Someone recently called a young woman I know a "lady."<\/p>\n
Despite the fact I had a dog named Lady MacBeth, who was frequently called just Lady, the word felt awkward in reference to this young woman.<\/p>\n
As a reference to women, the term has fallen out of favour in recent decades.<\/p>\n
At one time, it was reserved for women of superior social standing, particularly royalty or nobility.<\/p>\n
Over the centuries, though, it became more or less interchangeable with women. "Welcome Ladies and Gentlemen," Ladies Curling Club etc.<\/p>\n
While it still works for some women of a certain vintage, it really doesn't wash for the younger crowd anymore.<\/p>\n
In its definition of the word, even Oxford now refers to 'lady' as an "old-fashioned form of reference."<\/p>\n
Its fall from grace is for good reasons.<\/p>\n
Going all the way back to its origins, the word has always had a connotation of women being lesser. It is derived from the Old English word hl\u01e3fdige, meaning "bread-kneader" or "loaf-kneader" whereas the male equivalent, Lord, comes from hl\u0101fweard (bread-keeper).<\/p>\n
A humble beginning in an era of well-defined gender roles.<\/p>\n
But it evolved to become classist and then evolved again to entrench now outdated expectations of femininity (i.e., ladylike—demure, subordinate, well-mannered). <\/p>\n
It has also been used to condescend and trivialize, such as lady cop or cleaning lady, as if the work they do is substandard or less important.<\/p>\n
It can also be downright derogatory, as in ladies of the night or bag lady.<\/p>\n
In short, it is a term that harkens to a time when the inherent male dominance of society was taken for granted.<\/p>\n
I'm probably overthinking it, because, well, that's what I do.<\/p>\n
But honestly, it just doesn't feel right anymore. That's how language evolves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Thom digs into the origins of the word and how it came to fall out of favour<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":130,"featured_media":137797,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137792","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-columnists","category-opinion"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n