Gender-neutral language in English
Encyclopedia
Gender neutrality in English is a form of linguistic prescriptivism that aims at using a form of English
that minimizes assumptions about the gender or biological sex of people referred to in speech.
These differences in usage are criticized on two grounds: one, that they reflect a biased state of society, and two, that they help to uphold that state. Studies of children, for instance, indicate that the words children hear affect their perceptions of the gender-appropriateness of certain career
s. Other research has demonstrated that men and women apply for jobs in more equal proportions when gender-neutral language is used in the advertisement, as opposed to the generic "he" or "man". Some critics make the further claim that these differences in usage are not accidental, but have been deliberately created for the purpose of upholding a patriarchal society. Proponents of gender-neutral language give many examples of usages that they find problematic.
" to argue that, although the word once referred to both males and females, it no longer does so unambiguously. In Old English, "wer
" referred to males only and "wif" to females only; "man" referred to both, although in practice "man" was sometimes also used in Old English to refer only to males. In time, "wer" fell out of use, and "man" came to refer sometimes to both sexes and sometimes to males only; "[a]s long as most generalizations about men were made by men about men, the ambiguity nestling in this dual usage was either not noticed or thought not to matter." By the eighteenth century, "man" had come to refer primarily to males; some writers who wished to use the term in the older sense deemed it necessary to spell out their meaning: Anthony Trollope
, for example, writes of "the infinite simplicity and silliness of mankind and womankind" and when "Edmund Burke
, writing of the French Revolution
, used men in the old, inclusive way, he took pains to spell out his meaning: 'Such a deplorable havoc is made in the minds of men (both sexes) in France....'"
Proponents of gender-neutral language argue that seemingly generic uses of the word "man" are often not in fact generic:
Other commentators have suggested that truly generic uses of the word "man" would be perceived as "false, funny, or insulting", citing as an example the phrase "Some men are female."
Further, some commentators point out that, in the past, the ostensibly gender-neutral use of "man" has in fact been used to exclude women:
For these reasons, proponents of gender-neutral language claim that linguistic clarity as well as equality would be better served by having "man" refer unambiguously to males, and "human" to all persons.
and, despite its putative inclusiveness, has been used to deny women's entry into professions and schools.
Proposed alternatives to the generic "he" include "he or she" (or "she or he"), "s/he", or the use of "they" in the singular; each of these alternatives has met with objections. Some feel the use of the singular "they" sounds like a grammatical error, but according to some references, "they", "their", and "them" have long been grammatically acceptable as gender-neutral singular pronouns in English:
Proponents of the singular "they" argue that the word has been used in the singular continuously since the Middle Ages
, and cite its use by a number of prominent authors, including Geoffrey Chaucer
, William Shakespeare
, and Jane Austen
. Linguist Steven Pinker
goes further and argues that traditional grammar prescriptions regarding the use of singular "they" are themselves grammatically incorrect:
Most style guides agree with these arguments, and generally accept the singular "they" as grammatically correct, while others continue to reject it. Some, such as The Chicago Manual of Style, hold a neutral position on the issue, and contend any approach used is likely to displease some readers.
Research has found that the use of generic masculine pronouns creates "male bias" by evoking a disproportionate number of male images and excluding thoughts of women in non-sex specific instances. Moreover, a study by John Gastil found that while the plural they functions as a generic pronoun for both males and females, males may comprehend he/she in a manner similar to he.
is used of men regardless of marital status, the titles Miss
and Mrs
indicate a woman's marital status, and thus signal her sexual availability to men in a way that men's titles do not. The practice of referring to married women by their husband's first and last names has also been criticized, beginning in the nineteenth century: when the Reverend Samuel May "moved that Mrs Stephen Smith be placed on a Committee" of the National Women's Rights Convention
in Seneca Falls
, Lucretia Mott
"quickly replied: Woman's Rights' women do not like to be called by their husbands' names, but by their own." Elizabeth Cady Stanton
refused to be addressed as "Mrs Henry B. Stanton". The practice was developed in the mid-eighteenth century and was tied to the idea of coverture
, the idea that "By marriage, the husband and wife are one person in law; that is, the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during the marriage."
The honorific "Mx
," full form Mixter, is used in place of traditional honorifics in order to provide gender-neutrality.
"). There may also be parallel usage of existing gender-specific terms - for example, "men and women" rather than "men and ladies", or "husband and wife" instead of "man and wife".
