go into banking or think-tanking or munitions-manufacturing or something similarly remunerative and well-respected by your comrades in people-hating.

Nina, you're mistaken. As you said, the English word "man" originally and primarily (if not exclusively) referred to a human being. But your conclusion that this implicates men as the default human being does not follow. A male human being and a female human being, respectively, were referred to as "werman" and "wifman." A commenter above already mentioned this in passing. In Middle English, of course, "man" replaced "wer" but "wyf" was retained, and "wifman" gradually evolved into "woman." You're right to think that "wo-" is a suffix, but it is not a suffix to maleness -- it is a suffix to humanness. That the word for humanness in this context happens to still be "man," which is now seen as gendered, does not prove your point.

As for "history," it comes from the Middle English "historie," from the Latin "historia," from the Greek "historía" -- which means "learning or knowing by inquiry," and also connotes our modern idea of "history." This Greek word "historía" itself derives from "hístÅ?r," which means "one who knows or sees." No mention of masculinity, as far as I can tell. Though an ancient Greek writer may have envisioned this "one" as a man -- one wonders what Sappho thought -- there doesn't seem to be any sexism in the etymology itself.

A little common sense and research go a long way to making sense of these disputes. I couldn't help but notice that two separate posters mocked the article's author for supposedly inventing "skreak" before even bothering to look it up themselves -- and the one who did, upon finding herself wrong, proceeded to further insult the author for knowing a word that she had not. Even were it a neologism, what a silly point to pick on! In the context of nails on a blackboard, the efficacious onomatopoeia of the word speaks for itself.

Nina, you're mistaken. As you said, the English word "man" originally and primarily (if not exclusively) referred to a human being. But your conclusion that this implicates men as the default human being does not follow. A male human being and a female human being, respectively, were referred to as "werman" and "wifman." A commenter above already mentioned this in passing. In Middle English, of course, "man" replaced "wer" but "wyf" was retained, and "wifman" gradually evolved into "woman." You're right to think that "wo-" is a suffix, but it is not a suffix to maleness -- it is a suffix to humanness. That the word for humanness in this context happens to still be "man," which is now seen as gendered, does not prove your point.

As for "history," it comes from the Middle English "historie," from the Latin "historia," from the Greek "historía" -- which means "learning or knowing by inquiry," and also connotes our modern idea of "history." This Greek word "historía" itself derives from "hístÅ?r," which means "one who knows or sees." No mention of masculinity, as far as I can tell. Though an ancient Greek writer may have envisioned this "one" as a man -- one wonders what Sappho thought -- there doesn't seem to be any sexism in the etymology itself.

A little common sense and research go a long way to making sense of these disputes. I couldn't help but notice that two separate posters mocked the article's author for supposedly inventing "skreak" before even bothering to look it up themselves -- and the one who did, upon finding herself wrong, proceeded to further insult the author for knowing a word that she had not. Even were it a neologism, what a silly point to pick on! In the context of nails on a blackboard, the efficacious onomatopoeia of the word speaks for itself.

Nina, you're mistaken. As you said, the English word "man" originally and primarily (if not exclusively) referred to a human being. But your conclusion that this implicates men as the default human being does not follow. A male human being and a female human being, respectively, were referred to as "werman" and "wifman." A commenter above already mentioned this in passing. In Middle English, of course, "man" replaced "wer" but "wyf" was retained, and "wifman" gradually evolved into "woman." You're right to think that "wo-" is a suffix, but it is not a suffix to maleness -- it is a suffix to humanness. That the word for humanness in this context happens to still be "man," which is now seen as gendered, does not prove your point.

As for "history," it comes from the Middle English "historie," from the Latin "historia," from the Greek "historía" -- which means "learning or knowing by inquiry," and also connotes our modern idea of "history." This Greek word "historía" itself derives from "hístÅ?r," which means "one who knows or sees." No mention of masculinity, as far as I can tell. Though an ancient Greek writer may have envisioned this "one" as a man -- one wonders what Sappho thought -- there doesn't seem to be any sexism in the etymology itself.

A little common sense and research go a long way to making sense of these disputes. I couldn't help but notice that two separate posters mocked the article's author for supposedly inventing "skreak" before even bothering to look it up themselves -- and the one who did, upon finding herself wrong, proceeded to further insult the author for knowing a word that she had not. Even were it a neologism, what a silly point to pick on! In the context of nails on a blackboard, the efficacious onomatopoeia of the word speaks for itself.

