From: jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton)
Newsgroups: alt.feminism
Subject: Re: girl/woman = guy/man? (WAS: Sexist Incidents)
Date: 4 Sep 92 18:09:44 GMT
Organization: AIAI, University of Edinburgh, Scotland

In article <MUFFY.92Sep3110347@remarque.berkeley.edu> muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu (Muffy Barkocy) writes:
>In article <7445@skye.ed.ac.uk> jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton) writes:
>>In article <MUFFY.92Sep2161818@remarque.berkeley.edu> muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu (Muffy Barkocy) writes:
>>>The word "girl" has a denotation of "child", 
>
>>Connotation, surely.  (If it really were denotation, it we wouldn't
>>find it being used for non-children.)
>
>Well, here's my dictionary's definition:

Is this supposed to show I was wrong about connotation vs denotation?
(Or did you think I didn't know that "girl" could mean "a female
child" and hence denote a child?)

>So, yes, both words *do* have denotations of "child."  I was not meaning
>to say that that was the *only* meaning, if that's what you mean.

I meant when it was used of adults.

>However, that is the first and most common meaning in each case.

So?

>>It isn't used consistently for women, and "guy" is often used for men.
>
>Umm...what I was was *when* it is used consistently, not that it always
>was used consistently.  Like if I said "when someone hits me over the
>head, it hurts" I would not mean that people were always hitting me over
>the head.

No, for that you'd have to say "when people were always hitting
me over the head".  And what you said was "used consistently" and
not just "used".

>>Why should this low opinion of children (powerless, not competant)
>>have so much influence?  Why should I change my language because of
>>an anti-child bias that I don't share?
>
>I'm not saying you (or anyone else) should.  I'm simply explaining a
>thought process.  The question was not "should I change what I'm doing"
>but "why are people offended."

They are offended because they don't think much of children?
Maybe their views of children ought to change.

Anyway, my point was that being called a child didn't mean quite what
you seemed to be saying it meant.

>>In short, while I can agree that "girl" has its problems, I don't
>>think the case against it is as strong and clear-cut as you seem to.
>>Some uses of "girl" to refer to an adult female are sexist, others
>>are not.
>
>>So what it comes down to is this (IMHO): don't use "girl" when it
>>will taken as implying something you don't mean to imply.  I don't
>>think many will object to this, because there's so little point in
>>saying things you know will be misunderstood.  
>
>Ah, but how do you tell which time/usage is which?  If you believe (I
>don't know if you do) that using "woman" to refer to an adult female is
>never sexist, but that using "girl" is sometimes sexist, and you don't
>want to be sexist, then it would seem to make sense to always use
>"woman" and therefore not have a problem.  This is what I have chosen to
>do, although I found it very awkward at first.

Of course, I can't _always_ tell whether "girl" will be considered
sexist, but that doesn't mean I can never tell.  Consequently, it
isn't necessary to use "woman" all the time if my goal is to
avoid being misunderstood.

-- jd
Newsgroups: alt.feminism