Masculine, Feminine, or Neuter?

It would have been helpful to point out when first posting that this is another guest post from Georgia. It was in the post tags, but not in the body text...

Recently I’ve been pondering some possible sexism. Those of you who know me will be aware that I do this a lot. You’ll also be aware that often little things irritate me, which, on their own seem to be insignificant. My argument is always that those little things either contribute or attest to a wider problem.

My latest irritation is just how often, linguistically, masculine is placed before feminine. I know, I know, no biggie. That’s just the way it is. I’ll get onto that in a bit, (though, historically speaking, "That’s just the way it is", can be a bad excuse for continuing to do something bad).  But first, let me illustrate my point.

It made sense to write “Dear Sir or Madam” when we lived in a time where few women worked - but why do we still always list the masculine first. ‘Ah-hah!’ I hear you say, ‘what about “Ladies and Gentlemen”, eh?’ To which, my response is, the laydeez wouldn’t come first if there were any lords around, it’s just that lords are pretty rare at the moment.

What about the fact that male people just get to be Mr (or ‘Master’, if you’re splitting hairs, but that is (a) increasingly falling out of use and (b) a purely age-based differentiator), but female people spend their lives making people feel uncomfortable as they try to guess whether they are Miss, Mrs, or Ms. (I forgot: Dr!)

Does anybody ever write “Mrs and Mr So-and-So” when addressing envelopes or joint emails?  In fact, as a female person, you never, ever get to be first on any tick-box list or survey. ‘Mr’ is always the default setting. As a young, female person you only get to be third (Miss), as opposed to your brothers and male friends who are first for all their lives. As you get older, you have the option of marrying someone and changing your name to move up to second place or (as I did, aged seventeen) decide your marital status ain’t nobody’s business and become a Ms for life (editor’s note: ‘Ms fo’ life, yo’). Or, you could spend years studying for a PhD; then you could be fourth!

“Mother and Father” is the only exception I can think of, but the sceptic in me feels that that order is probably due to women being traditionally (i.e. in terms of centuries/millenia) more involved in parenting than men. Plus, pater is still listed regularly in Latin grammar books - mater doesn’t feature at all!  In fact, looking at Kennedy’s Primer, masculine noun examples which are human beings include: judge, king, soldier, chieftain, consul and father. Feminine nouns: virgin. That’s it.

Let’s get down to linguistic brass tacks. What about “je suis, tu es, il est, elle est”. Or, for my own personal irritation, and a much more deeply discussed example, read on:

[Skip this ‘Ancient Languages 101’ section if you already know some Latin/Greek.]

In Latin and Greek, the function of a word in a sentence (subject, object etc.) is marked by the endings of the word. For example, with nouns, -m often shows the object:

puella feminam amat            The girl loves the woman

puellam femina amat   The woman loves the girl

This is great because it means you can put your words in *any* order you want - so useful for exciting prose or poetry! It also means that there are a bunch of different words with a bunch of different endings and to make it easy to learn/recognise these, words are sorted into different groups.

[Hey Skippy! Here’s where you start reading again.]

The first declension (set of nouns grouped by endings) is overwhelmingly populated by feminine nouns. Not sure why, but it is. The second declension consists of masculine and neuter nouns - whose endings are largely the same (masculine endings differ from neuter in only two cases). So why is it, when any word which can be masculine, feminine or neuter is listed, it is always listed in that order? Why, when the feminine formation is the first declension, and the masculine and neuter are so similar, do we insist on putting them in such an order? This happens with adjectives, pronouns, participles, the definite article (in Greek), it happens in German, there’s no neuter in modern Romance languages but masculine still comes before feminine… In the Latin GCSE defined vocabularies, instead of giving the fourth principal part as the supine (a formation which looks neuter) they give it as masculine (because pupils learn perfect participles but not the supine, and the first version of a perfect participle is masculine - then feminine, then neuter).

Whhhhhyyyyyy??? Is language inherently prejudiced in favour of the masculine? Does the masculine always come first? Whhhhhhyyy?