Further, proponents of gender-neutral language argue that making language less biased is not only laudable, but achievable. Many people find non-neutral language to be offensive.
However, the use of the word "man" as a generic word referring to all humans has been declining, particularly among female speakers and writers. Other potentially male-centric terms such as woman are generally acceptable. Many editing houses, corporations, and government bodies have official policies in favor of in-house use of gender-neutral language. In some cases, laws exist regarding the use of gender-neutral language in certain situations, such as job advertisements. The majority of advocates for gender-neutral language, however, generally prefer persuasion rather than enforcement. One method for such persuasion is creating guidelines that indicate how they believe language should be used, or providing an example through their own use of gender-neutral language.
Different authorities have presented guidelines on whether and how to use gender-neutral, or "non-sexist" language. Several are listed below:
In addition, gender-neutral language has gained support from some major textbook publishers, and from professional and academic groups such as the American Psychological Association
and the Associated Press
. Newspaper
s such as the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal use gender-neutral language. Many law journals, psychology journals, and literature journals will only print articles or papers that use gender-inclusive language.
Employee policy manuals have recently started to include strongly worded statements prescribing avoidance of language that potentially could be considered discriminatory. The wording of this statement from a policy manual is typical: "All documents, publications or presentations developed by all constituencies…shall be written in gender neutral and/or gender inclusive language." Employees are told that they need to be aware of their responsibilities to avoid discriminatory language, and that they must implement the enterprise's commitment to treat stakeholders equally and with courtesy. Institutional members are instructed, as a matter of corporate policy, to avoid using language that may even appear to be discriminatory, or that may gratuitously give offense in verbal or written communication. Manuals sometimes provide guidance about how to reflect the concept of valuing diversity in language usage.
Standards advocated by supporters of the gender-neutral modification in English have been applied differently and to differing degrees among English speakers worldwide. This reflects differences in culture and language structure, for example American English
in contrast to British English
. They are also affected by other factors, such as whether a person uses English as a first language or as a second language, regional variants or whether a particular form of English is based on grammatical structures inherited from another language (for example, Hiberno-English
) or owes its linguistic structure to earlier Old English or Elizabethan English. In these cases, language structure from the native tongue or linguistic inheritance may be engaged.
". Any other alternatives to gender-specific language are claimed to "lead one into using awkward or grating constructions" or neologisms that are so ugly as to be "abominations".
Some argue that gender-neutral language is unnecessary because no bias exists, finding the endeavor to be "useless, for we all know that the masculine pronoun refers to female and male people". A common argument is that historically terms such as "man" have been uniformly used as gender-neutral, and opponents of gender-neutral language often point to the fact that "man" in Old English referred to either men or women; feminists are claimed to be engaged in an attempt to "blot out" this fact and "re-write history".
Others argue that the linguistic differentiation
of women actually reflects women being "more" valued than men, not less. Opponents of gender-neutral language often argue that proponents of gender-neutral language are impinging on the right of free expression and promoting censorship. A few commentators do not disagree with the usage of gender-neutral language per se, but they do question the effectiveness of gender-neutral language in overcoming sexism.
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
that minimizes assumptions about the gender or biological sex of people referred to in speech.
Rationale
Proponents of gender-neutral language argue that the use of gender-specific language often implies male superiority or reflects an unequal state of society. According to The handbook of English linguistics, generic masculine pronouns and gender-specific job titles are instances "where English linguistic convention has historically treated men as prototypical of the human species." Words that refer to women often devolve in meaning, frequently taking on sexual overtones.These differences in usage are criticized on two grounds: one, that they reflect a biased state of society, and two, that they help to uphold that state. Studies of children, for instance, indicate that the words children hear affect their perceptions of the gender-appropriateness of certain career
Career
Career is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as a person's "course or progress through life ". It is usually considered to pertain to remunerative work ....
s. Other research has demonstrated that men and women apply for jobs in more equal proportions when gender-neutral language is used in the advertisement, as opposed to the generic "he" or "man". Some critics make the further claim that these differences in usage are not accidental, but have been deliberately created for the purpose of upholding a patriarchal society. Proponents of gender-neutral language give many examples of usages that they find problematic.
Words for humans
Proponents of gender-neutral language often point to the history of the word "manMan (word)
The term man and words derived from it can designate any or even all of the human race regardless of their sex or age...
" to argue that, although the word once referred to both males and females, it no longer does so unambiguously. In Old English, "wer
Were
Were and wer are archaic terms for adult male humans and were often used for alliteration with wife as "were and wife" in Germanic-speaking cultures ....
" referred to males only and "wif" to females only; "man" referred to both, although in practice "man" was sometimes also used in Old English to refer only to males. In time, "wer" fell out of use, and "man" came to refer sometimes to both sexes and sometimes to males only; "[a]s long as most generalizations about men were made by men about men, the ambiguity nestling in this dual usage was either not noticed or thought not to matter." By the eighteenth century, "man" had come to refer primarily to males; some writers who wished to use the term in the older sense deemed it necessary to spell out their meaning: Anthony Trollope
Anthony Trollope
Anthony Trollope was one of the most successful, prolific and respected English novelists of the Victorian era. Some of his best-loved works, collectively known as the Chronicles of Barsetshire, revolve around the imaginary county of Barsetshire...
, for example, writes of "the infinite simplicity and silliness of mankind and womankind" and when "Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke PC was an Irish statesman, author, orator, political theorist and philosopher who, after moving to England, served for many years in the House of Commons of Great Britain as a member of the Whig party....
, writing of the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
, used men in the old, inclusive way, he took pains to spell out his meaning: 'Such a deplorable havoc is made in the minds of men (both sexes) in France....'"
Proponents of gender-neutral language argue that seemingly generic uses of the word "man" are often not in fact generic:
One author, ostensibly generalizing about all human beings, wrote:
"As for man, he is no different from the rest. His back aches, he ruptures easily, his women have difficulties in childbirth...."
If man and he were truly generic, the parallel phrase would have been he has difficulties in childbirth.
Other commentators have suggested that truly generic uses of the word "man" would be perceived as "false, funny, or insulting", citing as an example the phrase "Some men are female."
Further, some commentators point out that, in the past, the ostensibly gender-neutral use of "man" has in fact been used to exclude women:
Thomas JeffersonThomas JeffersonThomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
did not make the same distinction in declaring that "all men are created equal" and "governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." In a time when women, having no vote, could neither give nor withhold consent, Jefferson had to be using the word men in its principal sense of "males", and it probably never occurred to him that anyone would think otherwise.
For these reasons, proponents of gender-neutral language claim that linguistic clarity as well as equality would be better served by having "man" refer unambiguously to males, and "human" to all persons.
Pronouns
The use of masculine pronouns to refer to antecedents of mixed or indeterminate gender, while traditional, is a target of frequent criticism by proponents of gender-neutral language. Critics of the use of the generic "he" argue that this usage was invented and propagated by men, such as Thomas Wilson and Joshua Poole, whose explicit goal was the linguistic representation of men's superiority. The use of the generic "he" was in fact enforced by an Act of ParliamentInterpretation Act 1850
The Interpretation Act 1850 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom passed in 1850 that simplified the language that was used in statutes. It was also known as Lord Brougham's Act, and its long title was An Act for shortening the Language used in Acts of Parliament...
and, despite its putative inclusiveness, has been used to deny women's entry into professions and schools.
Proposed alternatives to the generic "he" include "he or she" (or "she or he"), "s/he", or the use of "they" in the singular; each of these alternatives has met with objections. Some feel the use of the singular "they" sounds like a grammatical error, but according to some references, "they", "their", and "them" have long been grammatically acceptable as gender-neutral singular pronouns in English:
Proponents of the singular "they" argue that the word has been used in the singular continuously since the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
, and cite its use by a number of prominent authors, including Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer , known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey...
, William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
, and Jane Austen
Jane Austen
Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...
. Linguist Steven Pinker
Steven Pinker
Steven Arthur Pinker is a Canadian-American experimental psychologist, cognitive scientist, linguist and popular science author...
goes further and argues that traditional grammar prescriptions regarding the use of singular "they" are themselves grammatically incorrect:
The next time you get corrected for this sin [of using "they" in the singular], ask Mr. Smartypants how you should fix the following:
Mary saw everyone before John noticed them.
Now watch him squirm as he mulls over the downright unintelligible "improvement", Mary saw everyone before John noticed him.
The logical point that you, Holden CaulfieldHolden CaulfieldHolden Caulfield is the 16-to-17 years old protagonist of author J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. He is universally recognized for his resistance to growing older and desire to protect childhood innocence...
