Talk:Gender neutrality in English

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Contents 1 Esperanto error 2 Spivak 3 Split article? 4 this article makes sexist language sound like a bad thing... 5 'Common positions' section 6 Swedish 7 Linguistically and psychologically speaking 8 This is Rediculous 9 no reference for phrase 10 About the sentence... 11 contradiction 12 POV 13 this article isn't very neutral 14 LoL 15 Grammar of example 16 Advocates and opponents 17 Absurdity? 18 Contradiction in negative positions 19 Removed paragraph 20 POV template 21 A section in the Manual of style on gender-neutral language 22 Incorrect Old English 23 Sapir-Whorf 24 Ignorance of Language

[edit] Esperanto error

The Esperanto examples are good on the whole, but there _is_ a word for "parent": gepatro. Feel free to make the change. SiennaLizard 14:32, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

One tiny change and yet you still let two months go by waiting for someone else to do it rather than just highlighting the incorrect sentance and pressing "delete" all by yourself. There, it's been done. Master Deusoma 17:39, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Spivak

The article for Spivak pronouns links here; shouldn't there be a section here discussing it, or a "see also" link? B7T 06:59, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Split article?

Since this page is getting very long, I'd suggest splitting most of the section "Gender neutral language modification in other languages" into its own article and leaving just a short discussion in that section without specific examples from many languages. (Right now, the first paragraph under that section header is very specific to IE languages). Comments? cab 10:46, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, I decided to be bold. Basically, I took the old Gender-neutral language article and cut the non-English parts out to Gender-neutral language in Indo-European languages and Gender-neutral language in non-Indo-European languages. What remained turned out to be very English-specific, so I moved the page to Gender-neutral language in English and fixed the double redirects. So far the results feel less than satisfactory, especially for Gender-neutral language in non-Indo-European languages which just feels like a laundry list. I will continue to work on improving it in the coming days; your suggestions are appreciated.

One question I do have for all contributors: is there anything which could be said generally about gender-neutral language regardless of the language in question (e.g. non-specific to English)? Such as the politics of it, or the relation to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, etc. Would it be enough to make an article? cab 15:48, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

I applaud your decision to split the article, but I think that, instead of having one article for gender-neutral language in the Indo-European languages and another for gender-neutral language in non-Indo-European languages, it would have been more interesting to have one for languages that have grammatical genders, and another for those that don't. FilipeS 17:05, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] this article makes sexist language sound like a bad thing...

but then again, wikipedia actually has an article on "womyn" so I guess I shouldn't be surprised... —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 4.152.105.16 (talk • contribs) .

Well, isn't sexism a bad thing?

Sexism is a great thing, it keeps us bitches in the kitchen where we belong —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.178.96.229 (talk) 15:03, 19 January 2007 (UTC).

Whether it is or not isn't the business of an article on Wikipedia to say. The article about Adolf Hitler doesn't say "Hitler was an evil man", even though almost everyone reading the article will consider him one based on his actions. I agree with the previous person that this article radiates a general tone of approval towards gender-neutral language and disapproval towards gender-specific language. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.97.214.247 (talk) 11:45, 19 December 2006 (UTC).

[edit] 'Common positions' section

I am sceptical of the value of the second half of this section. It discusses a specific article about women's usage of language and their role in society. However, it does not talk about gender-neutral language - it is discussing how the language is used by women, a very different topic. I'm inclined to remove the entire second half of this section (possibly putting it somewhere more fitting, if such a place can be found), because it doesn't actually discuss gender-neutral language. --Sam Pointon 15:04, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

After looking at the page history, I see that the passage in question was added two days ago by a user otherwise uninvolved with the article. In that case, I'm going to be bold and remove it. --Sam Pointon 15:15, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Swedish

I read the section about the Swedish language and I think the sentence at the end of the section: "Swedish women also generally have lower salaries than men for the same kind of work, because they are all expected to stay at home with children at some point and, while well represented in government, are scarce in higher company positions.", although partly true, really does not have anything to do with gender-neutral language issues and hence I have decided to remove that part of the text. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 213.64.223.85 (talk • contribs) .