It’s easy to say that these things have always been done in that order, but does that mean we still have to keep it that way? Does the fact that, in languages, the masculine comes before the feminine, have a subconscious effect on men and women, boys and girls (ooh, look, there it goes again!)?

For example, is the phenomenon of young female students being far more reticent to volunteer than young male students (widely noted anecdotally by teachers) influenced by young women learning that they come second (third!) from a young age?  Am I the only woman who gets frustrated *waiting* for all the men to get out of the Jitsu circle so that I can get in to attack? Is there a deeper reason why George wrote his name on the lease first (even though I am older than him and have a slightly better degree, not to mention bigger ears)? Who knows! Maybe it’s something to think about though. Especially since I (a self-confessed, active feminist) had to actively think about putting “young female students” first in that first sentence and call myself a “woman” rather than a “girl” in the second one...and it felt *weird* doing so.

I’d love to hear other people’s thoughts and examples that support or contradict the theory that language privileges the masculine over the feminine. So, ladies, lords and gentlemen, girls and boys: what do you think?

Lefhanded Steampunk Milk Zombies...or something. Anyway A BLOG (post)!

So, I think it's fair to say that I'm a bit behind on blogging... Apologies for that, for anyone who actually reads what I write here, but busy-ness appears to be my...well, business, at the moment.

I'm definitely aiming to pick up some more activity on here towards the end of the year, but otherwise, will try to do some more posts, albeit sporadically.

The reading has been going well. Today, I hit 46 books, right on schedule (this being week 46). It seems crazy that this means I only need to get through 7 more before the end of the year. I'm obviously shooting for more, but it looks like I'll meet my target. I just wanted to briefly call attention to a couple of the things I've read recently.

Today, I finished Boneshaker, by Cherie Priest. This is a self-proclaimed zombie steampunk novel, set in a slightly alternative history Seattle, where the civil war rages on. For all that it plays on several big genre trends - zombies and steampunk - it doesn't overplay them. It's a fun read (or rather, for me, a decent audiobook, with Wil Wheaton narrating half of it), with a cool setting and interesting enough characters. I don't think it's anything groundbreaking, but it's a entertaining and solidly written. Priest has written some other books in the same steampunk universe, which I'd be interested to check out at some point.

Another one I finished fairly recently is The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin. This is phenomenal. I've never read any of her stuff before, and, though the basic premise, as laid out in her introduction, was interesting, it didn't hook me in straight away. Or rather, I thought it didn't, but I think that's partly because it underplays itself and its own brilliance.

It's a view of a world without gender, through the eyes of an 'alien' (read: sex binary). The natives are essentially human, except that, most of the month, they are neither male nor female until they enter a period of fertility, which later passes. This, along with aspects of the environment in which they live, has produced some interesting social trajectories. Obviously, the novel explores issues of gender, but its even more fundamental than that in its anthropological scope. This is a book I see myself come back to again and again, and I really recommend checking it out.

Lastly, something I was going to do a full blog post on, but that definitely deserves a mention. I went to see Neil Gaiman (him again!) reading his new children's book Fortunately, the Milk... I say 'read', but really, it was a performance, with 'special guests including Mitch Benn and Lenny Henry (as a dinosaur! the book has dinosaurs!). Chris Riddell, illustrator extraordinaire, did live-drawing to match. It was unique event (sidenote: can an event be non-unique, really?) about a pretty magical children's book (then again, there weren't that many children in the audience). You can read it in under an hour (unless you're ACTING IT OUT WITH GUITARS), so why wouldn't you read it?

Oh, and Amanda Palmer showed up and the end with a ukelele.

Oh, and lastly for real this time - I posted two bits of writing to the blog in the last few weeks. You can read Winter's Tale (intrigue! parallel worlds! a Japanese folk monster!) here, and Wordmarket (a much shorter, more random thing) here. You can always find either via the 'writing' tab at the top (including downloadable formats for Winter's Tale, if white text on black background isn't your thing). Read, share, tell me they're dumb (and why!), whatever you like!

CUT TO PHOTOS *flaps cape and disappears*

Two Neils and a Chris, who is making one of the Neils.

