When did "woman" become an adjective?

I find the use of the word "female" as a noun more problematic than the use of the word "woman" as an adjective. This is the only thing I can think of when someone refers to "females".

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Note - because this isn't my first rodeo - the use of "females" in this way may not be technically wrong in certain contexts. However in certain other contexts, it can be demeaning and I prefer to avoid it if possible.
 
It's a perfectly normal usage in many cases, and in others it was used a lot and has since been discontinued, for example "Woman Police Constable" (WPC)...

From 1919 when they were first recruited in the UK, female police officers were distinguished from their male counterparts by the prefix 'woman' before their rank (WPC or WDC). This was officially discontinued in 1999, although is still sometimes used informally by members of the public.
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There may be some uses which have become more common, but it's not really a "new" thing to use "woman" in front of another noun. In fact, it is not uncommon at all to use a "noun" as an "adjective". The Germany team etc...
 
angrysoba said:
It's a perfectly normal usage in many cases, and in others it was used a lot and has since been discontinued, for example "Woman Police Constable" (WPC)...







There may be some uses which have become more common, but it's not really a "new" thing to use "woman" in front of another noun. In fact, it is not uncommon at all to use a "noun" as an "adjective". The Germany team etc...
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And it was used for all the various women's suffrage groups, e. g. the first back in the 19th century National Society for Women's Suffrage and they all talked about women's right to vote, even though in the legislation that in effect banned women's right to vote was worded as "male person".

Seems it has ever been so...
 
Brainster said:
Women-owned is a compound adjective. Women itself is not an adjective, but the individual words in a compound adjective don't have to be adjectives themselves. For example, in "a smartly-dressed woman" the word smartly is an adverb, but smartly-dressed is an adjective.
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OK, that makes sense for the latter case. As both would modify the unstated noun of 'Company' or 'Business'. In spite of such compounds generally being hyphenated.
 
Puppycow said:
The International Chess Federation, FIDE, has some titles that are exclusively reserved for women:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIDE_titles
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But that is slightly different. Only women can be granted the Woman Grandmaster title, but the criteria are easier to attain than the Grandmaster title, and a woman can be granted both the WGM title and the GM title, whereas men can only achieve the GM title.

So a woman who is a Grandmaster (I think that's one word.) can be a woman Grandmaster and a Woman Grandmaster.
 
Chess is interesting. I'm accustomed to there being a segregation of men and women in athletics, but chess is purely a mental exercise. Is the separation of men's and women's titles a sexist holdover from less enlightened times? Or is it a recognition of biological differences, same as pro football or olympic track and field?
 
Meadmaker said:
It has been for all of my life, and I'm not young, and I doubt it started in 1962.

I suppose it gives grammar teachers fits, but people have been using it that way for as long as I can remember.

"Female" seems a bit dehumanizing. It isn't genuinely offensive, but it just doesn't sound right.
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There's some data analysis of usage on this blog post which I found interesting when I read it a few months back.

https://becauseits2015.wordpress.co...re-human-adjective-for-women-but-not-for-men/

Hard to quote anything without providing tons of statistical context and such so better to just read it yourselves if interested. It's a short read. It looks at many different types of jobs and compares (woman vs female) vs (man vs male)
 
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theprestige said:
Chess is interesting. I'm accustomed to there being a segregation of men and women in athletics, but chess is purely a mental exercise. Is the separation of men's and women's titles a sexist holdover from less enlightened times? Or is it a recognition of biological differences, same as pro football or olympic track and field?
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The existence of the women's titles is controversial. A lot of people think they should go away.

It's a recognition of observed performance differences, the cause of which is unknown. Is it culture, is it genetic? No one knows and FIDE doesn't take a position on the subject. All they know is that very few women reach Grandmaster level, but there are a significant number who reach a little bit lower than that, so they made the Woman Grandmaster title. It probably was done in a more sexist era, but it still gives a way of recognizing the people are are at the very top of the women's field, even if they are only near the top of the overall field.

What would be truly sexist would be if they didn't allow women to get the "real" Grandmaster title, but they do.

Also, Chess is odd in that major international competitions sometimes include a "women's" section, but there is usually not a "men's" section. There is usually a "women" and an "open" section.

ETA: Well, "usually", there is only one section, but certain international competitions have a section restricted to women.
 
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I notice that in certain circles, the use “male” and “female” is considered inappropriate.... As in “female receptacle”...
Much as how “Master” and “slave” likewise.... “Master cylinder”, for instance.
 
Meadmaker said:
The existence of the women's titles is controversial. A lot of people think they should go away.

