Girl

[prog]

Already rethinking earlier statement about the word "girl". To go against college-indoctrinated language lessons feels like a tiny act of sacrilege, and invites a deal of internal debate. Here is an excerpt:

jmac: After all, there are plenty of contexts where I could legitimately use "boy" in reference to an adult male.

strange interlocutor: Fair enough, but what about that context in the cafe? if you'd been served your coffee by a man, would you have written "the boy who..."? No, you'd have written "the guy who...", and I resist your sexist equivalence of the ambiguous "guy" with the diminutive "girl". Shame shame shame on you.

jmac: [Mumbles, shuffles feet.]

This is an old argument and I back away from having an official opinion on it for today.

Comments

[dougo.livejournal.com]

You could have called her "gal" and claimed you were being ironic and/or retro.

Or given that it's the Diesel, "grrl" might have been the best word.

[(Anonymous)]

And yet so many vaginally-equipped members of the human species are so uptight about 'not appearing old' that the use of the 'younger' thought of expression of 'girl' would be complimenting. But, as with much said by men to women, if there's a negative side to the comment, the negative will be the foremost part of the comment discussed.

Switching to anonymous mode for this comment. Oh yes. Definately.

[cortezopossum.livejournal.com]

I'm still griping over how my mom still refers to a friend of mine as my 'boyfriend' which (to me at least) implies that we're gay and dating each other.

[daerr.livejournal.com]

I was raised such that it really doesn't usually occur to me to use "girl" for anyone older then a teenager. Though, given common language ususage I've probably done so at times.

I remember all of my mother's battles to get her co-worker's to stop them from referring to each other as "girl". Mind you, this was more of self image thing...

[mrmorse.livejournal.com]

This is evidence of my own programming more than anything else, but the use of "boy" to refer to an adult sets off possible racism flags in my head. There are obvious power and race issues in the historical use of "boy" when speaking to black men.

Of course, it depends on usage. There are certainly cases where "boy" isn't racist and there are probably cases where "girl" isn't sexist, but both words set off all sorts of warnings in my head.

Then again, I do sometimes use "girl" to refer to an adult woman. But it almost always makes me uncomfortable when I do.

I'm with you on the mumbling and lack of official opinions.

[lyricon.livejournal.com]

Always a strange, awkward discussion. I also have somewhat ambiguous opinions about it. I'm not sure I really mind being referred to as a "girl" but then again, I'm not sure I really like it either. Perhaps it depends almost entirely on the context of the situation for me. Hmm.

However, when I refer to other people I have found a way to avoid the connotations of "girl" or "guy" or whatnot, by adopting the habit of using the vaguely archaic words of "lady" and "gentleman" in most situations. For example, when I am speaking to several male-oriented persons at work, I might address them with, "Good morning, gentlemen. How are you doing today?" Or when describing an female acquaintance say, "Dana is a lady with a wonderful sense of humor blahblahblah..."

Of course, this works for me also because I like to be a little outside of the norm in terms of my speech patterns. Somewhere between old fashioned and sophisticated. I'm not recommending it for everyone, but I personally find it quite enjoyable.

[keimel.livejournal.com]

prowler1971, meet prog, prog meet prowler1971.

you're blogging about the same thing this week.

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