Week 22 and Notes on Scrabble Sexism

The queenside.

This week was the majority of the Ks, and there were an impressive amount of units-things. If your country's coinage or measurements of length or power don't start with a K, you ain't kool, yo!

But there was also another sad reminder this week of how our language reflects the sexism of the ages: the dictionary shows kingside (a part of a chessboard) but not queenside (also a part of the chessboard!). While I was willing to believe that -woman suffixes were largely excised because of the 8-letter rule, today I saw kidnapping, which is a full 10 letters. Boo! Hiss! Not sure how a present participle of a criminal act trumps the inclusion of 50% of the population. It's strange to have a dictionary that cuts out many equivalent female-gendered words because of the letter restriction.

But beyond the 8-letter restriction, there are overwhelmingly more -man and -boy suffixes that have no balanced -woman and -girl words (for example, there's ladhood but no lasshood this week, and lasshood falls within the 8-letter range). I recognize that this is not OSPD's "fault." It's the cultural inertia of the ages. But I think we could all do a little bit better in having inclusive language. White space speaks volumes, even in the Scrabble dictionary.

But we're getting there. It is definitely NOT acceptable anymore to use the generic masculine pronoun "he" to represent all people, everywhere. "Humankind" is replacing "mankind." "Police officer" is replacing "policeman." And so on. It just takes some awareness (educate yourself!) and reframing. Don't use gender markers unless they're necessary. The LGBTQ community would appreciate that as well, I wager. And maybe someday English will get with the program and decide on a gender-neutral pronoun so we can stop all this unnecessary gender assignment when there is no need to do so, when the context doesn't even call for it. We just have to agree on a pronoun and go for it.

More examples of the white space I'm talking about, the lost herwords of herstory: "Avuncular" means "an uncle-like relationship" but there is no word for an aunt-like relationship (people have suggested "amital"—"amita" is "father's sister" so it's not perfect). Of course, there are PLENTY of words for a female prostitute, and plenty of derogatory terms in general specifically aimed at women and girls that far exceed those specifically aimed at men.

I think the worst one so far is "jailbait"—"a girl under the age of consent with whom sexual intercourse constitutes statutory rape." Why is this in the Scrabble Dictionary?! And, God forbid that boys suffer this too, but why are only girls jailbait? To me this word sums up how sexism gets passed down through the ages so easily: with extra derogatory terms for women and fewer terms denoting empowering occupations for women. It's carved in of our very language—and dictionaries like the Scrabble Dictionary keep it that way. We're not the only ones whose worldview on gender is affected by language: things that are assigned gender in other languages (German and Russian, for example; see the study here) tend to make those speakers think of men and women in terms of the qualities of those objects.

Religion also doesn't help—traditionally, Eve was a subset of Adam, made from his rib. Fortunately, more and more people are questioning this event and its sexist implication: that woman was made for man, is man's object.

I am not an object, a decoration, a service, or property. And my language will reflect that. I hope yours will too.

⚛ Units of the Week (Special K edition!)
    Kantar: a unit of weight
    Kaon: a type of meson
    Kappa: a Greek letter (have I included one Greek letter here yet as a representative? No? Well, here it is)
    Karat: a unit of quality for gold
    Kbar: a kilobar
    Kelvin: a unit of temperature
    Khoum: a monetary unit of Mauritania
    Kilo: a kilogram or kilometer
    Kilobar: a unit of atmospheric pressure
    Kilobase: unit of measure of a nucleic-acid chain
    Kilobaud: a unit of data transmission speed
    Kilobit: a unit of computer information
    Kilobyte: 1,024 bytes
    Kilogram: a unit of mass and weight
    Kilomole: one thousand moles
    Kilorad: a unit of nuclear radiation
    Kiloton: a unit of weight
    Kilovolt: a unit of electromotive force
    Kilowatt: a unit of power
    Kina: a monetary unit of Papua New Guinea
    Klick: a kilometer
    Kobo: a monetary unit of Nigeria
    Kopeck: a Russian coin
    Kopiyka: a monetary unit of Ukraine
    Kor: a Hebrew unit of measure
    Koruna: a monetary unit of the Czech Republic
    Kos: a land measure in India
    Kreutzer: a former monetary unit of Austria
    Krona: a monetary unit of Sweden
    Krona: a monetary unit of Iceland
    Krone: a former monetary unit of Austria
    Krone: a monetary unit of Denmark
    Kroon: a former monetary unit of Estonia
    Kuna: a monetary unit of Croatia
    Kwacha: a monetary unit of Malawi and Zambia
    Kwanza: a monetary unit of Angola
    Kyat: a monetary unit of Myanmar
    Kymogram: a record of fluid pressure
    Laari/lari: a monetary unit of the Maldives
    Lakh: the sum of one hundred thousand
    Lambert: a unit of brightness
    Langley: a unit of illumination

!!! Unexpected Words of the Week
    Keddah: an enclosure for elephants
    Kegler: a bowler
    Keister/keester/keyster/kiester: the buttocks (a popular term)
    Keitloa: a rhinoceros
    Kiaugh: trouble; worry
    Kicky: exciting
    Klavern: a local branch of the Ku Klux Klan
    Kleagle: an official in the Ku Klux Klan
    Klepht: a Greek guerrilla
    Kneesies: the pressing of one's knees against another person's knees
    Kob: a reddish brown antelope (Antelope alert!)
    Kobold: an elf
    Kudu: a large antelope (More antelope alert!)
    Kulak: a rich Russian peasant (a rich . . . peasant?)
    Kurbash: to flog with a leather whip (ouch)
    Kye: a private Korean-American banking club
    Kyte: the stomach
    Laetrile: a drug derived from apricot pits (wow, creative)
    Lagnappe: a small gift given to a customer with his purchase (IGA here in Montreal does this all the time, as long as you spend over $75 . . .)
    Laitance: a milky deposit on the surface of fresh concrete (why?)
    Laky: of the color of blood (what!)
    Landau: a type of carriage (Carriage alert!)
    Lapidate: to hurl stones at

♡ Favorite Words of the Week
    Kenning: a metaphorical compound word or phrase (I love kennings! Here's a list, although "girl of the houses" (a wife) makes me frown. Much better is "bane of wood" (fire) and "sea-steed" (a ship) and lots of others that mean gold or blood)
    Keyway: a slot for a key
    Khamsin: a hot, dry wind
    Kist: a chest, box, or coffin
    Kithe: to make known
    Kitsch: faddish art or literature
    Kurgan: a mound of earth over a grave
    Lahar: a flowing mass of volcanic debris
    Lamia: a female demon
    Lamster: a fugitive
    Lanosity: the state of being lanose (covered with wool)

(Pages 295–308)