Feminist linguistics (1960S- )

Originally expressed in terms of political feminism, recently more technically articulated through the contribution of linguists such as Jennifer Coates and Deborah Tannen.

Studies of women’s language, of language and sexism, and of male bias in linguistic theory.

Also see: GENDER AND LANGUAGE

Source:
D Tannen, Feminism and Linguistic Theory (London, 1985)

History

Linguistic activism and feminist authorship stemming from second wave feminism in the 1960s and 70s began to draw attention to gender bias in language, including “the uncovering of the gendered nature of many linguistic rules and norms”.^[6] Scholarship such as Dennis Baron’s Grammar and Gender and Anne Bodine’s “Androcentrism in Prescriptive Grammar” uncovered historical male regulation to promote male-centric language such as the use of “he” as a generic pronoun.^[7][8]

The 1970s feminist movement led to the title Ms becoming more widely used. Previously, Miss and Mrs were used in order to indicate a woman’s marital status. However, the title Mr does not imply marital status, so feminists saw it necessary to find a parallel term.^[9]

Exposition and analysis of sexism in language through a grassroots feminist linguistics movement continued throughout the 80’s and 90’s, including study across languages and speech communities such as Germany and France.^[10][11] Study and documentation of gendered language has since spread to cover over 30 languages.^[12]

Feminist language planning has more recently been instituted centrally in countries such as Sweden, Switzerland and Australia, with mixed results.^[2][3][5]

Sweden has made strides towards shifting their language to fit a less misogynistic society. In the Swedish language, there has never been a word for the female genitalia or even a translation of the word “vagina”, even though the word snopp translates to “penis” and has been used as such since the 1960s.^[2] Through history, there have been many slang terms used for the woman’s genitalia, including words such as fitta translated to “cunt”, där nere translated to “down-there”, and even mus translated to “mouse”. In the 1990s, Swedish media started to bring the absence of such a word to light. It wasn’t until the early 2000s did the feminists and activists start using the word snippa to be identified with the female genitalia. Snippa’s origins can be traced back to many different Swedish dialects. Its popular definition “refers to something small and/or narrow, for example a small pike or a narrow boat”.^[2] In regards to genitalia, “it might have been used to refer to female genitalia of cows and pigs in the early twentieth century”.^[2] Since the popularization of using the word Snippa, the Swedish Academy added the word to the 2006 Swedish Language Dictionary.

Some language reformers directly work with identifying and changing sexist undertones and patriarchal vocabulary through a method called “linguistic disruption”.^[13] An example: In the United States, the word “herstory” became popularized “to refer to history which is not only about men”.^[13]

Sweden has also shown efforts in language planning regarding changing misogynistic undertones in their vocabulary. The Swedish Association for Sexuality Education has promoted the word slidkrans to replace the word for “hymen”, mödomshinna. The new word, slidkrans, is made up of the two parts slid, translating to “vaginal” and krans, translating to “garland”. It lacks the connotations of the ideology of virginity and honour attached to mödomshinna.”^[2] The gender-neutral pronoun hen was originally promoted by feminists and the LGBT community. Controversial at the outset, it has gained wide acceptance in Sweden, is used in schools, and recently was added to dictionaries.^{[citation needed]}

Australia has been identified as a nation that officially promotes the feminist influence to its public bureaucracy by implementing feminist language reform across many institutions.^[14] Since this planned social shift, Australia has seen changes in political and government leadership that aim to interfere with this reform, such as a shift towards a conservative-leaning government.^[14] There are shifts that come from such movements that support them as well, such as the gender-neutral pronoun “they” being more widely accepted.^[15]

The ongoing feminist movement acknowledges language as a “powerful instrument of patriarchy”.^[13] The goals set for linguistic reform aim to achieve linguistic equality of the sexes. A study of Australian newspapers from 1992 and 1996 found that the word “chairman” was used to describe all people holding the position, including women.^[13] This is an example of a linguistic issue that feminists seek to reform. Occupational nomenclature reflects gender bias when “professional nomenclature used in employment-related contexts displays bias in favour of men leading to women’s invisibility in this area.”^[13] The invisibility of women is a linguistic feminist issue because when encountering sentences predominantly using male pronouns, listeners are more likely to think of men before women and therefore women get overlooked.^[15] Positions are gendered to be male and the “continuing, frequent use reflects the fact that far more men than women continue to occupy this position.”^[13] This study further investigated and found instances of female professionals being specified as women while men would just be titled with the profession itself, for example “female judge”, “woman engineer”, and “woman politician”.^[13]

Switzerland

Switzerland has attempted to implement feminist language reform both formally and informally. However, changes in Switzerland have proven to be complicated due to the fact that Switzerland is a multilingual country (with the major languages being German, French, and Italian). The Bulletin Suisse de Linguistique Appliquée (Swiss Bulletin of Applied Linguistics) addressed this issue in 2000 when it created a special issue dedicated to the feminization of language in Switzerland. The bulletin attempted to critique language in Switzerland by creating a composite image of all the languages in Switzerland and how they interact with gender.^[16]

The most commonly spoken language in Switzerland is German. German is a gendered language. This has concerned some language activists due to the fact that many important societal positions such as judge and professor possess the gender of male and are often referred to as he/him. Activists worry that the gendering of those words discourages women from entering those fields. This facet of the German language is particularly important in Switzerland because it was historically used as a justification to restrict women’s right to vote and pass the bar.^[17]

Various attempts to implement feminist language reform have been undertaken in German-speaking Switzerland. The government and other organizations have attempted to implement language feminization in the realms of policy making, teaching, advertising, etc.^[17] Language feminization refers to when in writing or talking traditional male words are feminized by either using the feminine variant of the word or adding a feminine suffix.^[18] However, these attempts have had only limited success. For example, private Swiss radio and television broadcasts still generally use the generic-masculine form of words.^[16]

The second most commonly spoken language in Switzerland is French which is also a gendered language. The French language raises similar concerns to that of the German language. This is because many nouns (especially those of professions) are gendered. To address these concerns, the Swiss government has created a guide on the non-sexist use of the French language. However, these attempts at change have been met with little success. This is due to the fact that Switzerland has limited influence over the French language. Meanwhile, France and specifically the government backed Académie Française (the French council for matters relating to the French language) has resisted feminist language reform