, and everyone but the language mavens intuitively grasp is that everyone and they are not an "antecedent" and a "pronoun" referring to the same person in the world, which would force them to agree in number. They are a "quantifier" and a "bound variable", a different logical relationship. Everyone returned to their seats means "For all X, X returned to X's seat." The "X" does not refer to any particular person or group of people; it is simply a placeholder that keeps track of the roles that players play across different relationships. In this case, the X that comes back to a seat is the same X that owns the seat that X comes back to. The their there does not, in fact, have plural number, because it refers neither to one thing nor to many things; it does not refer at all. The same goes for the hypothetical caller: there may be one, there may be none, or the phone might ring off the hook with would-be suitors; all that matters is that every time there is a caller, if there is a caller, that caller, and not someone else, should be put off.
Most style guides agree with these arguments, and generally accept the singular "they" as grammatically correct, while others continue to reject it. Some, such as The Chicago Manual of Style, hold a neutral position on the issue, and contend any approach used is likely to displease some readers.
Research has found that the use of generic masculine pronouns creates "male bias" by evoking a disproportionate number of male images and excluding thoughts of women in non-sex specific instances. Moreover, a study by John Gastil found that while the plural they functions as a generic pronoun for both males and females, males may comprehend he/she in a manner similar to he.
Naming practices
Some critics oppose the practice of women changing their names upon marriage, on the grounds that it makes women historically invisible: "In our society 'only men have real names' in that their names are permanent and they have 'accepted the permanency of their names as one of the rights of being male.'... Essentially this practice means that womens' family names do not count and that there is one more device for making women invisible." Historically, as women have been granted greater access to the professions they have been less likely to change their names, either professionally or legally; names are tied to reputations and women have been less likely to changes their names when they have higher reputations.Honorifics
Proponents of gender-neutral language point out that, while MrMR
MR, Mr, mr, or mR may refer to:*Mr. an honorific title of menPlaces:* Morocco country code * Martinique country code...
is used of men regardless of marital status, the titles Miss
Miss
Miss is an English language honorific traditionally used only for an unmarried woman . Originating in the 17th century, it is a contraction of mistress, which was used for all women. A period is not used to signify the contraction...
and Mrs
MRS
MRS can refer to:* Magnetic resonance spectroscopy* Mandibular repositioning splint* Marginal rate of substitution, in economics* Marseille Provence Airport, IATA airport code* Materials Research Society* Melbourne Rectangular Stadium...
indicate a woman's marital status, and thus signal her sexual availability to men in a way that men's titles do not. The practice of referring to married women by their husband's first and last names has also been criticized, beginning in the nineteenth century: when the Reverend Samuel May "moved that Mrs Stephen Smith be placed on a Committee" of the National Women's Rights Convention
National Women's Rights Convention
The National Women's Rights Convention was an annual series of meetings that increased the visibility of the early women's rights movement in the United States. First held in 1850 in Worcester, Massachusetts, the National Women's Rights Convention combined both male and female leadership, and...
in Seneca Falls
Seneca Falls (village), New York
Seneca Falls is a village in Seneca County, New York, United States. The population was 6,861 at the 2000 census. The village is in the Town of Seneca Falls, east of Geneva, New York. On March 16, 2010, village residents voted to dissolve the village, a move that would take effect at the end of 2011...
, Lucretia Mott
Lucretia Mott
Lucretia Coffin Mott was an American Quaker, abolitionist, social reformer, and proponent of women's rights.- Early life and education:...
"quickly replied: Woman's Rights' women do not like to be called by their husbands' names, but by their own." Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Elizabeth Cady Stanton was an American social activist, abolitionist, and leading figure of the early woman's movement...
refused to be addressed as "Mrs Henry B. Stanton". The practice was developed in the mid-eighteenth century and was tied to the idea of coverture
Coverture
Coverture was a legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman's legal rights were subsumed by those of her husband. Coverture was enshrined in the common law of England and the United States throughout most of the 19th century...
, the idea that "By marriage, the husband and wife are one person in law; that is, the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during the marriage."
The honorific "Mx
MX
-Internet and computing:* .mx, an Internet top-level domain* MX record, an Internet data element used for routing email* WinMX, a file sharing program* Logitech MX Revolution, a computer mouse* Macromedia Studio MX, a web content software program...
," full form Mixter, is used in place of traditional honorifics in order to provide gender-neutrality.
