Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language

I loved this book so much it may have blinded me...

Amanda Montell''s Wordslut is a deep dive into a feminist view of the English language - its history, the evolution of grammar, the intersection of language and gender, etc. - it is fiendishly funny, playful, gleeful, thoroughly researched and erudite. it explores many fascinating themes like "grammatical gender", the origin of swear words (so fun!), and how language can affect sexuality, and vice versa. For me, this book was deeply resonant and quite validating. it's both a highly perceptive analysis of language as well as hilariously entertaining. It is a delight for language lovers, logophiles, linguists, and anyone with an interest in gender and language issues.

Montell breaks it show more all down by taking a metaphorical looking glass and peering very closely at the origins of grammar, how we use language in our a day-to-day lives, as well as all the hows and whys of language and gender. She cites many professions that address these issues: linguists, writers, speech pathologists, sociologists, lexicographers, etymologists, phoneticians and all our fellow "language geeks."

Montell does a wonderful job at being inclusive. She takes it all into consideration - race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. Plus others I may have/probably missed.

Sidenote: I honestly liked that Montell refers to men as "dudes" throughout the book. I know, reading other reviews, that some readers found this tiresome and hokey, but I found it kinda refreshing and funny to boot.

This woman has some serious writing chops. She delves into the academic study and theory of language and gender, but it is also accessible, which I appreciated. Simply put, I was blown away by this book. It's wonderfully fascinating, relevant, entertaining, humorous and very necessary. it was a delectable treat for wordy birdy me. An enthusiastic five stars! show less

A fun and fascinating look at sex, gender, and language. When Montell talks about those second-wave feminists like Dale Spender and Mary Daly, it took me back to my college days and my sociolinguistic class taught by Cheris Kramarae. I’m happy to say that there’s been a lot more research into language and gender, even if there hasn’t been a whole lot of real-world progress in, say, use of gender-neutral pronouns (though I guess the notion isn’t regarded as fringe as it used to be) or perceptions of women’s speech (e.g., Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is still characterized as “shrill” by detractors, women are still chastized as sounding as “indecisive” or “weak”—even by other women—for using speech habits like show more qualifiers and uptalk). The chapters on gay speech and slang for genitalia were especially interesting.

I don’t usually list a table of contents, but the one in this book is super fun and gives a good sense of the flavor of this book:

Chapter 0: Meet Sociolinguistics: What All the Cool Feminists Are Talking About

Chapter 1: Slutty Skank-hoes and Nasty Dykes

Chapter 2: Wait, What Does the Word “Woman” Mean Anyway? Plus Other Questions of Sex, Gender, and the Language Behind Them

Chapter 3: Mmm-hmm, Girl, You’re Right: How Women Talk to Each Other When Dudes Aren’t Around

Chapter 4: Women Didn’t Ruin the English Language, They, Like, Invented It

Chapter 5: How to Embarrass the Shit Out of People Who Try to Correct Your Grammar

Chapter 6: How to Confuse a Cat-Caller and Other Ways to Verbally Smash the Patriarchy

Chapter 7: Fuck It: An Ode to Cursing While Female

Chapter 8: Cackling Clinton and Sexy Scar-jo: The Struggle of Being a Woman in Public

Chapter 9: Time to Make this Book Just a Little Bit Gayer

Chapter 10: Cyclops, Panty Puppet, Bald-Headed Bastard, and 100+ Other Things to Call Your Genitalia

Chapter 11: So, in 1,000 Years, Will Women Rule the English Language show less

Wordslut by Amanda Montell is a captivating exploration of the intricate relationship between language and societal attitudes towards women. It’s always nice to stumble across an unexpected gem, and finding this book is one such occasion. The cover's striking colour and standout title may have reeled me in, but it was the intriguing subject matter and Montell's accessible writing style which kept me reading.