I think my original message was too long -- I kept getting a connection time-out -- so I've broken it into two posts.

Nina, you're mistaken. As you said, the English word "man" originally and primarily (if not exclusively) referred to a human being. But your conclusion that this implicates men as the default human being does not follow. A male human being and a female human being, respectively, were referred to as "werman" and "wifman." A commenter above already mentioned this in passing. In Middle English, of course, "man" replaced "wer" but "wyf" was retained, and "wifman" gradually evolved into "woman." You're right to think that "wo-" is a suffix, but it is not a suffix to maleness -- it is a suffix to humanness. That the word for humanness in this context happens to still be "man," which is now seen as gendered, does not prove your point.

Continued below . . .

"HAHAHAHAH! What goes around comes around.

He says the English language is wrecked? I'll bet he's not losing sleep over all of the languages wrecked by English! What a pathetic loser.

How many English words have gotten sucked mercilessly into other languages?

I've heard it with my own ears too; Italians lament the creeping of English into their language, especially in technical areas like business."

This is a pretty lame comment. English has "wrecked" no languages. In fact, if you want to talk about such an absurd thing as a language being "wrecked" by another, how about the French influence, the Breton influence, and the Latin influence? Stupid languages, they wrecked English!

The French are probably one of the most protective peoples of their language (l'Académie Française), more so than the Italians for sure (who are equally proud, probably). Tons of english words have crept into everyday French, and while some "lament" it, it doesn't make them right. It makes them linguistically myopic.

English is prominent in business largely because of technology. Most modern (nano)technology came out of english speaking countries, and thus it's written in english. Go look at the source code for a website in Japanese: it still has [i][/i] for italic. Their word for it likely doesn't begin with an I. Ohnoes, english is wrecking other idiomas!!

"Oh, and since there is an ungendered pronoun in French which means roughly "people" ("on"), I'm sure it is the translator's fault rather than de Beauvoir's."

Probably the translator's fault, but "on" for people is quite rough. "One" would be better. And we have it in english...

"Herstory" and other such concoctions are usually rather childish, in my opinion. "History" in French is "histoire," but the possessive adjective "his" is "son/sa". What would a "rebelling" french feminist call it who does not connect "his"-toire with maleness, "sastoire"? It's a platitude and pointless.

EG,

Sure right-wingers attack the ideas in academia (well, I've had my share of right-wing idea, male-centered universe perpetuating profs in areas like philosophy and biology, but that's a slightly different issue...)

What I'm thinking is more that if college let in anyone and everyone, it would cease to exist. It helps create economic stratification.

The_Cellest, I think the point is more that if people never took liberty w/ language, we'd all still be speaking something totally different than English. I agree standardized spelling is for the most part a good thing (trying to read middle-english can be a b****) but as long as a new term/spelling is widely recognizable, it's really not different from the process that has been happening to our language, sometimes consciously, sometimes not, throughout the centuries...

"The media was playing with replacing 'actress' with 'actor' for a while (still not sure which won out) and 'poet' completely eliminated 'poetess'. Yet again the masculine form of a word is considered somehow gender-neutral."

Actually, these particular examples ARE gender-neutral. A poet is a person who writes poems, and an actor is a person who acts. Do you insist on referring to a female doctor as a 'doctress'? There is nothing in the words themselves to indicate 'male person'.

Calling these gender-neutral words 'masculine' is actually misogynist, since it assumes that a 'person' is male unless that person is specically stated to be female.

Yeah, that's not "rape" means, even metaphorically. I loathe the use of the word "rape" to mean "do something I don't like" in the same way that I loathe the use of the word "Nazi" to mean "someone who's strict." It's a way of effacing brutal violence against disempowered groups.

"An act of plunder, violent seizure, or abuse; despoliation; violation: "the rape of the countryside"."

Or, in fact, the word rape has more than one meaning, and that's the one I used. See the above definition.

According to the American Heritage Dictionary, "man" in its origin meant "human being". But it also means male. The implication is sort of that males are the default human being, don't you think? That is what the alternative spellings to "womyn" are seeking to address.

They're incorrect. Man meant human being, "werman" and "wifman" were male and female. As the language evolved, the prefix was dropped from one, changed from the other. It does not imply that "male is default".

That's why I find it gratingly ignorant when people use it. It's also misandrist, because the group using it is implying they detest males so much they have to eradicate even things that spell out the word "man".

