| The American Heritage® Book of English Usage. |
A Practical and Authoritative Guide to Contemporary English. 1996.
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5. Gender: Sexist Language and Assumptions
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| § 8. female / male |
| Contrary to popular opinion, the word female is not derived from male, nor is it even related. In this case, women preceded men. Female comes from the Latin word femella, “young woman, girl,” which was a diminutive of femina, “woman.” Female came into English by way of Old French around 1330 and was first spelled femele. Male came along in 1373, also from Latin via Old French. But male derives from the Latin masculus, a diminutive of mas, “male.” As early as 1380 femelle began to be influenced by male, and spellings with an a began to appear. Eventually, female became the standard English spelling. | 1 |
| When used to refer to persons, male and female should be used in parallel and only when relevant: Male and female guards were assigned to the rest rooms. Often people use female and male in a way that draws attention to something perceived as unusual without realizing they are doing this. When the sex of the person performing a job is irrelevant, phrases like a female police officer and a male nurse are viewed by many as offensive, since the gender marking is gratuitous and carries the implication that the norm in certain professions, such as police work, is to be a man and that the norm in other professions, such as nursing, is to be a woman. | 2 |
| As nouns, male and female are generally used in technical, medical, or scientific writing, often to refer to groups of subjects in an experiment, whether humans or other animals: The control group consisted of twelve females and eleven males. Since male and female are used so much in zoology to designate animals, their application to people can sometimes have comical overtones. Nevertheless, they represent a convenient way to avoid repeating phrases like a boy or a man and girls and women: This disease usually affects females. | 3 |
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| The American Heritage® Book of English Usage. Copyright © 1996 by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. |
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