英语论文网

ed on a person’s sex, esp. discrimination against women.[4] This definition shows that the female is the sex that suffers discrimination in language. In this part, the author will list sexism in English in terms of (1) the generic masculine terms; (2) naming and addressing terms; (3) word order; (4) semantic derogation of women; and (5) idiomatic phrases. 2.1 The generic masculine terms 2.1.1 Generic pronouns Generic pronouns are pronouns that are said to refer to, with equal likelihood, to women and men, such as he, she, his, her, himself and herself. But in linguistic reality, these pronouns are often represented by masculine pronouns----there is no pronoun for a person of unknown sex and even when the female sex is specified. For example, (1) Everybody talked at the top of his voice. (2) In anyone calls, tell him I’ll be back later. (3) One must remember to remain still when he attends a concert. (4) Man, being a mammal, breastfeeds his young. The first third sentences are in habitual usages of most people and the last sentence is taken as a joke when we talk about the general reference of he. In 1977, the Associated Press Stylebook decided to use the pronoun his when an indefinite antecedent may be male or female. Many feminists object to the generic reference of the masculine pronouns. The feminist linguists have commented that the practice of using the masculine for generic purposes makes women invisible in language and relegates women to a secondary position dependent on man. 2.1.2 Masculine terms In English, when referring to people taking certain jobs, with certain careers or of certain status, man and man-linked words are used to cover people of both sexes. We can give a long list of this kind: salesman, postman, congressman and chairman, etc. And we call a person of British nationality an Englishman and students in the first year of college freshmen. Also we can present a table of phrases about generic man: [5] 作家a man of pen 医生 a medical man 职业外交家 career man 指纹专家 a fingerprints man 了不起的人 a man of men 守约的人 a man of his words 领导人 a man at the wheel 当今重要人物 a man of the moment 上流人士 a man of fashion 爱读书的人 a reading man 有阅历深的人 a man of the world 有审美力的人 a man of taste 自己奋斗起家的人 a self-made man Besides man and man-linked terms, many other masculine terms can also be used generically in English. For example, father is the “male parent”, but it also has some extended meanings, as seen in “the heritage of our father”, which means “ancestor” that may include the female. Another word son is not always restricted to the male descendents. In the Bible, the sons of Noah refer to all descendents of Noah, male and female. Even the neutral word person, which is made up of per and son, in the author’s point of view, also implies the fact that man is dominant. In the normal situation, the brotherhood of men includes women, but sisterhood does not include men. In professional career, “men were envisioned as members of brotherhood…; women, as something other.”[6] The word son is sometimes used generically when referring to people from a certain place, of a certain race or with certain appearance, e.g. son of the soil (local people); son of the mountains (a person living in the mountain area); the sons of modern technology (people who master modern technology). It is common to use masculine terms to cover the cases of the female, however,