I think you made the right decision. Ruakh 00:02, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Linguistically and psychologically speaking

This section reeks of personal opinion, makes assertions that are uncited and uses "I" and "we" a lot. I'm tempted to remove the whole thing, as that entire section seems based on nothing other than the synesthesia of one user who has nothing else to do with the entry. Not that I have historically either, but it definitely needs to be reworked at the very least.
Kelbesque 16:28, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

The use of "I" there is ridiculous (eg, "the few languages I know"), and the viewpoint described, while intriguing, needs evidence. I'm going to remove this section. --Lazar Taxon 05:13, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] This is Rediculous

I'm sorry but seriously, it seems these people think language itself is a conspiracy against women, which is silly. 82.9.230.246 18:35, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

"Rediculous" - please refer to discourse for explanation of the arguments behind gender neutral language.--Cailil 17:53, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

No, I think the person who started this discussion section is right, this article is obviously slanted to make language seem like a conspiracy against women. ALSO who really cares about the spelling, that's irrelivent. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.35.152.58 (talk) 06:06, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Radical Feminists are the source of this annoyance. I support feminism, the right for women to be a full-fledged citizen of their country. But this stinking idea that there is a conspiracy against women, and men are the source of all of women's pain is ridiculous. -Yancyfry 03:52, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] no reference for phrase

There is no reason to assume that the traditional linguistic gender hierarchies reflect a bias against women. The female grammatical gender is simply marked and it could actually reflect women being more valued than men.[4]

This phrase has a reference link which goes nowhere.. -- Sy / ^(talk) 12:50, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Such as,for instance, "man" being used as a synonym for "people"? Our language's sexism is not an "assumption" but a fact. It is quite comical, though, that the advancement of one group causes ignorant people to fear the downfall of another, demonstrated in the proposition above that gender-neutral language shows a preference for women.

[edit] About the sentence...

Inclusive language follows the principles of gender-neutral language and extends them to other areas of language, such as referring neither to adults nor children when discussing a person whose age cannot otherwise be determined.

Please give some examples when it comes to age. Georgia guy 19:18, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] contradiction

...is what I would call "Gender-neutral_language_in_English#In_other_languages" (shouldn't be more than a link), and unless these unsourced claims are moved to the articles now on top of that section, they should better be deleted... Opinion, anyone? --Flammingo^Parliament 21:49, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

The stuff you brought from Feminism does not seem to add anything worthwhile to Gender-neutrality in languages with grammatical gender or to Gender-neutrality in languages without grammatical gender (which is where it should be, not here). I would delete most of it, and revert to the previous version of the section. FilipeS 16:51, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

It was redundant there, but it seems to be redundant here, as well. --Flammingo^Parliament 17:08, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

There may be some sentences in it which would benefit the other two articles... FilipeS 17:13, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] POV

There is a *lot* of opinion being thrown about in the Affirmative Positions section. "Gender neutral language has become both accepted and expected" is not an NPOV statement. Some of this section is well-written and conforms to NPOV, but much of it requires cleanup. Akqjt 10:23, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] this article isn't very neutral

for instance, "Gender neutral language has become both accepted and expected. As a result, gendered language sounds parochial and out-of-date. It also risks offending readers of both sexes. This is particularly true when the language is based on stereotypical assumptions about occupations, as when the language infers that all lawyers are men or that all teachers are women ..."
what? 82.112.145.194 00:49, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] LoL

I found this tag on this line in the article.

• Men and women are different and speakers need not be afraid to admit that.^{[citation needed]}

Hmmm, which fact is disputed? Men and women are different? or Speakers need not be afraid to admit that? I presume the tagger meant the latter, and as a joke. Joke appreciated, and recorded here for others to enjoy, but tag removed. Alastair Haines 08:26, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Grammar of example

One example in the article says:"Tomorrow I will meet my new doctor, whom I hope is friendly." Shouldn't this be as follows? "Tomorrow I will meet my new doctor, who I hope is friendly." Andrew Moylan 14:54, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

it should, and does now, thanks. see whom --Flammingo^Hey 15:51, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Hey Flammingo. You reverted your change back to using "whom". Why's that? Andrew Moylan 16:18, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Now, what word in the sentence being talked about is the subject of the clause "is friendly"?? Georgia guy 16:24, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure what you're asking Georgia Guy. For now I'm going to change it to "who" because I think that's more likely to be correct. Andrew Moylan 05:30, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Who is correct. Relative pronouns depend on function in subordinate clause. The subordinate clause here is I hope [that] my new doctor is friendly. Test with pronoun she:

• I hope that her is friendly.

Nope, not object, but subject, so who is correct.

A good example of where generic pronouns like she or he are superior. ;)

But it makes you wish there weren't no such thing as grammar, don't they?

Alastair Haines 05:52, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

"Whom I hope" seems correct to me. It's "who" who is hoped, not "I". FilipeS 22:38, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, Filipe, it is 'who'.

This is, by the way, a great reason to use generic singulars, they are much clearer.

• Assume the doctor is a woman.
• Tomorrow I will meet my new doctor, I hope her (equivalent of whom) is friendly. X
• Tomorrow I will meet my new doctor, I hope she (equivalent of who) is friendly. :D
• Consider the contrast
• Yesterday I talked with my sister, I love her very much.
• Yesterday I talked with my sister, whom I love very much.
• Today I ate with my brother, he is such a pig.
• Today I ate with my brother, who is such a pig.
• Who or whom is decided on whether the referent is subject or object of the subordinate clause.
• What is the object of hope in "I hope to read the book that John might give me."
• Is hope a transitive or intransitive verb? Complete the sentence with a one word object: "I hope ----."

