[H-GEN] Man - general-neutrality [was Re: SFD]

Robert Brockway rbrockway at opentrend.net
Mon Sep 11 10:56:23 EDT 2006


On Mon, 11 Sep 2006, Anthony Irwin wrote:

> We need a few people to staff a stand?  That doesn't  really sound right to 
> me hey I am all for gender neutral terms but wouldn't operate,  manage or run

I'm also a fan of gendel-neutral terms.  One of the interesting things 
about the term 'man' is that it started out gender-neutral:

"The original meaning of the English word "man" (from Proto-Germanic 
mannaz, "person") and words derived therefrom was used as a designation 
for any or all human beings regardless of gender or age. This is the 
oldest usage of "man". In Old English the words wer and wyf (also wpman 
and wifman) were used to refer to "a man" and "a woman" respectively, and 
the word "man" was gender neutral. (This is still seen even today in 
certain words. For an example, there is the word "werewolf", which 
literally means man-wolf.) Later, in Middle English, "man" displaced wer 
as the term for male humans, whilst wyfman, which eventually evolved into 
woman, was retained for female humans. Since then, the word "man" has been 
used to refer both to humanity as a whole and to male humans."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Womyn

I'm sure I've seen a better reference on Wikipedia but this was the first 
one I found.

Having said this I recognise the term man is no longer taken as a gender 
neutral term by most English speakers.

Rob

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