Essay on Alleen Pace Nilsens View of Sexism in English

Alleen Pace Nilsens View of Sexism in English Alleen Pace Nilsen began a study of Sexism in American English after returning from a two-year stay in Kabul, Afghanistan. Trying to avoid social issues in her research, Nilsen used the dictionary, as her main source and guide, making note-cards on every entry that seemed to tell something about male and female. She soon discovered that language and society go hand and hand. Furthermore, that the language a culture uses is evident in its values and beliefs. Amore careful look at the English language revealed three main points that Alleen Nilsen elaborates more on. The first point Nilsen makes is that American culture values woman for their sexiness and men for their success.†¦show more content†¦Nilsen also compared sir and madam in which sir is a term of respect while madam is known as a manager of a brothel. The word women have so many sexual connotations that people began using lady instead. It was feminists who wanted the women used over lady. That was successful be cause now it is commonly used without implying sexuality. Another discovery of Nilsen was the 200 pairs of words with masculine and feminine forms nearly all the pairs had the masculine word as the base and the feminine word as the suffix, which was added. (Example heir-heiress, hero-heroine) Nilsen research showed that the only time the base of a word is not masculine is when it is dealing with sex and marriage. The examples that she gives are bride, bridal attendant, bridal gown, and so on. This is so because marriage is so on. This is so even when a marriage ends in death the woman gets the title of widow. Nilsen revisits her studies twenty years later and has acknowledged that the feminists movement has caused the differences between the sexes to be down played. The second point Nilsen makes is that Women Are Passive and Men Are Active and that point are illustrated by the wording of the wedding ceremony. In the ceremony Nilsen points out that the women is expected to play a passive role and the men play a strong role. The question is asked; Who gives this bride away? was implying that the bride is something to be handed over. This goes back to the times when