Alright, so some of you might be familiar with the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, and linguistic determinism. Basically, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis proposes that there is a relationship between the language a person speaks, and how that person percieve and act in the world, while linguistic determinism is the idea that language (to a debatable extent) dictates thought. Both proposals are generally accepted by liniguists, but to different degrees, though most agree that the strong version (no thoughts can exist without language) is wrong.
We are not going to debate to what extent this is true, however.

What I'm thinking about is all the focus on the male in the english language, even though it is a gender free language, as opposed to latin languages. Take for example the word "chairman". There are countless of words like it. Our children grow up being told about how the young boy got the princess and half the kingdom due to his valour, and even in biology, a science, plants and animals and so forth are divided into kingdoms. The reasons these words are as they are is obviously because of a history of male domination. A chairwoman was unheard of only 50 years ago.

So what I ask is, with the saphir whorf hypothesis and linguistic determinism in mind, do you think that the existence and usage of those words uncounciously contributes to our culture thinking of men as dominant, as the male is dominant in our language? Should further action be taken in order to root out these words where it might be appropriate? Or do you think that even though we use those male dominant words, it doesn't really affect us at all, and that taking action against them is only feminism gone too far yet again? Or maybe you have some completely different thoughts regarding the topic?

either way, I'll pay a penny for them.

Interesting. Your first link is broken btw but I know what you're talking about and there's a brief explanation in the second link.

If you've read the abortion thread you'll know that I won't give women an inch on even things that maybe they're right about. This is right out. Feminism has a habit of going too far and I think this is one of the examples.

Before I go on I should make it perfectly clear that there are some feminists who just ask for equal rights and I agree with them completely. I do not condone sexism or chauvonism in any way.

I disagree that chairman (and, with some reservations, kingdom) are sexist. A man in this instance simply refers to a person. "Man" is regularly used as a reference to our species as a whole. It's not to be detrimental to women. If anything it;s harsh on men because we don't get a suffix.

I don't think that men are seen as dominent these days. There is almost no real anti-female sexism left. Granted, a kingdom is called a kingdom because in the old days it would be the king that ruled the country. This was obviously a good system back then because who ruled was based on physical strength and it is a physiological fact that women are lesser to men in this regard (please don't post a pic of a female body-builder. It just looks gross.). If my memory serves me correctly Queen Elizabeth I made it treason to refer to our country as a Queendom, and it could hardly be said that there is any woman less male dominated than her throughout history.

Altering these words is simply further mutalation of our [great] language and is simply unnecessary.

The things I'll do for a penny...

I would like to implement the slippery slope argument here.

If we remove words from the english language that some people find offensive (a very small but vocal minority) then we are determining things through government policies and unnatural peer pressure rather than the way they naturally are, through natural selection (of words in this case) and evolution.

We are giving people too much control over trivial, and negligible things. If anything being referred to as a chairman should be a reminder to all woman that they have overcome the sexist boundaries that used to not allow them into positions like this. And every reference to that should remind them of their success in their struggle to overcome a social system they disagreed with. If we give artificial controls and constraints to negligible, natural things, like words and such, how far is it until we are molding other things to create perfect people, or a perfect society?

How long until we go too far in psychologically, or genetically, encouraging conformity in children, just to keep some of them from becoming bigots?

How long until we keep people from owning pets because it distracts them at home, and at work, and is not a necessary part of survival in society?

By giving people (policy groups, or even the government) artifical control over natural things you are encouraging a ridiculous growth in government control, breeding, maybe even eugenics.

And this is wrong. This would set us on a slippery slope to personal opinions dictating how other people live their lives, for negligible benefit to any involved but the extremely vocal of the group who causes the change.

Furthermore, how would one go about removing these words from the english langauge? Would there be word police going around and fining people who use the words? Or would it be a mandatory class in high school to teach people about sexist words? Either way it gives the government too much control over the insignificant minutia of our lives.

