Pilar García Mouton, language researcher: "An excess of courtesy devalues ​​the image of women"

Above all, a passionate about language,

is a philologist, teacher, specialist in dialectology and linguistic geography, member of the RAE, researcher, disseminator... 20 years ago she published

an exciting book in which she dissected the (huge) differences in the

between the

very useful when it comes to understanding the

and

that often occur when a man and a woman initiate a conversation.

The big question, and that is why we turn to it again, is: How much have things changed, if at all, in these 20 years, in the way that women and men relate to each other verbally?

Do we understand each other better or just as badly as before?

Have we ironed out our communication differences?

Among these differences, for example, García Mouton highlighted in his book how

while

how they have an

style and women with a greater

how men prefer to call

while women opt for

; how where they

, they

; or how for them

while for them, it is a

The conclusion you drew from that book was that, far from physiology, biology and genetics, the element that contributes most to the misunderstanding between both genders is the word.

And the subsequent question was, perforce, are we condemned to not understand each other due to our different attitudes towards language?

The philologist Pilar García Mouton.José María Sánchez Bustos

"These are small differences that do not lead to isolation, but can create certain difficulties or misunderstandings," the expert reassures us today.

And he adds: "In any case, as the coexistence of women and men in education is increasing, these

are being

THE PHOBIA TO INCLUSIVE LANGUAGE

Language largely configures reality, and not just the other way around, something that many people do not quite believe, and that gives rise to dozens of controversies on social networks. For example, when social groups

a word that is used to insult them -as has happened with 'faggot'- and hoist it

as a flag of

. On the other hand, any attempt to advance

(perhaps because until now the formulas have not been the most successful) has instantly obtained generalized reactions that range between indignation and ridicule.

Does this mean that our reality continues to be cut off today by the masculine pattern in part because of our resistance to changing our linguistic formulas? In these years, society has improved in linguistic sensitivity regarding the presence of women in what we could call formal discourses.

Among other advances, no one uses men anymore to refer to humanity and the necessary professional females have been generalized without problem.

Now, those who staunchly defend the so-called inclusive language should bear in mind that our language works grammatically with an inclusive masculine plural.

This can, and sometimes should, be split into masculine and feminine or feminine and masculine, at the beginning of a speech or a text, for example,

Attempts from different groups to have the

modify the meaning of a word in its dictionary have also ended in failure (one of the most notorious cases was the request to eliminate the pejorative meaning of 'cancer' and another, quite embarrassing, the one that a cosmetic brand undertook in 2018, supported by celebrities such as

and

to change the definition of 'makeup'). All of them forgot that, as García Mouton reminds us, "trying to change our way of speaking from above is doomed to failure, because

It would be much more effective, he explains, to try to give prestige to certain linguistic uses, or to discredit others, "because it is prestige that moves the language of the community in one direction or another. If reality is unfair, it should be corrected, and then the language, though belatedly reflecting social changes, would change.

THAT YES: INSULTS ALWAYS IN FEMALE

One of the most obvious signs that our language is still anchored in a masculine pattern is found in the way we insult. Almost all the great insults of our language are related to the female sex. You are a 'son of a bitch' or you are a 'bastard' (in both cases victims of a 'bad woman'), or even you are a 'painful' person... Even the word 'border', which was originally referred to an illegitimate child (which was located on the edge of the paper in the family tree), it has a woman as the (malignant) ultimate cause.

I can't imagine how a man would react if I called him 'son of a bad father', but women don't even flinch if someone says 'son of a bad mother', we have all this language very integrated. Would changing the insults help us change ourselves? A few weeks ago

in his column for 'El País', spoke precisely about this issue. It is clear that the insults you refer to come from an inherited masculine language. With a conscious effort, we could perhaps try to banish them from our personal use and discredit them to reduce their social use, but it is unlikely that we would succeed. What happens is that we use insults because of their emotional charge, generally without thinking of its literal meaning...

But let's go back to the starting point, that we have gone through the branches (and not through those of the family tree), to how we women speak and if our way of communicating benefits us or harms us in the current context.

In García Mouton's book it was said, for example, that

used to be

when communicating so as

If we transfer this to the context of the company, does it really work for us or against us?

After warning us that this statement was "a generalization", the expert explains that "this was, and is, the result of an education of centuries. Without going any further, the education manuals for girls from the 19th century were very clear in that sense They were taught to speak little, not to ask, not to demand, not to protest, and to achieve goals by indirect means through manners and courtesy different from those taught to children."

Regarding

in the current context, García Mouton believes that it can play a double role: "Open paths in the exposure of problems and help

but also, if it is excessive, it can play against it, if it

In any case, well-internalized feminine courtesy is considered socially positive and is sometimes attributed as a plus to men with linguistic ability, who are said to be able to take advantage of their ' female side'.".

This leads us, inevitably, to an idea that has been repeated ad nauseam over the last two decades. It has been repeated so much that we have all believed it... namely, that women are

But isn't this belief hiding precisely the fact that we wear that communicative corset under which throbs the same naked reality of men? Come on, that the way of communicating may be different but the background is identical?

Indeed, explains Mouton, a more courteous approach may conceal the same reality, "but it is also true that women have less history behind them in managerial positions and that would allow them to take advantage of their recognized language skills to create a work environment less aggressive than is usual in some male environments.

A fallacy that I have been able to verify throughout my long professional life is that women are more nosy than men, also in companies.

Is the belief in this case pure propaganda? Yes, pure historical propaganda.

The masculine fear of the feminine word has a long development and silence has always been preached to women as a great virtue, that is why the Latins saw them adorned by silence, 'Mulierem ornat silentium', and

recommended to women perfect married women who spoke little.

Hence one of the most repeated topics, that women are nosy by nature and incapable of keeping secrets.

As the linguist

this topic is still valid: faced with the same schematic drawing in which the only thing that changed was short hair or long hair, those who interpreted it assumed that the men were talking, but the women were chatting, gossiping or gossiping. our time is that of feeling offended by multiple expressions of language that until recently seemed common to all of us.

Is the Internet, or the education we receive, or the advancement of the social itself, or is everything together making ours one of the most censored times in history? It seems as if we are suffering a serious setback that is leading to the censorship and self-censorship, and to avoid terms that are not considered politically correct.

And meanwhile,

in political forums, a degradation of discourse is taking place that was unimaginable in the most heated debates of years ago. And finally, a key question: Hasn't that evolutionary pseudo-psychobiology done great harm with all its clichés of the type 'men are of Mars and the women of Venus'?

Doesn't it work in many ways as a self-fulfilling prophecy [I'm sick of being told that because I'm a woman I multitask]?

If we women describe ourselves modestly -which is what normally happens- it is proving that we get worse jobs than men... to give an example. These tools are, to a great extent, a

but as speakers we can modify and adapt them to different situations according to the objectives we seek.

This ability is part of our linguistic culture, that of women and men.

If women are not (we are not) aware that, for example, as you say, self-describing modestly harms them and prevents them from taking advantage of their qualifications, they should learn to separate the 'social maYoYondats' inherited from linguistic and discursive behaviors that best ensure equality.

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