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Political correctness in speech
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| Teacher | Date: Friday, 08.10.2010, 22:28 | Message # 1 |
 Head teacher
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| Political correctness in speech is a mechanism we use in our everyday life. Sometimes we don't even think that this or that word can be politically incorrect. That's the list of some interesting "incorrect" words and their "politically correct" synonyms. Prison (a large building where people are kept as punishment after being found guilty of a crime) ==> Detention (an act of preventing people from leaving a certain place, especially if someone is believed to be guilty of a crime), facility (a building used for a particular purpose). Homeless(one who has no shelter) ==> A street dweller (one who chooses the city streets to live in). Jobless (having no job) ==> Self-employed (doing any kind of activity on one's own initiative). Please, add here more examples of politically "correct" and "incorrect" words.
In Vino Veritas...
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| MissJane | Date: Monday, 11.10.2010, 16:00 | Message # 2 |
 Union organizer
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| The problem of correct use of gender both in written and oral speech became urgent long ago and the changes are still in process. The reforms involving gender are explicitly political in intent and represent a quest for social justice rather than a wish for more consistent logic. And unlike other political language reforms, which tend to be limited to individual names for ethnic groups, gender reforms involve basic grammatical components like pronouns, basic grammatical rules like pronoun agreement, and basic words like man, father, male and female. Some of these elements have been in the language for over a thousand years. It is not surprising, therefore, that the effort to undo them can often be a difficult and untidy business.
Some people find compounds using master- to be sexist and avoid using the term fellow, as in fellow colleagues, to refer to women.
Many people would now agree that the concept of family can include persons living together who may not be married or who may not be of opposite sexes. Few can agree, however, on how to refer to such persons. One term, significant other, which has been in use since at least 1985, is an all-purpose word for describing a lover or a spouse, but this term is now considered somewhat outdated. Another term is POSSLQ (person of the opposite sex sharing living quarters). A term that is gaining in popularity and is being used by some companies and organizations in drafting benefits plans that include all members of such nontraditional families is domestic partner, which has also been in use since about 1985. A newer term that is also gaining in use is life partner. And there are other terms that have a long history of usage, such as companion, lifelong (or longtime) companion, and partner. (The examples are taken from The American Heritage® Book of English Usage. A Practical and Authoritative Guide to Contemporary English. 1996)
And are you always careful when dealing with gender? Do you think that some misleading term may cause a lot of offence to others? Or is it just an attempt not to call people and their status by what they really are?
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| Asya | Date: Tuesday, 12.10.2010, 10:57 | Message # 3 |
 Union committee president
Group: Moders
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| Quote (MissJane) And are you always careful when dealing with gender? Do you think that some misleading term may cause a lot of offence to others? Or is it just an attempt not to call people and their status by what they really are?
It seems to me that EVERY term may sound offensive.  It's not the words, it's our attitude that may hurt people. And these "politically correct" terms are used to make some unpleasant phenomena sound more polite and common. And that's misleading, to my mind.
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| Nekavaen | Date: Tuesday, 12.10.2010, 23:21 | Message # 4 |
 Head teacher
Group: Users
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| A lot of “politically correct” words appear each year.
Some of them are ethnic-related. For example, Indians should be called “Native Americans”, “Indigenous People” or “Amerindians”.
Political correctness connected with religious beliefs is also gaining popularity. There is a suggestion to replace the terms “Anno Domini” (AD) and “Before Christ” (BC) by “Common Era” (CE) and “Before Common Era” (BCE).
Also a lot of terms are supposed to give new names to various health problems. Among them disability-related words are the most popular ones. We shouldn’t say “backward”, “imbecile” or “idiot”. Instead of them we should use the following words and word combinations: “slow”, “mentally handicapped”, “mentally disabled”, “mentally challenged”, “a person will special educational needs”, “a person with learning difficulties”.
It is not human to be without shame and without desire. (Ursula K. Le Guin)
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| Luck | Date: Wednesday, 13.10.2010, 12:54 | Message # 5 |
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Union organizer
Group: Friends
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| I think that some politically correct words are just unnecessary. For example: a chairman-a chairwoman, a fireman-a firewoman and so on. All these "-woman" words sound funny. I even don't use them in my speech, because they seem to be absurd. Though maybe I sound conservative:) But anyway I would prefer to use a "chairman" or a "chairperson".
But such words as "mature", "physically challenged" do seem to be quite ok, and maybe creating words of such a kind can "improve" our attitude to some people, or at least we will sound more respectful.
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| Asya | Date: Wednesday, 13.10.2010, 14:01 | Message # 6 |
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Union committee president
Group: Moders
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| Quote (Luck) All these "-woman" words sound funny. I even don't use them in my speech, because they seem to be absurd.
Luck, if you were in Germany, nobody would understand you. These LehrerInnen and ÄrztInnen are just a vivid example of gender-linguistics. (And of political correctness, too, of course)
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| Nekavaen | Date: Thursday, 14.10.2010, 01:29 | Message # 7 |
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Head teacher
Group: Users
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| Luck, you are absolutely right! It’s really funny to avoid the usage of words that morphologically correspond to a certain gender and create new ones that sound more “female-like”.
