So I was talking to decanusdeadsea about implicit sexism vs. explicit sexism, and how insidious social constructs can slip under the radar when you’re not looking. Notions about how femininity is often times tacitly slammed as being Subhuman without us really thinking about it, and how that, automatically, by its very nature, creates disadvantages for even the Privileged gender. Then I remembered this article, one that Sam pointed out to me Long Long Ago, about how the English language is inherently sexist. I hadn’t really thought about it until that point, and when I read this article, finally, I was genuinely uncomfortable.
Why? Because it switches out the word ‘man’ with ‘white,’ and argues language constructs from a racial basis instead of a gender-specific one. I’m sure you can see why it had me squirming. If you’re not looking at the central focus, it comes off as incendiary. But that’s the point: if you find yourself worked up into a frothing mess over the approach taken in this article, there’s a reason that isn’t what you might see at face value. It’s shedding a giant fucking floodlight on the structural bias of the english language; meant to point out that if the language were altered even slightly, the ‘problem’ becomes AMAZINGLY obvious.
But it is v. uncomfortable to read.
Now, I’m not going to do something silly like argue for language becoming gender neutral, say that ‘women’ should be spelled ‘womyn’ (or ‘wimmin,’ my personal favorite), or say that everyone who speaks it is clearly sexist, but it’s worth seeing things like this because it reminds us of how many remnants still exist in this modern age, and how much of it we fail to notice.
A Good Post.
This is what I was telling you about today, if you are interested :3 I hope you read the whole thing when you have time.
callanswall 