It's a recognition of observed performance differences, the cause of which is unknown. Is it culture, is it genetic? No one knows and FIDE doesn't take a position on the subject. All they know is that very few women reach Grandmaster level, but there are a significant number who reach a little bit lower than that, so they made the Woman Grandmaster title. It probably was done in a more sexist era, but it still gives a way of recognizing the people are are at the very top of the women's field, even if they are only near the top of the overall field.

What would be truly sexist would be if they didn't allow women to get the "real" Grandmaster title, but they do.

Also, Chess is odd in that major international competitions sometimes include a "women's" section, but there is usually not a "men's" section. There is usually a "women" and an "open" section.

ETA: Well, "usually", there is only one section, but certain international competitions have a section restricted to women.
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I'm not familiar with chess, specifically, but one could assume it is purely biological differences without thinking women are less capable/men are more intelligent. We're talking about the best of the best of the best, here, and men tend to dominate the extreme (high or low).

It's certainly plausible that there are cultural elements as well. In my own experience only boys had any interest in chess when I was younger (I didn't)
 
Aren't most chess geniuses these days teenaged girls from Eastern Europe? That's just the impression I got, I don't follow the ...sport?
 
Athyrio said:
Well, we are still confronted with manhole covers in the street. Hopefully, that will not change.
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The problem with "manhole" isn't that it's sexist against women, it's that it makes the immature giggle. (Yes, I'm amongst them. "Manhole". Heh heh heh. "Hey, hope you make it across the street without accidentally falling into any manholes!")
 
Bikewer said:
I notice that in certain circles, the use “male” and “female” is considered inappropriate.... As in “female receptacle”...
Much as how “Master” and “slave” likewise.... “Master cylinder”, for instance.
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Yeah, we just had a corporate change in acceptable terminology (like "Primary" and "Secondary" instead of “Master” and “slave”) so I had to purge some of the excluded terminology from our procedural documentation. Don't recall anything about "male” and “female” though.
 
TragicMonkey said:
Aren't most chess geniuses these days teenaged girls from Eastern Europe? That's just the impression I got, I don't follow the ...sport?
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No.

I must not have followed it either lately, because I haven't heard of teenaged girls from eastern Europe.

There are the Polgar sisters, two out of three of which are "real" grandmasters, but they haven't been teenagers for quite some time.
 
theprestige said:
Chess is interesting. I'm accustomed to there being a segregation of men and women in athletics, but chess is purely a mental exercise. Is the separation of men's and women's titles a sexist holdover from less enlightened times? Or is it a recognition of biological differences, same as pro football or olympic track and field?
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The difference is certainly real. The reason for the difference is subject to controversy. Maybe it's rooted in physiological reasons, or maybe it's because boys and girls are raised differently from a very young age. Boys are encouraged to be competitive, while girls are encouraged to be cooperative. Or a bit of both. Personally, I think the former accounts for at least some of the difference. Maybe most of it.
 
It's always been that way. Probably going all the way back to the very first time a caveman backhanded a cavewoman for daring to form an opinion that goes against his.

The only time woman/female isn't used as a descriptive is when we're talking about anything that has always been commonly accepted as a "woman's place" throughout the ages. ie: Teacher, nurse, secretary, maid, housekeeper, cook, prostitute. You'll never see any of those being used as "girl nurse", "female teacher", "woman prostitute". Anything beyond those handful of professions that women were allowed to do outside of the home had to then be separated from their male counterparts so as to add emphasis on the 'oddness' of a female being a lawyer, a doctor, a politician.

Why is a female thesbian known as an "actress" instead of just an "actor"? Why must society invent a new word to separate one from the other? Waiter/waitress? Host/hostess? Hero/heroine? What the hell is the difference? They're both doing the exact same job, are they not?

You'd think in today's world these divisive gender descriptives would finally become redundant, but apparently society is still having great difficulty letting go of its male dominion and thus, still can't quite fully grasp that a pilot is a pilot is a pilot, no matter if said pilot stands or sits to pee.

Some day in a future world, a long long long long long time from now.... A lawyer that has a vagina will just simply be a known as a "lawyer", a doctor that has a uterus will just simply be a known as a "doctor", a hero that has a pair of boobs will just simply be known as a "hero". And a nurse that has a penis will just simply be known as a "nurse".

But until then, society insists that we all continue to be pigeon-holed based on whether we have an outie or an innie, whether we're the pitcher or the catcher. With the former still being viewed as dominating over the latter. "Stop being such a (weak) pussy and grow a pair of (strong) balls." :rolleyes:
 
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