I remember, I laughed a lot when I once read an article devoted to this problem. Its author is firmly convinced that the spelling of the word “woman” should be changed into “womun” or “womin”. It seems inappropriate to him that a “female” word includes a “male” root. I think, he is crazy. Do any women really care about it?
Of course, feminists may call it an urgent problem. But they have a unique ability to see injustice towards women everywhere and very often make the cup run over.
It is not human to be without shame and without desire. (Ursula K. Le Guin)
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| 8davids8 | Date: Thursday, 14.10.2010, 18:09 | Message # 8 |
 Union organizer
Group: Admins
Messages: 166
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| Political correctness shouldn't be overused - this conclusion we made while discussing the topic in groups at the lesson. Seems to be a reasonavle one. Consider the USA - the Negroes paradox. They seem to have even more rights now than whites do actually. The eagerness of Americans to apply legislation and political correctness works in this way.
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| Rina | Date: Thursday, 14.10.2010, 22:05 | Message # 9 |
 Union committee president
Group: Friends
Messages: 208
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| Quote (Nekavaen) Its author is firmly convinced that the spelling of the word “woman” should be changed into “womun” or “womin”. It seems inappropriate to him that a “female” word includes a “male” root. I think, he is crazy. Do any women really care about it?
I doubt that he really bothers about women's attitude toward this “problem”, may be it is him, who is offended by the spelling of these words. May be as a man he doesn't like the fact that “every woman is partly a man”. By the way, though I understand what I mean, even my explanation seems ridiculous.. Oh... I, guess I'll never understand these “fighters for gender equality in language”.
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| MissJane | Date: Friday, 15.10.2010, 09:31 | Message # 10 |
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Union organizer
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| Quote (Rina) May be as a man he doesn't like the fact that “every woman is partly a man”
I'd rather say he's aggravated to understand that "man is a part of woman" Well, actually I think all this struggle about equality between men and women comes from those people (or groups of individuals) who are dissatisfied with their life (perhaps some troubles in communication with the opposite sex). And in order not to vex each other even in speech, such terms as "chairperson" or "salesperson" were introduced. By the way, I don't see anything reasonable in making people biologically neutral. Indeed, do you feel strange realizing that you are a man/a woman?Added (15.10.2010, 09:31)
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FYI: Contrary to popular opinion, the word female is not derived from male, nor is it even related. In this case, women preceded men. Female comes from the Latin word femella, “young woman, girl,” which was a diminutive of femina, “woman.” Female came into English by way of Old French around 1330 and was first spelled femele. Male came along in 1373, also from Latin via Old French. But male derives from the Latin masculus, a diminutive of mas, “male.” As early as 1380 femelle began to be influenced by male, and spellings with an a began to appear. Eventually, female became the standard English spelling.
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| Nekavaen | Date: Friday, 15.10.2010, 20:34 | Message # 11 |
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Head teacher
Group: Users
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| Miss Jane, thanks a lot for the valuable information provided. I've always thought that the words "a man" and "a woman" are related.
It is not human to be without shame and without desire. (Ursula K. Le Guin)
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| Former-Teacher | Date: Saturday, 16.10.2010, 10:22 | Message # 12 |
 Dean
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| Overuse of political correctness leads to an abuse of the idea of empathy and tolerance. All of these should have limits. In the modern world politically correct communication is actually a form of censorship. Common communication patterns are reconsidered because living standards (including all factors) are changing and taking us far away from a simple denotant-referent relations in a language. Our languages are becoming more abstract. The abstract notions are often imposed.
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| Nekavaen | Date: Sunday, 17.10.2010, 00:40 | Message # 13 |
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Head teacher
Group: Users
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| And very often “politically correct” words become bases for social, political and sexual stereotypes.
It is not human to be without shame and without desire. (Ursula K. Le Guin)
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| Luck | Date: Monday, 18.10.2010, 23:29 | Message # 14 |
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Union organizer
Group: Friends
Messages: 172
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| but in fact, why do we use some politically correct words that seem to be really silly? what is the reason for it? why do we let all these abstract notions be imposed? To tell the truth I myself can't even get the meaning of some "politically correct" words, and it just makes me feel really stupid! Why can't we call things as they are? I do not mean that we should humiliate each other or be vulgar, I just want to say that there are PLENTY of words that must be deleted from our language! instead of it we just create new equvalents of them, and quite often they seem to be very obscure.
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| MissJane | Date: Thursday, 21.10.2010, 23:26 | Message # 15 |
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Union organizer
Group: Friends
Messages: 193
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| I have just found another example of how to "let people go" (I mean "firing employees") which amazed me a lot! The staff reduction is also called "shedding employees" (as if it were a natural process, the way trees shed their leaves in the fall, out of the company's control and therefore not their responsibility). It sounds nice, isn't it? 
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