Language changes caused by feminist movement and sexism

From the mid 1960s, some feminists argued that English not only reflected the lack of equality between the sexes but also in some ways was responsible for it. For example, they objected to the fact that all adult males were referred to as Mr, whereas adult females were called Mrs or Miss, according to whether they were married or not. As a result, the new form of address Ms was suggested for women of both types of marital status, and this has now been widely accepted.

A number of vocabulary changes have recently been introduced as a result of the feminist movement and heightened awareness of the sexist nature of some English vocabulary.

David Crystal in The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language writes: “Attention has been focused on the replacement of ‘male’ words with a generic meaning by neutral items – chairman, for example, has become a chair or a chairperson (though not without controversy); a salesman has become a sales assistant. In certain cases, such as job descriptions, use of sexually neutral language has become a legal requirement. There is continuing debate between extremists and moderates as to how far such revisions should go – whether they should affect traditional idioms such as man in the street (means a typical person; could it be replaced by person in the street) and Neanderthal Man (primitive people who lived in Europe and Asia 2.5 to 3 million years ago), or apply to parts of words where the male meaning of man is no longer dominant such as manhandle (handle roughly, using force).

Feminists also objected to words like fireman, spokesman, etc., preferring fire fighter, spokesperson. And they particularly disliked the automatic use of the male pronouns he, him, his etc. in sentences where the sex of the person being referred to is unknown or unimportant.

This problem is not a burning question in our country but we need to be aware that this is a sensitive issue in America and Europe, and if we want to avoid causing offence to some people, we will need to know the words to avoid and which ones to use instead.

Here are some examples of non-sexist variations of vocabulary: