Was just watching a women's rugby match, listening to sports commentators (never generally known for being the smartest people on the planet), and someone was referred to as a "taliswoman", rather than a talisman.
This irked me slightly because, as far as I am aware, talisman has nothing to do with gender, and comes from the Arabic for a religious rite, and so exchanging -man for -woman seems just a ridiculous thing to do. One person thought that we should be fortunate that female commentators are not referring to themselves as com-women-tators!![Smile :) :)](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)
I'm aware that for the vast majority of words ending in -man it makes sense to use -woman for the female equivalent: chairwoman, spokeswoman, policewoman, etc. But this is because the -man implies a person taking part in the activity, etc. So using the appropriate gender makes complete sense.
But "talisman" isn't based on that principle, and is just coincidental that it ends in -man.
Thoughts?
Have you heard any other efforts to crow-bar gender equality into words where it etymologically has no place?
Should we just accept it as an example of our language adapting to the times?
![Smile :) :)](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)
This irked me slightly because, as far as I am aware, talisman has nothing to do with gender, and comes from the Arabic for a religious rite, and so exchanging -man for -woman seems just a ridiculous thing to do. One person thought that we should be fortunate that female commentators are not referring to themselves as com-women-tators!
I'm aware that for the vast majority of words ending in -man it makes sense to use -woman for the female equivalent: chairwoman, spokeswoman, policewoman, etc. But this is because the -man implies a person taking part in the activity, etc. So using the appropriate gender makes complete sense.
But "talisman" isn't based on that principle, and is just coincidental that it ends in -man.
Thoughts?
Have you heard any other efforts to crow-bar gender equality into words where it etymologically has no place?
Should we just accept it as an example of our language adapting to the times?