to object to terms such as manageress or authoress?

[MaundyBra]

It was mentioned on another thread but was really a side issue, so I've started another one.

I work with a lady who refers to herself as a co-parent rather than a mother.

I bet she is a right little bundle-ess of joy

One gets stewardesses on PanAm a-la Catch Me If You Can.
Everywhere else one is helped by cabin crew.

Stewardesses

I hate it too
My parents refer to the female doctor as the 'lady doctor' I have pulled them up on it several times but they don't seem to get why it makes me so annoyed.

lol! I'm sure they were called air hostesses the last time I flew! [old git emoticon]

Madam Chairman is correct. The Chair is what she sits on, not a committee member in itself (drives me mad)

Even Chairman (not a madam) is better, as its -man as in hu-man rather than a gender thing.

could be patronising. if used that way. The words themselves are just words and when I grew up if I'd said manager when it was a woman I'd have been corrected.

If you get twisty enough with it you could probably cobble up an argument that calling a woman 'manager' was an insult. :)

It would go something like this.

The people in charge are men and called Managers (that's what the 'er' part means. If a woman takes the job then we'll make her an 'honorary man' and give her the same title rather than one that recognises her own gender.

jenni This 'Chair' title also drives me mad. I am not sure why anybody would prefer to use this over 'Madam Chairman' or 'Chairman' or even 'Chairperson'... it sounds so weird.

I have always wondered what a male dinnerlady should be called?

I worked in primary schools until recently.

They were defintitly referred to as dinner ladies and lunchtime supervisor is a different role

For me the touchstone eg is
Police Constable, PC
Woman Police Constable, WPC.

There's no possibility of pretending this is just correct grammar.

zukiecat, can you explain in your own words why a police force would implement a new, longer job title instead of using the existing neutral job title, to mark that it is a woman doing the job?

I think your own answers to that will tell you exactly what people are getting hot under the collar about here.

zukiecat does "Keep quiet, woman!" not offend you at all? You must have nerves of steel!

zukie - I would get a grip, honestly I would. I would get a good firm grip around the throats of any of my minions staff if they called me a manageress.

Its a mouthful if nothing else and frankly they don't need to point out I'm a woman with the 'ess' suffix as my name usually gives it away.

Dinner ladies are called Midday Supervisory Assistants (MSAs) if you can be arsed. They still refer to themselves as dinner ladies in our school though.

MSA are the same as luchtime S. Im sure of it.

I looked at a job vacancy ad:

"Vacancy Description
We are looking for two people to join our team of midday supervisors. Our children need help with their packed lunches or school dinner and someone to initiate play afterwards. This post is term time only from 11.45 - 13.00 daily "

Perhaps it depends on the individual school. My dc knows them as dinner ladies.

But anyway the point is if the school calls them dinner ladies what would a male call himself in this role?

ThisisaniceCage I had never even thought of the issue of WPCs - thanks for that example. It really is the epitome of sexist job titles. I might start using the term MPCs - Male Police Constables - in the future to demonstrate my point.

yanbu

YANBU. All this 'grammatically correct' smoke and mirrors is nonsense. The correct terms are eg aviator (m) aviatrix (f) Not aviatorix. Likewise female usher shouldn't be usherette (lesser kind of usher).
All these 'political correctness gone mad' types are mighty keen on maintaining the most ludicrous constructions eg Madam Chairman. What's wrong with Chairwoman? Why do women want to be called 'man'? This idea of 'man' meaning gender neutral human is only credible if you take no account of the historical development of language. Do we really believe 'man' = human and 'man' = male is coincidence? Honestly?

YANBU. Its bloody annoying.

Oh god I hate It too. I'm a manager just like any other manager not a manageress. It's really patronising to put ess on the end.