When I first heard this bit of grammar advice (6th grade?) I wonder if I bristled, or asked why, or felt left out:
"When you don't know the gender of the person, or if you're talking to a mixed gender group, always use HE."
"Everyone bring his books" was the example the teacher wrote on the board. "Everyone" is singular, therefore we need a singular masculine pronoun, she said, straight face.
I wonder if, like everyone of those decades before feminism woke us up, I just accepted it as reasonable--since it was reinforced every day in grammar books, musical lyrics, and the whole culture. Except for mothers and teachers, most authorities were male. Newscasters, presidents, preachers and priests--all men. With precious few exceptions, the writers in the deck of Authors cards and in our literature textbooks were men. Even our college degrees were bachelors and masters. Women entering college were fresh
men.
If a man chose to stay single, he was called a
bachelor--sexy and cool. If a woman chose singleness into her mid-twenties, she was called an
old maid--not sexy, not cool.
When I was teaching gender neutrality in first-year college classes, I read an essay about how many negative, inflammatory words are female. (I won't list them here, but you can check them out.) Adult men were rarely called boys; adult women were often referred to as girls or chicks. Females were often trivialized or infantilized by the English language, and even we females let it slide.
The preference for the male pronoun swam freely in songs and sentences until the Sixties. Now we know better. Females are now linguistically included in the human race. We're no longer back stage in the world of "
Mankind."
One feminine hygiene product now airs a great ad in which young girls name the limitations they feel due to their gender. Each girl writes her limiting belief on a cardboard box, then they smash and destroy the boxes with gusto.
I'll never forget the first time I heard Maya Angelou, in person, on the stage at Trinity University, reciting her poem "Phenomenal Woman." It was the late Sixties or early Seventies--somewhere around the time I read Virginia Woolf's words that every
woman should have "money and a room of her own."
Hearing it, I felt included, inspired, and powerful. As we said in those days, "It blew me away!"
But, actually, it sort of blew me back onto the stage from behind the curtain, made me feel real and visible and proud to be a woman.
Phenomenal Woman
Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms,
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can’t touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them,
They say they still can’t see.
I say,
It’s in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing,
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need for my care.
’Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