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Hardly any of this was serious. But it was enjoyable.

Men are better than women. That's why we get all the words.

Quote from The Pirate

Not an attack on you, but that sounds like a lot of political correctness and that sort of nonsense.

Words like "chairwoman" irritate me on a much deeper level than they probably should. It just feels like such a meaningless, even condescending gesture to me. As George Carlin once said, some people just wont be satisfied until we're calling the thing in the street a "personhole cover".

Anyone who thinks we should go so far as to remove these words from language really needs to find a more productive means of fighting for their cause.

Saying chairwoman is not the alternative, as that is just as backwards. The alternative would be to for example say chairperson instead of chairman, and humankind instead of mankind (George Charlin actually advocated this, btw). It may seem like a lot of political correctness and that sort of nonsense, but it isn't necessarily as trivial as it might seem, especially if you strongly believe in linguistic determinism.

Quote from Schwa

I would like to implement the slippery slope argument here.

If we remove words from the english language that some people find offensive (a very small but vocal minority) then we are determining things through government policies and unnatural peer pressure rather than the way they naturally are, through natural selection (of words in this case) and evolution.

We are giving people too much control over trivial, and negligible things. If anything being referred to as a chairman should be a reminder to all woman that they have overcome the sexist boundaries that used to not allow them into positions like this. And every reference to that should remind them of their success in their struggle to overcome a social system they disagreed with. If we give artificial controls and constraints to negligible, natural things, like words and such, how far is it until we are molding other things to create perfect people, or a perfect society?

How long until we go too far in psychologically, or genetically, encouraging conformity in children, just to keep some of them from becoming bigots?

How long until we keep people from owning pets because it distracts them at home, and at work, and is not a necessary part of survival in society?

By giving people (policy groups, or even the government) artifical control over natural things you are encouraging a ridiculous growth in government control, breeding, maybe even eugenics.

And this is wrong. This would set us on a slippery slope to personal opinions dictating how other people live their lives, for negligible benefit to any involved but the extremely vocal of the group who causes the change.

Furthermore, how would one go about removing these words from the english langauge? Would there be word police going around and fining people who use the words? Or would it be a mandatory class in high school to teach people about sexist words? Either way it gives the government too much control over the insignificant minutia of our lives.

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Hardly any of this was serious. But it was enjoyable.

You misunderstand. The reason for doing this is not pleasing people. It's not really the words in themselves that are important, and whether or not people find them offensive, but the effect they have on our thoughts and culture. Thing is; we humans think, mainly, in language. We form most of our thoughts in the language we are most comfortable with, and how well we control that language therefore in many ways determines the quality of our thoughts. As Wittgenstein said: "The limits of my language means the limits of my world." Another strong supporter of this was George Orwell, and in 1984, one of the main points is how the party limits the English language in order to control the people. I am a living example of this. I am not a native English speaker, but I now live in China, and speak English everyday. I notice, both when discussing here on this forum, and when discussing in class, that I am unable to adequately form some of my thoughts and ideas in English, and is limited by my (lack of) control of the language. Therefore, if our language is constructed in such a way that we, unconsciously, focus more on the male, does that not limit us in such a way as to think of men as superior?

Quote from alive

You misunderstand. The reason for doing this is not pleasing people. It's not really the words in themselves that are important, and whether or not people find them offensive, but the effect they have on our thoughts and culture. Thing is; we humans think, mainly, in language. We form most of our thoughts in the language we are most comfortable with, and how well we control that language therefore in many ways determines the quality of our thoughts. As Wittgenstein said: "The limits of my language means the limits of my world." Another strong supporter of this was George Orwell, and in 1984, one of the main points is how the party limits the English language in order to control the people. I am a living example of this. I am not a native English speaker, but I now live in China, and speak English everyday. I notice, both when discussing here on this forum, and when discussing in class, that I am unable to adequately form some of my thoughts and ideas in English, and is limited by my (lack of) control of the language. Therefore, if our language is constructed in such a way that we, unconsciously, focus more on the male, does that not limit us in such a way as to think of men as superior?

