Describing the female body using male language

[JohnnyMcGrathSaysFuckOff]

Sort of inspired by the wonderful vagina facts thread.....

I have often wondered about the implications of the fact that women's bodies are described and mapped by men. For example, Braxton Hicks cx are named for a male doctor in the 1870s who first noticed them.

Only, I'm fairly sure women had been 'noticing' them for some time before he happened along

And the oft-cited fact that vagina means scabbard, obviously labelling a key female organ in terms of its use value for men.

What other egs are there are of our bodies being mapped and appropriated by men like this? And what are the ramifications?

departments.kings.edu/womens_history/trotula.html
What about Trotula of Salerno though? History isn't a simple linear progression of women gradually getting more rights, there have been women writing about obstetrics at times when it was easier for women to practice, and then quietly erased in the intervening times.

departments.kings.edu/womens_history/trotula.html
What about Trotula of Salerno though? History isn't a simple linear progression of women gradually getting more rights, there have been women writing about obstetrics at times when it was easier for women to practice, and then quietly erased in the intervening times.

departments.kings.edu/womens_history/trotula.html
What about Trotula of Salerno though? History isn't a simple linear progression of women gradually getting more rights, there have been women writing about obstetrics at times when it was easier for women to practice, and then quietly erased in the intervening times.

departments.kings.edu/womens_history/trotula.html
What about Trotula of Salerno though? History isn't a simple linear progression of women gradually getting more rights, there have been women writing about obstetrics at times when it was easier for women to practice, and then quietly erased in the intervening times.

Ouch...sorry...

departments.kings.edu/womens_history/trotula.html
What about Trotula of Salerno though? History isn't a simple linear progression of women gradually getting more rights, there have been women writing about obstetrics at times when it was easier for women to practice, and then quietly erased in the intervening times.

Actually you’re right. But isn’t more
Of a reflection of lack of women in academia?

I mean if there was (and of course there was) institutionalised sexism it shouldn’t detract from the individual scientists who were first published or acknowledged should it? Isn’t it symptomatic of s problem rather than the fault of the individual
Men?

It’s not just you, my post also has a stutter!!

Am I going to go to the GP and say I think I have a prolapse in my cunt?
A propos of cunty bits, I got asked by my doctor if myself and the missus used 'appliances'.........

I resisted the temptation to say 'Well, we've got a hoover..........'

(To those not in the know, way back when when lesbian mums were trying to get custody of their kids, one woman was asked by a judge if they 'used appliances', and the above was her reply!)

I was then going to look for the marvelous clitoris sculpture, but instead came back with this one by a bloke that I am not terribly impressed by:
www.atlasobscura.com/places/le-clitoris Too angular, surely!

Any suggestions as to a new name for the vagina?

I think it says a lot that the internal structure of the clitoris was only properly studied in the 1990s I think

PS. I thought this thread was going to be about this

observer.com/2018/04/male-authors-write-about-women-twitter/

We should rebrand the poor old vagina, I hate that word. Because of the scabbard meaning.

Every name is either really twee or crude (Mary foo foo minnie flower) vs the usual

I quite like fanny but it has no gravitas

If this were a marketing exercise and you were on the Apprentice you’d have a great time rebranding with a powerful message

Like Phoenix? Goddess? GIVER of LIFE

I recently discovered that pudenda comes from the Latin word for shame.
Apparently because the female genitalia hides itself away but still......
The awful implication that women's sexuality is something to be ashamed of.

www.dazeddigital.com/artsandculture/article/34166/1/why-we-still-need-ways-of-seeing-john-berger

Does all this labelling of women with men's names constitute a kind of colonialism?

Well, we could go back several thousands of years to the Judeo-Christian genesis myth of Adam’s rib ...

Which is why the wonderful 70s feminist magazine was called Spare Rib

Rename the vagina? My sister's gynaecologist called it "the pink pearly palace of pleasure " ! That's Australians for you. She found it hilarious. But don't tell the tras - they're bound to want it even if we don't.

Fuelled it seems likely that pudenda comes from the verb "to be ashamed" rather than the abstract noun, so both male and female (as it is a unisex word) cover up their genitalia because they feel ashamed, rather than the womans genitals lurk inside ashamedly though right now mine should be ashamed for the bloodbath they are inflicting on me I have only ever read things where pudenda referred to male genitals so didn't realise it could refer to female ones until just now.

Surely scabbards are named after vaginas, not the other way round?

All language is male. Short of making an entirely new language, all we can do about it is talk in ways that men don't like and make sure we constantly talk about fannys in the most vulgar ways possible. It's what Cixous would have wanted.

(As an aside, I prefer fanny because men don't say it. I dont think I've ever heard a man say fanny, especially not in a sexual context.)

RadicalFern I have only heard it being used for female genitalia especially on artwork.
wiki has it that it is usually in reference to female genitalia
So different experiences there.

There’s a book that was recommended to me on here ‘A Midwife’s Tale, the Life of Martha Ballard’ (or something like that, think the title is actually slightly longer) that talks a little bit about the rise in medical men taking over obstetrics in America while she was practicing.

Earlier on in her career the male Doctors came and assisted her at births, while allowing her to be at autopsys, a sharing of information.

As male Doctors rise in prominence in the obstrectic field that sharing is thrown out, posh families are encouraged to call the doctor first rather than a midwife, although she was sometimes called as a last resort

Sorry not directly relevant to the thread but thought some people reading mind find it interesting. It’s a good book.

Toofle I don't think so.

I believe in classical Latin that vagina is a military/ arms related term.

Reproductive organs were genitalia -"the parts that create othet things" - or pudenda - " the parts of which it is needful to be ashamed".

Then as medical Latin evolved vagina began to be used metaphorically for that specific structure. Older med diagrams I've seen don't use it.

But I am not a classicist or a med historian!

Interesting thread, OP, thanks

Naice - so that's where Brian from Hull got his ideas about yoni massage from!