[lg policy] On the birthday of the (legal) generic masculine, let's declare it legally dead

[Baron, Dennis E]

There’s a new post on the Web of Language:

On the birthday of the (legal) generic masculine, let's declare it legally dead

Today is the 145th birthday of the generic masculine, or to be more specific, it’s the 145th birthday of the legal generic masculine. On Feb. 25, 1871, Congress passed “the Dictionary Act,” which said, in part, that in all federal laws, “words importing the masculine gender may be applied to females” (Statutes at Large, 41st Congress, session III, ch. 71, p. 431).

Before you light all those candles, remember that the generic masculine originated long before its legal birthday, and it’s not even English. It comes from Latin, and Latin is dead. Also, the generic masculine in English was supposed to be gender inclusive, but at best it only grudgingly accepted women. More often than not, it ignored them. And all too often it excluded women altogether from the protection of the law, as well as from most everything else, which is why English speakers don’t use the generic masculine any more. So maybe we should celebrate its birthday by finally declaring it legally dead?

Read the full post on the Web of Language: http://bit.ly/1KLRcIZ

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