[extropy-chat] Language Again

Randall Randall randall at randallsquared.com
Thu Dec 28 17:06:23 UTC 2006


On Dec 28, 2006, at 10:07 AM, Lee Corbin wrote:

>
> The word "her" is still jarring because it necessarily makes
> a political statement:  "I affirm that male dominance has
> caused and is causing women to stay out of certain professions
> because of the way these words unconsciously affect their
> mental imagery, and so constrain what they will *do*."
> Whereas, when one writes "The historian, after making
> careful inquiries, usually finds that his data support..."
> chances are that this will not flag the political parts of one's
> brain.
>
> (Of course, I could be wrong:  it may be that people under
> the age of 25 do not find the specific uses of "her" and "she"
> in these instances at all jarring.

I'm over 30, and don't find use of "her", "she", and so on
jarring, though I, myself, often prefer to use "they", and
I do still find that a bit jarring (!), because a part of
me wants to "correct" the grammar.

--
Randall Randall <randall at randallsquared.com>
"If you are trying to produce a commercial product in
  a timely and cost efficient way, it is not good to have
  somebody's PhD research on your critical path." -- Chip Morningstar





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