英语中的性别歧视

In countries like the US and UK, where political correctness and gender equality are a big deal, it's often difficult to describe women. If you don't pay close attention, you can come off as impolite, or even worse — if you are a man — a sexist jerk.在英美等国，政治正确与性别平等都是头等大事。用正确的词汇描述女性并非易事，如果你不够谨慎，轻者将被视为无礼，重者(如果你是男性)则会被当做歧视女性的蠢货。Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg's "ban bossy" campaign intends to show people that it is unfair to use the word "bossy" to describe women who aspire to take up leadership roles at work.Facebook首席运营官谢丽尔·桑德博格就发起了“禁用‘bossy’(独断专横)”的运动，因为用这个词来形容有领导能力的女性并不公平。In and outside of work life, there are many other words that have sexist undertones. One of these words is "feisty".不论是在工作中，还是在生活里，还有很多英文单词隐含性别歧视的意味，“feisty(好争辩)”就是其中之一。"Feisty" is often used to describe a lively woman with the implication that she is aggressive and gets on people's nerves.“Feisty”常用来形容活力四射的女性，但暗含“强势、令人心烦”之意。UK actress Daisy Lewis plays an out-spoken feminist teacher in the hit TV series Downton Abbey. While Lewis admits her character is courageous and unconventional, she does not want to be described as "feisty".英国演员黛西·刘易斯在热剧《唐顿庄园》中饰演了一位心直口快的女教师，刘易斯认为自己的角色颇具胆量，并颠覆了传统观念，但她并不喜欢用“feisty”来形容这一角色。In a recent interview with UK newspaper Daily Mail, she said: "Feisty? My least favorite word. Have you heard a male character described as feisty? I think not."在最近接受英国《每日邮报》的采访时，刘易斯说：“‘feisty’是我最不喜欢听到的词。你有听说过哪个男人的性格被形容为‘feisty’么？我猜没有吧”Kudos to Lewis who "has uncovered yet another word that shows the vocabulary gender divide and a wider level of everyday sexism," says a column from UK newspaper The Telegraph.英国《每日电讯报》在一篇专栏文章中称赞道：刘易斯又发现了一个带有性别歧视的词汇。Feisty争强好胜"Feisty", like "bossy", is one of these words that once had the same meaning for both men and women, but evolved to mean something usually negative when applied to women. The Telegraph column lists a few of them.和“bossy”一样，“feisty”曾同时用于形容男性和女性，含义并无差别，但随着它更多用于女性之后就含有了贬义。《每日电讯报》的专栏文章还列出了其他一些与之类似的词语：Ambitious野心勃勃When applied to men, the word describes a positive trait. But when describing a woman, it becomes a dirty word. Even Madonna, in an interview with Harper's Bazaar, has said she felt "being openly ambitious [is] frowned upon".这个词用在男性身上时，多含褒义。但用于形容女性时，却成了难听的字眼。就连麦当娜在一次接受《时尚芭莎》的采访时都表示，她认为“‘野心满满’很让人反感。”Emotional情绪化Every human being has emotions. While "emotional" can be applied to men, "the word is commonly thrown at any woman who dares mention how she feels, or raises her voice," says The Telegraph column.是人都有感情，因此“emotional”也可用来形容男性，但正如《每日电讯报》在专栏文章中所写，“这个词通常用来形容女性，只要她们稍微提及自己的感受或是说话声音大一些(就会被称为‘emotional’)”。The word, together with "moody" and "hysterical", often appear in the "crazy woman" stereotype, says a Time magazine article.而《时代》周刊的一篇文章也写道：这个词还与“喜怒无常”以及“歇斯底里”连用，是形容“疯女人”的典型词汇。Being a woman, it is impossible to avoid the "crazy" label, says the Time article: "What even is crazy? A woman who expresses opinions? Am I crazy if I yell? Am I crazy if I act like a leader? Whatever it is, it usually doesn't refer to any kind of real life mental illness."女人似乎总是逃不开“疯子”这个词，可是什么叫“发疯”?女人发表个观点?还是她大叫一声?或者表现得像个领导？不管是哪一种，反正都和现实中的精神病相去甚远。High-maintenance金贵难养The "high-maintenance girlfriend" with her manicures and love of shopping is a modern day trope firmly rooted in sexism, says The Telegraph column. A guy may be demanding, but he is never "high-maintenance".《每日电讯报》在其专栏文章中写道：做美甲、爱逛街的女孩子被称为“难养的女朋友”，这正体现出当今时代仍然根深蒂固的性别歧视。男孩子也可能有很多花钱的需求，但是他从来不会被形容成“High-maintenance”。Pushy爱出风头Closely related to "ambitious" and "bossy", "pushy" is another word that sums up gender inequality in the workplace.与“ambitious”和“bossy”相似，“Pushy”也是一个在工作场合带有性别歧视的词汇。

构词是语言的基本要素之一，在英语构词方面我们可以看到许多性别歧视的例子。最突出的例证莫过于history，它是由his和story构成的，也就是说，历史是男人的故事，没有也不需要女人的参与。（1）以man结尾、含有man的复合词及派生词。这一类词泛指男女两性，但从表述效果来看，对于男女性别指代往往不是很清晰，甚至仅仅向读者或听众传递男性形象。例如：①Manisthemostintelligentofallspecies.②Allmenshouldmaintaintheecologicbalance.这些句子容易误导人们忽视女性的存在以及女性在历史发展进程中的作用，可将其更改为：①Humankind/humanbeingisthemostintelligentofallspecies.②Allpeopleshouldmaintaintheecologicalbalance.或veryoneshouldmaintaintheecologicalbalance.在英语词汇中，还有很多含有man的复合词及派生词，均带有明显的性别歧视色彩。这一类词主要有man-kind、man-made、freshman、manhood、manly、toman、manhours、manpower等等。在实际应用中，应将其更改为humanbeings、synthetic、first-yearstudent、adulthood、strong、tooperate、workhours、workforce。（2）英语中有一些以-ess，ette，rix和enne等阴性词缀结尾，如Actress、Authoress、Suffregatte、Usherette、Administratrix、aviatrix、Comedienne，他们往往含有微不足道、无足轻重或卑微低下的含义，因此要避免使用这一类词缀，并可改变使用or，an，er，ist等无性别歧视的词缀。（3）在含有man的英语短语中，我们也不难发现有很多带有性别歧视色彩的，如beone'sownman、goodwilltoman、Jackofalltrades、Manoftheworld、Maninthestreet、Toaman等等，如果我们在使用这些短语是将其置换为beone'sownperson、goodwilltoall、personofalltrades、personoftheworld、personInthestreet、everyperson就显得更为客观和容易被接受了。

sexual/ gender discrimination 性别歧视