Far from the radical feminist manifesto I had feared, Wordslut is witty, engaging, and well-researched. Montell displays a particular talent for making complex linguistic concepts comprehensible to a broader audience, challenging readers to contemplate their language use and question societal norms. Montell prompts readers to show more rethink language not merely as a reflection but as a potent influencer of societal dynamics and attitudes towards women. This book is not a comprehensive treatise on sociolinguistics, but it’s not meant to be. It is an introduction of the topic to the masses, and, in this, it certainly serves its purpose.

Montell delves into some polarising topics, with her take on political correctness, in particular, likely provoking strong reactions, especially among conservatives. Political correctness, she tells us, ‘…does not endanger our freedom of expression at all. The only thing it actually threatens is the notion that we can separate our word choices from our politics – that how we choose to communicate doesn’t say something deeper about who we are…What rubs people the wrong way about political correctness is not that they can’t use certain words anymore, it’s that political neutrality is no longer an option.’ Nevertheless, publishing a book on such topics as those discussed in Wordslut inevitably involves stepping on someone's toes; it's impossible to avoid offense.

A helpful addition to future additions would be the inclusion of a glossary and reference list. Needing to flick back through the book when I forgot an acronym, or qualification was an annoyance, and I often seek out further reading on the topics that interest me. While in-text references are included, an easily accessible list at the back would have been more convenient.

Minor inconveniences aside, Wordslut skilfully navigates the intricate role language plays in shaping our attitudes, beliefs, and behaviours, introducing sociolinguistics to the layperson, and encouraging readers to question social norms and the role of their own linguistic choices in shaping who they are. Whether or not you agree with Montell’s arguments, I encourage you to read what she has to say. show less

Amanda Montell explores studies in sociolinguistics that explore how the very language we use supports the default system of patriarchy and how as everyday users we can try to be more proactive in how we use English as feminists.

I adored this book from the opening introduction. While the linguistics studies Montell is unpacking are rigorous and academic, she makes them clear and understandable for a general audience while being smart and funny and entertaining. Whether she's exploring the swears we use, the euphemisms we use for genitalia, or how women talk amongst themselves, everything is well explored and clear for the non-expert. Highly recommended for all feminists but also for those who are just curious about how English really works.

Best for:
Those interested in learning more about how our language is shaped by - and shapes - society. Everyone who speaks US English.

In a nutshell:
Author Montell explores a variety of aspects of language and how it reinforces and can be used to fight the patriarchy.

Worth quoting:
N/A (but only because it was an audio book and usually I was running while listening so didn’t have a way to note something down)

Why I chose it:
The topic was intriguing to me.

Review:
I wish I’d read a hard copy instead of reading an audio version because I think I would have been underlining a lot and keeping it for future reference. That aid, it was great to listen to the author read her work.

The book explores multiple ways that language reinforces the show more patriarchy (the English language, specifically). Things like the default for ‘person’ being man, for example. As though men are the standard or the norm, and women are a deviation from that. But also more insidious things, like creating gendered qualifiers for words that theoretically are gender neutral, suggesting again that the default boss is male (hence ‘girl boss’). Or, conversely, some insults again should be gender neutral, but the default for the negatives are female (whore vs manwhore, for example).

Montell argues convincingly that this isn’t just an issue of sticks and stones, its that the words show the values of the speakers overall. She makes the point even clearer in the chapter where she references how some folks complain about how ‘you can’t say anything anymore;’ it’s not that one can’t say things, it’s that what they say and the words they choose reflect their values, and people are allowed to make judgments based on those values.

Each chapter covers a different aspect of language, including language changes from the LGBTQ community, the use of singular they/them, and how women are judged for sounding ‘shrill’ when they speak. This book was written a few years ago, and it’s disappointing to think about how much language and our acceptance of new usages to better reflect reality has been rolled back as more conservatives and more anti-trans folks have gained power.

The section on vulgar language and the slang that exists for penises vs vaginas (spell check wants me to call that vaginae?) was also so interesting. I’ve obviously thought in passing about how gross it is that the worst insults for men are to refer to them by terms associated with female genitalia, but hearing it spelled out here made it even clearer how gross that is. show less

Brilliant, necessary, and funny besides, this book covers gendered insults, gender itself, how language changes and evolves (and who helps that along - namely, women and minorities), catcalling, gay culture and language, nicknames for genitalia, and an entire chapter on cursing. Highly recommended for everyone.

