Quiz: Chairman or chairwoman?

[Barbara Need]

Just an observation, my recollection is that Old English had the
compound _werman_ (though I cannot find it right now). As I recall,
it appeared in conjunction with wifman.

Barbara

Barbara Need
UChicago

>At 12:47 AM -0500 11/3/06, Wilson Gray wrote:
>>Let's simply spread the use of the English equivalent of Latin _vir_,
>>still alive only in "werewolf,"
>
>there's always wergild...
>
>>as the opposite of "woman," leaving
>>"man" to mean "human being," as "homo" originally meant in Latin.
>>
>>-Wilson
>
>Nice thought, but a friendly amendment:
>
>  (i) Since _wer-_ is pretty much extinct, we might as well go with
>the Latin cognate _vir_, still alive in virile, virtue, virago,
>triumvirate, etc.
>(ii) On the model of _wi:f-man_, which has undergone the usual
>ease-of-articulation reductions to arrive at _woman_, I propose that
>we get those changes out of the way ahead of time, leaving us with:
>  _vir_ + _man_ > virman, pl. _virmen_.
>
>LH
>
>>
>>On 11/2/06, Troy <foxfoot at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>>-----------------------
>>>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>Poster:       Troy <foxfoot at YAHOO.COM>
>>>Subject:      Re: Quiz:  Chairman or chairwoman?
>>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>>Well, as an intern teacher of "first-year composition"
>>>- I'd say that the "_man" makes "Chairman" non-gender
>>>neutral for the same reason I can't teach "freshman
>>>composition" in today's cultural climate.
>>>
>>>...and to be honest - I think there's something to it.
>>>Of course there is always the "Chairperson" option
>>>which while decidedly clunky, at least avoids complete
>>>dehumanization / objectification of the role.
>>>
>>>
>>>--- Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM> wrote:
>>>
>>>>  ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>>>  header -----------------------
>>>>  Sender:       American Dialect Society
>>>>  <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>>  Poster:       Jonathan Lighter
>>>>  <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
>>>>  Subject:      Re: Quiz:  Chairman or chairwoman?
>>>>
>>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>
>>>>  How do we know that "chairman" is gender-specific ?
>>>>  If it is, hasn't it become so only since the
>>>>  introduction of "chairwoman" ?
>>>>
>>>>    JL
>>>>
>>>>  "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET> wrote:
>>>>    ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>>>  header -----------------------
>>>>  Sender: American Dialect Society
>>>>  Poster: "Joel S. Berson"
>>>>  Subject: Quiz: Chairman or chairwoman?
>>>>
>>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>
>>>>  At 11/2/2006 04:06 PM, Page Stephens wrote:
>>>>  >What do you call an actress these days, a woman
>>>>  actor or simply an actor?
>>>>  >
>>>>  >As far as I can tell the use of a word which
>>>>  denotes the sex of a person is
>>>>  >going out of style and therefore the use of gender
>>>>  specific words denoting
>>>>  >the sex of the person is disappearing..
>>>>  >...
>>>>  >The men got there first ...
>>>>
>>>>  A short quiz (do NOT consult your local OED, or
>>>>  other historical dictionary).
>>>>
>>>>  Which came first, chairman or chairwoman?
>>>>
>>>>  By how many decades?
>>>>
>>>>  How many centuries later did chair arrive? (For the
>>>>  occupier, not
>>>>  the place he sat.)
>>>>
>>>>  Which came first, chairwoman or chair?
>>>>
>>>>  Joel
>>>>
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>>
>>
>>--
>>Everybody says, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange
>>complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>>-----
>>Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is knows how deep
>>a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our
>>race. He brought death into the world.
>>
>>--Sam Clemens
>>
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