Wumpires.

Lenny Henry-saur.

"Play your ukelele!"

We're so happy we're blurring!

Wordmarket

It’s midnight at the London Library and the Wordmarket is in full swing.

Some of the small stalls are stacked precariously in the entrance hall. These are mostly newcomers, pedalling a range of neologisms (and a few cunningly disguised mispellings). You’re going to have to dig around through all the alots and twerks to find a rare gem like an omnishambles.

A little further in, tucked away amongst the stacks, you’ll find some of the more reputable vendors. Here you can buy yourself a new name, for the right price. Names finely wrought to be weighty with power and authority, or lighter - more whimsical and carefree. Whether you want to be more of a Stapleton or a Strawley, a Tobias or a Bluebell. If you have enough to offer, you might even get something bespoke - a name that will fit you better than any you’ve worn before. Most of these vendors only take payment in kind, so think twice about just what you’re giving up, and where your new name might have come from.

The stacks are also a good place to browse for a bargain. The lady with the tattered dress and enigmatic smile - no-one has ever quite been able to place her accent - will sell you elisions. Bits of lamb and vegetables and castles and the like. She says that these ems and ees and els were carelessly dropped by their original owners, but there are those that will tell you that she just went out and took them, and it’s just that no-one has noticed yet. If you ask her, she’ll just give you that smile. They say she even has a collection of old vowels from before the Great Shift, but you won’t find anyone who’s heard them.

If you’re looking for something a bit more playful, the gentleman in the top hat and tales will set you right up with some tmesis any-old-how you like. Don’t let his refined appearance fool you, though, nothing amuses him more than slipping unexpected profanities in for the unwary customer, and there’s nothing that will derail an otherwise well-crafted phrase than a ri-goddam-diculous infixation. They can be quite incongruous.

Here you will find the Wordsmith himself. His arms are thick and grimy from working long hours at the forge, and his stare can melt any lazy, ill-considered cliché, quick as a flash. He offers solid constructions for a fair asking, and he has fixed many a faulty phrase for the literati over the years.

The truly experienced visitor to the Wordmarket knows straightaways where to go. If you make your way up to the reading room, you’ll find all the old hands of the market. Stalls most prestigious and ancient, some still trading in languages that have been thought extinct for centuries. Those words always fetch a high price.

Here you will find ‘Taunton’s Tautologous Pleonasms- all words bought, procured, sold and traded’. His stock may be at an all-time low right now, but most of the great and the good have come through Taunton’s at some time. Shakespeare got his ‘tomorrows’ here, and Taunton nearly cleaned himself out trying to fill Proust’s orders.

At the back, there, between the sofas, you’ll find Ponsonby’s - ‘Esteemed and Ancient Purveyor of Purple Prose’. Those who are too hard-up to afford Taunton’s extravagant prices come here to buy florid and flowing adjectives by the pound - alas, too often lurid and overdone, for my tastes.

There’s Aliya, with her alliterations, shilling and selling her well-worn wares to whomever wanders by her stall. And there are Rhymers trading faded, aged pages and refined primers with old-timers and relative neophytes alike.

Beyond those doors right there, so well-loved and worn by the hands of readers and writers alike, you’ll find the largest stall of all. No common word-merchant hawking his wares, the appearance of the silent man beyond may trouble you, for a while. You’ll feel certain that you’ve met him before, though he’s different every time. There’s not a word in sight at his stall, just shelf after shelf of objects of all shapes, sizes, colours, with no further explanation. Some of them will be familiar, too.

These are the allusions, and the man makes no charge for them. You can just take whatever you need, but the polite thing to do is to return here one day with something of your own to offer. Everyone you ask will tell of a different great author whom they once saw here, but the truth is that all will come through here, in their turn.

Some time towards dawn, the market begins to slow. Those who have met their count for the evening break down their stalls first and trickle off into the trailing vestiges of the night. Those who have been, shall we say, ‘up against the block’ linger a little longer in the hope of shifting just a few more measures. Before long, they, too, are gone, and all that can be seen of the market is a few dusty footprints, and a few scattered, stray commas.