Quotes

Context will typically reveal if a term is being used in an objectifying way or a courteous one. (in a footnote on p. 35)

"The more one talks and the less one listens, the more likely it is that one's viewpoint will function as if it were community consensus even if it is not....
The more attention one pays to perspectives different from one's own, the more likely one is to give tacit - indeed sometimes unwitting - support to show more these other views simply by being able to understand them." Thus, women's experiences wind up getting squashed under their own generosity as listeners. (Sally McConnell-Ginet, Cornell University linguist, 36-37)

The purpose of name-calling is to accuse a person of not behaving as they should in the eyes of the speaker. (Chi Luu, JSTOR, 37)

If gender isn't something that comes fully formed at birth, where exactly do each of our genders come from then? This might not seem like a language question, but some philosophers theorize that gender is actually constructed through language itself....Language brings gender to life. (65)

[UK linguist Jennifer Coates examined speech styles of all-women and all-men groups - genderlects - and observed that] while men's speech styles can be categorized as "competitive," women's is "cooperative." [Vertical, hierarchical structure vs. horizontal, supportive structure] (84)

"Language is not always about making an argument or conveying information in the cleanest, simplest way possible. It's often about building relationships. It's about making yourself understood and trying to understand someone else." (Journalist Ann Friedman, 93)

...from early childhood, women and men are socialized to live in two opposing cultures with two opposing sets of values, so they grow up to understand things differently. Not better or worse, just different. As a result, men's goals when they talk are to communicate information, while women's are to form connections. (Deborah Tannen, You Just Don't Understand, 1990, p. 100)

...judgments about linguistic prestige depend a whole lot on how we feel about the speaker....People don't seem to care or even notice when men talk this way [uptalk, vocal fry, hedging]. Only when it comes from female mouths does it cause such an upset. (127)

"You can wonder why it is that the language of a powerless group gets taken up later by the majority - but perhaps it has always been the powerless who use language as a form of power." (Louise Vasvari, 131)

There is a simple way we can be part of the shift toward a less judgmental linguistic future: instead of acting crotchety and pedantic toward new language trends, we can feel curious and fascinated by them. (132)

One of our culture's least helpful pieces of advice is that women need to change the way they speak to sound less "like women" (or that queer people need to sound straighter, or that people of color need to sound whiter). The way any of these folks talk isn't inherently more or less worthy of respect. It only sounds that way because it reflects an underlying assumption about who holds more power in our culture. (133)

"The power of sexuality is asymmetrical, in part, because being seen as sexual has different consequences for women and men." (Beth A. Quinn, 183)

There is one unified reason why many men feel as though they have an inherent right to comment on women's bodies, ignore them in meetings, or dismiss them with the excuse that they're on their periods and acting hysterical: it's because of a lack of empathy. (183)

The way to get to that world starts not with teaching women how to protect themselves from harm but with teaching men, ideally from very early on, that the whole world does not belong to them. (188)

Sapir-Whorf hypothesis: language influences thought; language determines thought (277)

...women (or any oppressed group) can come up with new words to express what were once unnamed experiences, but sometimes the backlash is louder than the progress. (re: "mansplaining" 285) show less

Any college or university writing or English course needs to include "Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language" as one of the required texts. It makes one think about the motivations behind people's peculiar linguistic habits, like the use of fillers or hedging.

An in-depth analysis of how words associated with femininity frequently evolve into derogatory terms, while words associated with masculinity use power and authority connotations is given in this insightful piece that explores the evolution of gendered language throughout centuries of human social circles.

The book also examines how gendered language affects the LGBTQIA+ community and looks at how slang and the internet interact to influence linguistic show more norms.

With a delightfully snarky tone, the book delivers an engaging reading experience that is both enlightening and enjoyable. show less