Feasibility
Advocates of gender-neutral language argue that language is rich in alternatives that speakers and writers, sensitive to attitudes and beliefs of audiences, can use without impinging on the effectiveness of their communication. They are also able to be true to their notions of grammatical propriety. In some cases, gender-neutral language may be achieved through the use of gender-inclusive, gender-neutral or epicene words ("human being", "person", "individual", and so on) instead of gender-specific ones ("man", "woman", "he", "she", "businessman", "mother", etc.), when speaking of people whose gender is unknown, ambiguous, or unimportant. If no gender-inclusive terms exist, new ones may be coined (e.g., "businesspersonBusinessperson
A businessperson is someone involved in a particular undertaking of activities for the purpose of generating revenue from a combination of human, financial, or physical capital. An entrepreneur is an example of a business person...
"). There may also be parallel usage of existing gender-specific terms - for example, "men and women" rather than "men and ladies", or "husband and wife" instead of "man and wife".
Further, proponents of gender-neutral language argue that making language less biased is not only laudable, but achievable. Many people find non-neutral language to be offensive.
There is a growing awareness that language does not merely reflect the way we think: it also shapes our thinking. If words and expressions that imply that women or men are inferior are constantly used, that assumption of inferiority tends to become part of our mindset…. Language is a powerful tool: poets and propagandists know this — as, indeed, do victims of discrimination.
However, the use of the word "man" as a generic word referring to all humans has been declining, particularly among female speakers and writers. Other potentially male-centric terms such as woman are generally acceptable. Many editing houses, corporations, and government bodies have official policies in favor of in-house use of gender-neutral language. In some cases, laws exist regarding the use of gender-neutral language in certain situations, such as job advertisements. The majority of advocates for gender-neutral language, however, generally prefer persuasion rather than enforcement. One method for such persuasion is creating guidelines that indicate how they believe language should be used, or providing an example through their own use of gender-neutral language.
Different authorities have presented guidelines on whether and how to use gender-neutral, or "non-sexist" language. Several are listed below:
- The "Publication Manual" of the American Psychological Association has an oft-cited section on "Guidelines to Reduce Bias in Language". ISBN 1–55798–791–2
- American Philosophical Association — published 1986
- The Guardian — see section "gender issues"
- Avoiding Heterosexual Bias in Language, published by the Committee on Lesbian and Gay Concerns, American Psychological AssociationAmerican Psychological AssociationThe American Psychological Association is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States. It is the world's largest association of psychologists with around 154,000 members including scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants and students. The APA...
.
In addition, gender-neutral language has gained support from some major textbook publishers, and from professional and academic groups such as the American Psychological Association
American Psychological Association
The American Psychological Association is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States. It is the world's largest association of psychologists with around 154,000 members including scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants and students. The APA...
and the Associated Press
Associated Press
The Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
. Newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
s such as the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal use gender-neutral language. Many law journals, psychology journals, and literature journals will only print articles or papers that use gender-inclusive language.
Employee policy manuals have recently started to include strongly worded statements prescribing avoidance of language that potentially could be considered discriminatory. The wording of this statement from a policy manual is typical: "All documents, publications or presentations developed by all constituencies…shall be written in gender neutral and/or gender inclusive language." Employees are told that they need to be aware of their responsibilities to avoid discriminatory language, and that they must implement the enterprise's commitment to treat stakeholders equally and with courtesy. Institutional members are instructed, as a matter of corporate policy, to avoid using language that may even appear to be discriminatory, or that may gratuitously give offense in verbal or written communication. Manuals sometimes provide guidance about how to reflect the concept of valuing diversity in language usage.
Standards advocated by supporters of the gender-neutral modification in English have been applied differently and to differing degrees among English speakers worldwide. This reflects differences in culture and language structure, for example American English
American English
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....
in contrast to British English
British English
British English, or English , is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the United Kingdom from forms used elsewhere...
. They are also affected by other factors, such as whether a person uses English as a first language or as a second language, regional variants or whether a particular form of English is based on grammatical structures inherited from another language (for example, Hiberno-English
Hiberno-English
Hiberno-English is the dialect of English written and spoken in Ireland .English was first brought to Ireland during the Norman invasion of the late 12th century. Initially it was mainly spoken in an area known as the Pale around Dublin, with Irish spoken throughout the rest of the country...
) or owes its linguistic structure to earlier Old English or Elizabethan English. In these cases, language structure from the native tongue or linguistic inheritance may be engaged.
