{"id":827,"date":"2012-05-17T07:23:11","date_gmt":"2012-05-17T14:23:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/?p=827"},"modified":"2012-05-13T11:53:12","modified_gmt":"2012-05-13T18:53:12","slug":"qa-is-mansplain-sexist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/2012\/05\/17\/qa-is-mansplain-sexist\/","title":{"rendered":"Q&A: is “mansplain” sexist?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In my earlier post about sexism in CS<\/a>, I used the term “mansplain”. \u00a0Sam emailed me about it, saying (in part):<\/p>\n

I really enjoyed your recent blog post about sexism in CS. As a man in CS it is good to be reminded of such things and to be both cautious and aware of them. In particular I like your optimism and your examples of how you work to achieve a better situation.<\/p>\n

I’m not convinced the use of the word mansplain does much beyond switching the sexism back the other way, however. If I were to write a blogpost and use the word womansplain I am sure I would get at least one nasty email, and it would be justified, as it’s not really appropriate for the message. This is because it would be ascribing certain undesirable traits to women writ large, etc, I’m sure you see where I’m going.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s an interesting point, and I’ll admit that I haven’t really decided what I think about it. \u00a0I was using “mansplain” as a convenient shorthand\u00a0for the type of patronizing and condescending explanation that a sexist man is wont to use when speaking to a woman about a technical concept. \u00a0Perhaps this is a reflection of what I read, but I felt that the word was well-used enough (and self-descriptive enough, certainly in context) to be clear about exactly the behavior that I was describing. \u00a0On the other hand, the only instances that I was able to come up with when searching for “womansplain” were parodies of the former, and only a handful of them at all). \u00a0Is it sexist to create a portmanteau with man- at all (some interesting examples here<\/a>)? \u00a0Or is it that the behavior described is one that is itself sexist?<\/p>\n

Since I haven’t made up my mind about whether the use of “mansplain” is sexist, I decided to turn to an expert. \u00a0David Crystal<\/a> is a noted linguist and has published many books on the English language and its evolution. \u00a0In his blog<\/a>, he often takes on questions about words and phrases. \u00a0I wrote to him to ask:<\/p>\n

I’m curious about your opinion of the portmanteau “mansplain”, for which Urban Dictionary has several definitions variously involving a man giving a patronizing and condescending explanation. \u00a0Inasmuch as a linguist is comfortable commenting on language being sexist, do you think that this is? \u00a0Is there a litmus test of sorts that one might be able to apply? \u00a0For example, is the reaction to a simple replacement (eg, “womansplain”) such a test?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I wasn’t really expecting a response, but a few days later, he did write back! \u00a0(And I have to tell you that my little geek heart, which much enjoys linguistics and that’s how I came to be familiar with his work and an avid reader of his blog, was all a-flutter when I woke up to that email.) \u00a0Here’s what he said:<\/p>\n

I think it’s too early to say whether mansplain and womansplain have evolved a sexist status, The definitions on urban dictionary can never be properly interpreted, as no information is given about source and context. There’s a lot of idiosyncrasy and invention. So I think we’re going to have to wait a while to see how usage develops. However, I don’t know what a test for such things might look like. Social attitudes to language aren’t usually capable of being tested in a ‘litmus’ sort of way.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I have to admit that I was hoping for a definitive answer, although I’ve read enough about linguistics to know better.<\/p>\n

So, audience, what say you? \u00a0Do you think that it’s sexist?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In my earlier post about sexism in CS, I used the term “mansplain”. \u00a0Sam emailed me about it, saying (in part): I really enjoyed your recent blog post about sexism in CS. As a man in CS it is good to be reminded of such things and to be both cautious and aware of them. … Continue reading Q&A: is “mansplain” sexist?<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-women"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=827"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/827\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":831,"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/827\/revisions\/831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nadynerichmond.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}