Ruth, you mentioned that there is nothing to indicate doctor or actor as specificly male. But surley the "-or" at the end does? Is it dominator (male) and dominatrix (female), terminator and terminatrix ? So the "ix" became "ess" to indicate female in latin? Can anyone shead some light on this?

My main issue with "herstory" is that it's a pun masquerading as a serious argument. It's like arguing that we should rename the tropical storms to "himmicanes" because it's offensive to blame all that damage on women, or the surgery to "hersterectomy" because, after all, it's an operation on a woman.

It's also misandrist, because the group using it is implying they detest males so much they have to eradicate even things that spell out the word "man".

I think there are myny valuable viewpoints on this.

What I'm thinking is more that if college let in anyone and everyone, it would cease to exist. It helps create economic stratification.

Not really. The CUNY system was completely free for its first several decades of existence, until the city screwed it over financially, and it was a remarkable engine for working-class and immigrant kids moving into the professional classes.

Complete open enrollment would destroy academia, because students need to meet a certain baseline level of skills in order for higher education to happen. Without that baseline, college becomes remedial high school. Certainly, public high schools and elementary schools are failing to educate their students left, right, and center, but that slack can't be picked up by colleges and universities--that's not their purpose.

What does create and perpetuate the economic stratification you're talking about is this shift in the past thirty years in which any professional entry-level job now requires a college degree. That is total bullshit. One does not need a college degree to become an administrative assistant and move up the ranks. I've known people with five years of full-time experience in publishing, for instance, who were refused jobs because they didn't have college degrees--as though going to college somehow teaches you how to work successfully in an office and how to edit better than several years of experience actually doing those things does. There's no reason for those two things to be linked; they're not in the UK. That's what's perpetuating the economic stratification.

I've been reading the comments with great interest, and I have a question for those who know something about language and English etymology. It's my understanding that the 'man' in chairman is derived from the Latin manus, meaning hand (cf, manual labour, work done with one's hands), and signifies power or authority. Thus, the seat of power or seat of authority. Is this the case?

As to the article (screed?) written by Gelernter, well, I could hardly be bothered reading more than a few paragraphs. He does his argument no good when he proposes that fireman and firefighter mean exactly the same thing. If he can't understand the difference in meaning in these two simple words, then he is being willfully ignorant.

"They're incorrect. Man meant human being, "werman" and "wifman" were male and female. As the language evolved, the prefix was dropped from one, changed from the other. It does not imply that "male is default".

That's why I find it gratingly ignorant when people use it. It's also misandrist, because the group using it is implying they detest males so much they have to eradicate even things that spell out the word "man"."

This doesnt make sense. If you believe that "man" has no connection with the spelling "woman," then how can dropping the "a" in woman be misandrist? Anyways, you cant argue that man isnt seen as the default human being and woman as the word created from adding a "wo" to man. It insinuates she is second in consideration. For example vagina is a word that means "sheath for a sword," much of the english language was created by men seeing themselves as 'first' and women as the excemption to human. Youre missing the argument by focusing on the spellings themselves and not on the way people perceive when they use the words. You cant argue that when a person hears the word "woman" that they dont see it as a added deriviation from man, rather than an automous person. You forgot to mention, what were women known as? They couldnt have used werman and wifman to refer only to a woman.

"In fact, if you want to talk about such an absurd thing as a language being "wrecked" by another, how about the French influence, the Breton influence, and the Latin influence? Stupid languages, they wrecked English!"

Thanks Peripatetic.I was freakin reeling when I read his retort about Italians complaining about English creeping into their language. English was highly influenced by Latin (Rome conquered the Celtic areas...). I found the comment to be highly pompous and ignorant. I learned alot by reading, "The Story of French" for a French class I'm taking.

I'm more concerned about the actual effect of using male pronouns as if they're gender neutral than the history of them. Haven't there been studies showing that when the male pronoun or suffix is used, that people actually picture men only?

It's not just an academic or grammatical issue. It has actual impact, as commenters above described.

And Herstory is not just a silly pun, it makes a serious point about how history has been almost exclusively written and recorded from the male viewpoint which results in women's experiences being excluded. There are many misconceptions about women in history because women have been left out of recording and interpreting history.