Arguments against
Various criticisms have been leveled against the use of gender-neutral language, most focusing on specific usages, such as the use of "human" for "man" and "he or she" for "he". The use of the singular "they" is called "grammatical nonsense", as are such little-used neologisms as "herstoryHerstory
Herstory is history written from a feminist perspective, emphasizing the role of women, or told from a woman's point of view. Ii is a neologism coined in the late 1960s as part of a feminist critique of conventional historiography...
". Any other alternatives to gender-specific language are claimed to "lead one into using awkward or grating constructions" or neologisms that are so ugly as to be "abominations".
Some argue that gender-neutral language is unnecessary because no bias exists, finding the endeavor to be "useless, for we all know that the masculine pronoun refers to female and male people". A common argument is that historically terms such as "man" have been uniformly used as gender-neutral, and opponents of gender-neutral language often point to the fact that "man" in Old English referred to either men or women; feminists are claimed to be engaged in an attempt to "blot out" this fact and "re-write history".
Others argue that the linguistic differentiation
Markedness
Markedness is a specific kind of asymmetry relationship between elements of linguistic or conceptual structure. In a marked-unmarked relation, one term of an opposition is the broader, dominant one...
of women actually reflects women being "more" valued than men, not less. Opponents of gender-neutral language often argue that proponents of gender-neutral language are impinging on the right of free expression and promoting censorship. A few commentators do not disagree with the usage of gender-neutral language per se, but they do question the effectiveness of gender-neutral language in overcoming sexism.
Debate over Christian use
Much debate over the use of gender-neutral language surrounds questions of liturgy and Bible translation.See also
- Gender-neutrality in languages with grammatical genderGender-neutrality in languages with grammatical genderGender neutrality in languages with grammatical gender implies promoting language usage which is balanced in its treatment of the genders. For example, advocates of gender-neutral language challenge the traditional use of masculine nouns and pronouns when referring to both genders or to a person...
- Gender-neutrality in languages without grammatical gender
- EpiceneEpiceneEpicene is an adjective for loss of gender distinction, often specific loss of masculinity. It includes:* effeminacy — a man with characteristics that are traditionally feminine...
- Gender-neutral pronounGender-neutral pronounA gender-neutral pronoun is a pronoun that is not associated with any gender. It designates two distinct grammatical phenomena, the first being pronouns/periphrastics that have been assigned nontraditional meanings in modern times out of a concern for gender equity, and the second being genderless...
- Gender-specific pronounGender-specific pronounA language has 'gender-specific pronouns' when personal pronouns have different forms according to the gender of their referents.The English language has three gender-specific pronouns in the 3rd. person singular, whose declined forms are also gender-specific: he , she , and it...
- Gender-specific job titleGender-specific job titleA gender-specific job title is a name of a job that also specifies or implies the gender of the person performing that job, such as stewardess...
- Generic antecedents
- Unisex nameUnisex nameA unisex name, also known as an epicene name, is a given name that is often given to either a boy or a girl. Some countries, however, require that a given name be gender-specific or have enough names with male and female versions...
- Gender roleGender roleGender roles refer to the set of social and behavioral norms that are considered to be socially appropriate for individuals of a specific sex in the context of a specific culture, which differ widely between cultures and over time...
- MarkednessMarkednessMarkedness is a specific kind of asymmetry relationship between elements of linguistic or conceptual structure. In a marked-unmarked relation, one term of an opposition is the broader, dominant one...
External links
- Anyone who had a heart would know their own language — Transcript of ABC Radio program on the singular they.
- Attitudes toward the use of gender-inclusive language among residency trainees, G. H. Guyatt, D. J. Cook, L. Griffith, S. D. Walter, C. Risdon, and J. Liutkus (pdf)
- Bible Research — Gender-neutral Bible controversy
- CBT Policy on Gender-Inclusive Language
- Does the Bible really support gender-inclusive language?
- Excerpt from "The American Heritage Book of English Usage. A Practical and Authoritative Guide to Contemporary English". 1996.
- Female Grammar: Men's speech and women's speech
- Guidelines for Gender-Fair Use of Language The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE)
- Ansary, H., & Babaii, E. (2003). Subliminal sexism in current ESL EFL textbooks. The Asian EFL Journal Vol 5(1)
- Regender can translate English web pages so as to swap genders. Reading such gender-swapped pages can be an interesting exercise in detecting "gender-biased language".
- Some Notes on Gender-Neutral Language
- New Feminist. "Against 'Against the Theory of Sexist Language.'" http://newfeminist.wordpress.com/2008/10/02/against-against-the-theory-of-sexist-language/