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From: preece@uicsl.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: Language and Oppression - (nf)
Message-ID: <2907@uiucdcs.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 27-Sep-83 00:33:22 EDT
Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.2907
Posted: Tue Sep 27 00:33:22 1983
Date-Received: Thu, 22-Sep-83 06:50:36 EDT
Lines: 24

#R:yale-com:-204200:uicsl:16400021:000:1137
uicsl!preece    Sep 20 09:11:00 1983

	The unwitting oppressor claims (and firmly believes) only the 
	best of intentions when he refers to the "girls in the office."  
	However, those "girls" most definitely find it degrading and 
	insulting to be referred to as children.
----------
My mother-in-law always uses 'girls' for secretaries, including herself
(she's 62, maybe she likes thinking of herself as girlish). I'm sure
she doesn't mean in to be degrading. Her daughter, my wife, and I (that's
just two people) always flinch when she uses the term. Language is a
tricky bastard. I'm sure 'girls' was originally used in a familial
sense; remember it used to be common for companies to view themselves
as families. Now we call that paternalism. Intentions, assumptions,
and protests all find their way into very simple word choices.
I tend to favor a little more care in choosing words, a little more
attention to the sensibilities of the reader than seems to be the
preference of the language conservatives and a little more attention
to the sound of the language than is favored by the 'language is part
of the problem' crowd.

scott preece
pur-ee!uiucdcs!uicsl!preece