OK, sorry, I'm an ESL teacher. :( I'll shut up now. Alastair Haines 00:09, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

What's happening? It still says 'whom' in the example.Chompas 11:40, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

You're right. I've corrected it. FilipeS 11:53, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Advocates and opponents

What fraction of all American grammarians are advocates of gender-neutral language and what fraction are opponents?? Georgia guy 22:28, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

[1] Statistics on some questions from 2000. You have to bear in mind that most professional writers are not allowed to express an opinion divergent from institutional and government style manuals. This panel of writers were consulted in private and anonymously. The brave new world of gender-neutral prescriptivism rules, my friend. The words we use shape the way we think you see. Sapir–Whorf hypothesis. So the way to control people's minds is to control their language. I'm not American, but does that sound consititutional to you? God bless y'all! Alastair Haines 23:52, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Absurdity?

Hello,

The article states that the phrase "Tomorrow i will meet my new doctor; I hope they are friendly." sounds absurd. This is interesting, as in Australia this would, from my experience, be common usage. Is this not the case elsewhere in the world? 60.241.185.216 10:00, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree. It sounds perfectly unremarkable to me. I'll remove it. Misodoctakleidist 22:25, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

The usage is apparently different by country. In the United States of America, this would probably sound absurd to most listeners. Note that I am in favor of gender-neutral language, but this would sound very odd to me if it came out of an American's mouth. Wakedream (talk) 05:41, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Contradiction in negative positions

I'm surprised to see the statement "Traditional use of gender in English does reflect sexism", especially in the negative positions section. The rest of the article avoids making this statement, as it is dependent on interpretation and may only reflect specificity rather than inherent sexism. It also directly contradicts a sentence made five bullet points earlier: "Traditional use of the English language, and other Indo-European and Afro-Asiatic languages, including using male pronouns when referencing both males and females, is not sexist" in the Negative positions section. I'm removing it. Verslapper 01:44, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Removed paragraph

This paragraph was in the text, without any kind of "this person said this, and this is relevant because [...]". I removed it because, despite of the quotation marks, it read as though it was Wikipedia saying this, not some person.

"Many people believe that the general use of the term 'man' is offensive, or at least inaccurate. Phrases like 'no man is an island' or 'every man for himself' seem to exclude women. Although reading history as if every use of 'man' or 'he' was a deliberate insult to women is probably excessive," some people seek alternatives.

Also, this entire article reads as one big flaming argument in support of gender-neutral language. It needs a huge NPOV rewrite.

128.101.10.146 01:58, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] POV template

I've added the neutrality disputed template for a number of reasons. Here are some specific quotes that are very bad:

Another example shows the practical nature of the gender-neutral language proscription.

Gender neutral language is widely accepted.

Then to eliminate sexism, we would do well to eliminate allegedly "sexist" forms from our language.

Also, the positive views section is much longer and more sophisticated than the negative views section. The negative views section does not really address the points brought forth in the long positive views section.

In general, the whole article reads as a clear endorsement of gender-neutral language, not just because of the specific words used, but due to the length of certain sections and the whole approach taken to the subject.

It is actually quite striking that an article named "Gender-neutral language" does itself contain such loaded language.

128.101.10.146 02:18, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Also, the entire introduction is biased --

...it is important that an encyclopedic description start with a description of current language use and then proceed to present the goals of those advocating this change in language usage or its prevention.

and

Since most of these are however men, a more correct description of the current language situation needs to consider use in organisations whose chairperson is a woman. Less than half of the members of the American Heritage Dictionary's usage panel accept the use of the word chairman in describing a woman.

137.165.210.74 (talk) 22:50, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

I also find it ironic that an article about being "gender-neutral" may not be neutral. It appears that this has been improved. Wakedream (talk) 05:50, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

It may be that there simply are not as many views going against the use of gender neutral language. It is true that much of academia and the press have gone over to gender neutral language of some stripe. Obviously they are doing this for a reason. I don't think the prevalence of arguments supporting gender neutral language is non-NPOV. There is no requirement in WP:NPOV that the article must give equal voice to arguments on all sides of an issue. On the contrary, see for instance WP:UNDUE. Some of the wording should certainly be changed, however. I agree that the passages offered above should probably be edited for NPOV. (Although I note that some of these appear to be attributed to other sources, in which case the problem is not NPOV, but rather unclear citations.) Silly rabbit (talk) 04:15, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] A section in the Manual of style on gender-neutral language

I've been driving a gradual overhaul of the language and organisation of the MOS over the past month. This is likely to take a few more months to complete.

I think it's high time that the MOS provided guidance on gender-neutral language, and within a week or two I'll be posting a draft section on the talk page of the MOS. Almost by coincidence, a discussion of related issues has recently erupted on that page.

I'll notify users here when I post the draft, and will welcome input from this quarter. The guidelines will need to be expressed as succinctly as possible, and will need to be reasonably constrained in their scope and application. Tony 13:42, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Incorrect Old English

The gender of wífman in Old English was masculine, not feminine, as compound words adopted the gender of their head. The sentence "On the other hand, the word "woman" (from wífman, grammatically feminine) replaced wíf as the word for female person." should be revised. See any Old English dictionary for reference, e.g. http://home.comcast.net/~modean52/oeme_dictionaries.htm Correon 00:42, 24 October 2007 (UTC)Correon

[edit] Sapir-Whorf

"A deeper variant of these arguments involves the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, the suggestion that our language shapes our thought processes. Then to eliminate sexism, we would do well to eliminate allegedly "sexist" forms from our language."

This is a huge misunderstanding of the hypothesis. It even that strong linguistic determinism, which is the least favored interpretation of the hypothesis. What Sapir-Whorf is about is the connection between culture and language. Things that matter for a culture usually have a specialized vocabulary; for instance, artists and painters will have a larger vocabulary about color terms because it is culturally relevant to do so. Sapir-Whorf is not about causation between words and thought -- it's just an observation about culturally relevant terminology.

To recap, this article assumes linguistic determinism and thought-causation, neither of which are widely accepted, and the article misconstrues the whole hypothesis.

24.196.108.189 (talk) 09:31, 5 December 2007 (UTC)TJ

I'm curious: how else is the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis supposed to be construed? FilipeS (talk) 22:59, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Ignorance of Language

Doesn't it strike anyone fighting over this that feminist meddling to try and force a language to unnaturally adapt to an ideology like this...is based on a misrepresentation of it history? Two things: "man" is even now commonly known AND accepted, as the proper gender-inclusive term for a both sexes (see Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary unabridged edition 2). "Man" wasn't forced upon the masses or any like thing...the language naturally developed to be the way it is; and even despite being "gender inclusive" the word "man" still, however, remained (even then) a generic [i]masculine[/i]. The feminist arguments that someone just the presence of "man" being used by default being somehow sexist is akin to childish brats throwing tantrums over matters they're uneducated about...and this intrusion even into academia and politically-correct consciousness is appalling and discouraging. Personally I would not be averse to the re-establishment of, perhaps, "wer" in our language for the specific designation of a male...however it remains that "man" would still remain masculine and would not ever specifically address a woman outside compounds (mailman, etc.), just as this doesn't happen in languages with similar features. And sad as some might think, we can't neuter people. Even the etymology of "human" is...a masculine. : ) The thing English rightly possesses as a "neuter" is the proper use of "one", such as "one should not do such things". Yet "one" cannot fit many contexts, you cannot say "a one's got to do what a one's got to do". And despite ourselves there are distinctives between the sexes, developmentally, physiologically, and mentally (of the soul); I would say even spiritually: and it's sad that so many are so rash and zealous to try and eliminate these from consciousness by whatever means...it shows me they're unlearned, unpoetic, and even unromantic. If there's ladies reading this discussion page: enjoy your womanhood! And the use of "man" is the true inclusive, despite is masculine flavor; it developed into the dominant term (and has been all this time) for general-use and it wasn't imposed or ruled in order to exclude or dishonor you gals: and this historical information and knowledge, I think, needs to be made better well-known so as that we don't have such as ruckus: especially when it goes to the lunatic extremes where people (that's right...I just used "people") begin to change literature for "fairness": I don't want to be reading neutralized shakespeare Shakespeare, or any other work, destroyed for ideological ignorance; and why is it that we don't appreciate the benefit of the proper generic: it puts a great emphasis on our minds that men (males) and women (females) are not independent of one another...and, I suppose, embeds their love-affair in our consciences and enriches our poetry and literature. : ) Be linguistically and grammatically, and historically, informed: not re-interpretative and pulling these ideological propagandas out of opines on ambiguous "fairness" doctrines. Just a thought to pass-on to wikipedia and its editors...there's a lot there to appreciate, and I wish I could be more face-to-face on this as, well, it's much softer face to face rather than stating this all matter-of-factly: and I've found that women--even hardcore fem-Nazi types--have been very appreciative to hear a dude discuss all this with them apart from the politicization aspects of this language-wrestling junk. All the best.

tooMuchData

09:30, 21 April 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by TheResearchPersona (talk • contribs)