AIBU - sexist science homework

[Litchick]

Lst night's science homework was to write a short passage about a famous scientist, what they discovered and its applications today.

Fine except that each question said 'he'.

Eg what was his name? What did he discover?

DD and I chose Marie Curie and changed everything to she.

AIBU to make the point on the prep sheet or just touchy?
Does it matter? It felt to me like it does. Grrrr

LadyMMT: "OMG. There we have it. The 'M' word in all it's out of context glory. "

I beg to differ. Your knickers were definitely doing the twist at 7.55 this morning! (no grinning emoticons there, either!)

Au contraire Mrs!

I was doing my best Paul Merton impression. Knickers were not even - hang on - won't go there...

defiant
ha!

If you say so. Still, there were no emoticons at all in your 7.55 post, though, let alone of the grinning kind, so you'll have to try harder to convince me! (is that enough grins?).

And you did end that post by saying "I'm pretty sure he's not a misogyniost though." - methinks a little disingenuity, perchance?!

You know what I find depressing about this? I was having exactly these conversations in the 70s and all the same arguments were trotted out by the opposers of inclusive language then. I'm glad I didn't know then that the battle still wouldn't be won 30 years later!

Another good one is "Ms? Ms Why would anyone want to use Ms. You can't pronounce it for a start!"

I know, seeker. There's a really interesting looking book here - Gender shifts in the history of English

First paragraph of chapter 3 all looks horribly familiar.

Seeker, apologies if you have already said this but what is your solution to the issue, ie do you use plural, s/he?

I wonder if the arguments in the 70s are the same as those happening now. I wasn't privy to those but sometimes when I speak to women who were I think we aren't exactly on the same page because of the work that they did then iysim.

The generic use of "he" is some contexts doesn't offend me personally because I don't feel excluded as a woman in the same way that a woman in the 70s might have felt. The discussion is obviously still relevant but not as relevant. Much the same way I think that, for example, the changing of the word "history" to "herstory" is a little hysterical although I appreciate that in the 70s there was a very good reason to do so and was important for consciousness-raising.

S/he or they is fine by me. So is judicial redrafting to avoid the need to use either. I actuall prefer the last as I am a pedant and a style geek as well as a feminist.

Don't believe all you read about the history/herstory and similar insanities. There were a few - a very few - extremists, but most of that sort of stuff was invented by people wanting to ridicule feminists and to make the argument look ridiculous.

I think that issues like inclusive language are as important now as they were then. Children STILL think that girls are nurses and boys are doctors when they play!

Oh lawdy, 'herstory'!! I'd forgotten all about that!

ROFLROFLROFL

Cause the French (which it derives from) 'l'histoire' is clearly anti-female (il/ elle), right?

ROFLROFLROFL

Oh, sometimes you just wanna hug an extremist, don'tcha?

I deliberately didn't mention "herstory". But I couldn't resist alluding to the equally daft "girlcott", which a loony Australian feminist writer of my acquaintance used on me. (Not THAT Australian feminist, no.)

OMG! girlcott!!!

PMSL and ROFL and PMSL and ROFL and PMSL and ROFL and PMSL and ROFL and PMSL and ROFL and PMSL and ROFL and...

PLEASE don't let all the crap obscure the real issue!!!1

Nowt wrong with a bit of light entertainment before getting back to the meat and veg, seeker!

YANBU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

way back down the thread someone v. good posted a lengthy pedigree for the use of 'they' or 'their' meaning 'this applies to everyone not just men'.

So could we possibly all agree that 'they' and 'their' is actually legitimate although some real hard-core pedants feel a bit uncomfortable about it?

I agree - they/ their are by far the best options we have available.

I agree it's legitimate but confess that until I had read this thread I didn't know that it was considered an alternative to this issue and if I saw, for example, "A student must return their book" I would have just put it down to poor grammar/ignorance.
I also think it can be quite confusing in long and more complicated sentences where it is not clear what it is being referred to.

Interesting stuff here

especially the fact that the Chicago Manual of Style had a change of heart and flipped back.

I can't help at "Kitchen table issues ... are ones the next president can actually do something about if he actually cares about it." Said by the leading female candidate for the US presidency in the last 30 years.

That's a bit of a funny example though, stillstanding. In that case it would be better to rephrase it as "students must return their books". You surely don't think that "a student must return his book" would be preferable?

You have to look at the individual context. Often "they" is fine (see these from Jane Austen for example), sometimes he/she, and sometimes you just need to rephrase the sentence slightly.

Unquietdad, you should note that the Chicago Manual of Style reverted to a neutral position, not back to advocating the use of the generic he.

This in fact is the neutral position to which it reverts according to the Wiki entry:

"Though some writers are comfortable with the occasional use of they as a singular pronoun, some are not, and it is better to do the necessary work to recast a sentence or, other options having been exhausted, use he or she"

Yes. That's what I understood.

My whole purpose here has been to make it clear that there is still a debate, which the CMS acknowledges.

My edition of the CMS (14th edn) recommends the "revival" of the singular use of "they", "their", etc -- and refers Ruskin, Scott, Sharespeare, and many others as having employed it.

Certainly current publishing practice in the areas in which I work is to allow (but not impose) its singular use so as to avoid unwanted gender-specifity.

Most frequently I find that authors alternate between male and female pronouns when speaking of unspecified individuals -- in examples, etc. A few older authors will use 'he' throughout. I would generally ignore that but if it was too relentless I would suggest a change.