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Re: 'Women' as an adjective (was RE: sex or gender?)
Subject:Re: 'Women' as an adjective (was RE: sex or gender?) From:Vicki Rosenzweig <murphy!acmcr!vr -at- UUNET -dot- UU -dot- NET> Date:Fri, 10 Feb 1995 14:44:08 EST
There are instances when we might need a gendered adjective: for
example, "female firefighters often face resistance and even
harassment from their male colleagues" or "The US Congress is resistant
to allowing women to carry weapons in combat, although it doesn't seem
to mind allowing female nurses to be shot at on the battlefield." In
other words, so long as there is resistance to gender integration, we
sometimes need words to discuss that resistance or the progress made in
overcoming it. I happen to think "female" is a perfectly good adjective,
and "woman" is a perfectly good noun: if these things are relevant, I am
a female college graduate, and I am a woman who works in publishing--I
am not a woman college graduate (or, for that matter, a women's college
graduate) or a female who works in publishing.
Vicki Rosenzweig
vr%acmcr -dot- uucp -at- murphy -dot- com
New York, NY