"For example vagina is a word that means "sheath for a sword," much of the english language was created by men seeing themselves as 'first' and women as the excemption to human. "

I can't remember which book addressed this and suggested that if it weren't for a patriarchal society we might have different metaphors for heterosexual sex that didn't focus so much on penetration. The penis would be enveloped or something like that.

Since I started learning Spanish this year, I've been thinking about how other languages are more or less gendered than English. For example, in Spanish, the plural pronoun is masculine if the group is all male or male and female, but feminine only if the group is all female. Masculinity as the default seems to be built into the language more than it is in English, at least to my naive ears. Are there movements to "neuter" Spanish (or other languages) the same way we're talking about English?

Gopher, often women change the spelling of words often when they are in the inception of their feminist thinking and are experimenting with more radical notions of it. They are starting to be aware of the misogyny and sexism that dominates their society. They realize that women have largely been excised from history, so they are trying to reclaim their history. The are starting to realize how women are still undervalued as lesser than men, and so experiment with linguistically breaking with male root words. It's part of a process of understanding feminist thought and history.

So changing the spelling of words may be "ignorant" linguistically, but it's often an important (and transitional) part of man feminist's identity formation. For you to dismiss it purely on linguistic terms is equally ignorant and Experimentation is essential to identity formation. I hope you reconsider your disdain when you see people doing it.

I meant to write, "it's often an important part of a feminist's identity formation."

What a typo, huh?

Haven't there been studies showing that when the male pronoun or suffix is used, that people actually picture men only?...It's not just an academic or grammatical issue. It has actual impact, as commenters above described.

Yes, thank you.
If the female half of humankind feels left out when only the masculine forms are used as the default for "gender-neutral" language, then it's not actually "gender-neutral", is it?

This doesnt make sense. If you believe that "man" has no connection with the spelling "woman," then how can dropping the "a" in woman be misandrist?

Because, as I said: It implies the person using it has such a distaste for males that they have to eradicate things that even spell out "man", even when they don't mean "male".

I already said this. I hate repeating myself.

Anyways, you cant argue that man isnt seen as the default human being and woman as the word created from adding a "wo" to man.

As ALREADY SAID, (again), the word was not created by adding a "wo" to "man". The original words for male and female were "werman" and "wifman". The "man" in both of those words never meant "male". Understand? The "man" never meant "male". "woman" is not "wo" added to man (meaning male). It's an evolved prefix from "wif", which was attached to man (meaning human).

Follow?

It's been established by numerous people besides myself. It would help to read the comments to save people from repeating what's already been said.

I hate when people have the facts before them, and continue to argue points that are completely incorrect. It's ignorant.

They couldnt have used werman and wifman to refer only to a woman.

Again, werman = male, wifman = female.

Ergo, the "man" part did not mean "male" and had nothing to do with it. No matter how hard you argue it, your assumptions are wrong, reactionary, and based on personal interpretation, instead of actual fact.

can't remember which book addressed this and suggested that if it weren't for a patriarchal society we might have different metaphors for heterosexual sex that didn't focus so much on penetration. The penis would be enveloped or something like that.

Heterosexual sex IS penetration. You can't really argue the physical fact of it.

For you to dismiss it purely on linguistic terms is equally ignorant and Experimentation is essential to identity formation. I hope you reconsider your disdain when you see people doing it.

It's not ignorant to dismiss it. It's largely a group of people (like the person I quoted above) using incorrect assumptions about words. Such as assuming that "woman" means "extension of man" simply based on the fact that the word "man" is present in it. It's foolish, pointless, makes the user look ignorant, and makes them absolutely impossible to take seriously.

Mild Ennui, their point is, regardless of the ACTUAL history behind the words, people still percieve the word "woman" to be the masculine word "man" with "wo-" added to it. Regardless of whether or not that was historically the case, people still think of it that way, because that is how the English language is used now. "Man" is a masculine word now, whether or not it started out that way. Maybe YOU are the one who aren't reading the comments.

"Heterosexual sex IS penetration. You can't really argue the physical fact of it."

Well first of all you're assuming that sex is only vaginal (or I suppose anal) penetration. I consider oral sex to be sex, even though it doesn't necessarily involve penetration.

Secondly, is vaginal sex the penis entering the vagina? Or is it, as the other poster suggested, the vagina enveloping the penis? Well it's both, obviously. But I assume we view it as penetration because we've got the stereotype of men as active and women as passive stuck in our brains.

really? I wonder what he tells his students..does he point out all the girls and say look they are language rapists!!

what an ass!