Aww man, why'd you have to go and actually acknowledge that I posted?

Now I have to cover up my stupidity.

I think that any influence it does have is negligible compared to the effort it would take to root out all of those words, and edit them out of the english language.

I'm actually surprised Orwell advocated this, specifically because of New Speak in 1984. I was actually going to use that as one of my main points. That artificially editing the language to produce a desired effect in the population (equality) than it would be akin to New Speak, an artificially constructed language created to control the thoughts of the public.

But I digress-

I've long postulated to myself that language must effect thought in some way. However my thoughts have always been about the structure of language and how it effects the logical thought process.

In my honest opinion I do not think that having words with men in then encourage english speakers to think of males as superior. And if it does the effect is negligible compared to the efforts of the media and movies and general common sense to portray women as equal (and generally superior to males).

In my personal opinion women are far superior to men. And I would elaborate but I am being kicked off of the computer.

I agree with the pirate, but notice how everyone who has posted is male so far.

That's because most of the SPP population is male. Not a big discovery you made here.

I don't care about those words or that there should be a female equivalent to them. I don't find it oppressing for the women.

Also, that's pretty much just English language. In Slovene, there's a female equivalent almost everywhere. So it's just the language imo.

Yeah, but the opinions were biased = my point.

Bleh

I'd like to continue this, because I have a presentation on this topic on monday, and I'd like some more arguments as to why it's unimportant.

Quote from Mantha

That's because most of the SPP population is male. Not a big discovery you made here.

I don't care about those words or that there should be a female equivalent to them. I don't find it oppressing for the women.

Also, that's pretty much just English language. In Slovene, there's a female equivalent almost everywhere. So it's just the language imo.

It's not the words themselves that are oppressing, the words just reflect a history of male dominance. Question is; is that male dominance just of the past?

Also, there's no such thing as just the language. We think in language, and the way it is formed is therefore obviously very important. Thus, due the fact that the English language reflects male dominance, and that we think in language, aren't we inclined to unconsciously think of men as superior, and then in turn act oppressing to women?

Quote from Zed

I disagree that chairman (and, with some reservations, kingdom) are sexist. A man in this instance simply refers to a person. "Man" is regularly used as a reference to our species as a whole. It's not to be detrimental to women. If anything it;s harsh on men because we don't get a suffix.

I don't think that men are seen as dominent these days. There is almost no real anti-female sexism left.

It doesn't matter what the word refers to, what matters is the connotations that follow it. The connotation that follows "man," is an adult male. It is true that our species is often referred to as mankind. And that is exactly what can be seen as scary. In fact, there exists no way of describing our race (with the possible exception of "our race/species" and "earthlings") that does not focus on the male.

Human kind: Humanus = of, or belonging to man
Mankind: obvious
Homo sapiens: Wise man

Honestly, when I think of the words "manhole" and "kingdom" and the like I don't think of men in particular. But if it is subconcious, then I suppose it's possible. Yet I don't think a language reform could be pulled off even if it was nessisary.

Men are discriminated against in some areas as well. Look at "housewife". Social stigma keeps men out of some jobs, like hairdressing, ballet, cleaning, secratary, etc.

And how is that relevant? I never said that men aren't being discriminated against at all, or that women are living terrible, oppressed lives. This debate isn't about who's having the roughest time in today's society. I'm arguing that there is a dominant male focus in the english language, and I'm proposing that that might contribute to us being more inclined to regard men as dominant and superior.

Ok. I retract my statement as irrelevant.

However, do people regard men as dominant and superior? There are physiological facts like men being naturally stronger and having a slightly more developed visuo-spatial sketchpad but besides that it all seems fairly equal. Or are you arguing that men are, in fact, inferior, and it's only the English language that lets us keep any dignity at all?