![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
dancinglights brought up the term "lady" and its uses, and I made a remark myself in a comment to someone else about how I thought maybe people just used my name rather than a generic term if they needed to refer to me, but it actually does make me curious what word or words other people might use for me. Out of the following choices I think I would mostly use "girl" for myself (although as mentioned, I think I may be growing out of it). You?[Poll #981789]
no subject
Date: May. 9th, 2007 09:49 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 9th, 2007 10:33 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 9th, 2007 10:58 pm (UTC)From:And ewww, wife. I have no problem (aside from the "...whoa" factor) thinking of you as husband but I don't think I'm going to be anyone's wife, thank you.
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 12:09 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 12:39 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 12:44 am (UTC)From:Let me know if this makes any sense.
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 01:20 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 01:30 am (UTC)From:That said, you *are* attractive, and feminine, and pretty, just not... overtly so (at least to the point where they exude 'femaleness'. Than any sort of overt sexual overtones I am uncomfortable with regardless of whether it's male or female).
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 02:06 am (UTC)From:So do I. To me, "pretty" requires typically "feminine" characteristics (e.g. fine bone structure, soft clear skin, long hair, long eyelashes, etc.), so for either a male or female to be "pretty" to me, they are necessarily also "feminine".
It is also possible to be "handsome" (which involves some typically "masculine" characteristics), but that's a whole different set of aesthetic appreciation. Not generally something I am attracted to per se in the case of males (which is different WRT most of society, but you and I seem fairly similar in that regard), and something that I usually find specifically unattractive in females.
"just not... overtly so (at least to the point where they exude 'femaleness'. Than any sort of overt sexual overtones I am uncomfortable with"
See, I think I rather would "exude femaleness". To me that is a position of power, and more generally attractive rather than just to a niche market ;).
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 02:15 am (UTC)From:Ok, I see where you are coming from with this. I think for me, it's my perceived slant on sexuality, and seeing myself as "neutral" rather than male or female, hence being uncomfortable with the whole thing.
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 02:16 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 02:21 am (UTC)From:how about hawtness? :D
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 02:35 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 02:41 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 03:22 am (UTC)From:When I was your age, I felt the same way about "girls" and "woman" as descriptive terms. In my mind, I wasn't yet a woman, but was outgrowing "girl". I definitely call myself a woman now though (which is for me more about female adult vs. female child than traditional man/woman gender roles), and honestly, bearing children isn't what really did it for me. It was just aging and maturing to a certain point to where I felt that I was finally an adult, that I had the confidence adults have, and was looked upon by my colleagues at work in their 50's and 60's as an adult rather than a "just-out-of-college kid".
The moment came a few months after I turned 35 (I'll be 38 this December). I don't think there was a specific event that triggered the change. It was just a slow and gradual thing.
It felt good to finally grow up, to finally be confident in my own skin.
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 03:24 am (UTC)From:I feel like 'gal' is a word that comes out of the mouths of guys with handlebar moustaches. I can't remember the last time I used it.
'Lass' is what guys in utilikilts call girls they want to impress. Way too pretentious and pseudo-archaic for me.
'Lady', well maybe but only if I was being sarcastic for some reason. 'Chick' also, occasionally pops out of my mouth when I'm on a ramble or not paying terribly much attention.
'Other' in your case was something like a string of adjectives and nouns stuck together when it didn't seem like one of them was doing the job by itself or I didn't know which one was proper. Something like "you know that tass person, the faerie otherkin elf girl thing from lj?". :)
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 04:22 am (UTC)From:pet peeve
Date: May. 10th, 2007 05:02 am (UTC)From:I only use "girl" for circumstances in which I would call her a "boy" if she was male.
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 05:14 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 07:14 am (UTC)From:I have this same problem. "Woman" brings up images of very normal looking female people who are at least five years older than I am. I think the normality is a big part of it - someone who is kind of a subculture freak does not read as "woman" to me because "woman" is always foreign, other, like a teacher when I'm a little kid.
I am used to being "girl" and so I would still likely call my female friends who are weirdos and around my age "girls" because that's the category for people more like me. Does that make sense?
I totally don't think of myself as a woman. I think of myself as genderqueer, a girl, a person, and sometimes I identify with "women" in the greater plural sense, but never in the singular sense.
I'm kinda weird like that, though.
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 07:48 am (UTC)From:It's weird how these applications of terms to people happen when we're not looking...
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 04:10 pm (UTC)From:Ashran's commentary has reminded me of how I've always liked the Tarot having a knight between page and king, and that most of the guys I'm friends with really fall into that "knight" perceived age and stature category. I wish there were a simple word for it in English (maybe "guy" suffices), but even moreso I wish we had a female analogue to it even in concept.
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 07:55 pm (UTC)From:Aww. *warm fuzzies* Actually though, I would prefer this sentence construction too. That's why I gave the example I wanted people to fill in the blank for, since I figured many people might default to a relational term like "friend" (as opposed to general term -- i.e., something that takes "my" rather than an article).
"When I was your age"
...she says as though the difference were vast. ;)
no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 07:58 pm (UTC)From:*giggles* I can see that. (That said, my co-worker Alicia often uses "gal" as a general term for people of about my age, but her first language is not English, so she often has trouble with the subtle nuances of various English words, and tends to latch onto a phrase or word and use it repeatedly for all kinds of situations even when it might not really be applicable in my native-speaker way of thinking.)
"Lass' is what guys in utilikilts call girls they want to impress."
LOL!
Something like "you know that tass person, the faerie otherkin elf girl thing from lj?". :)
Heheh! But see, you used "person" there, which was the type of answer I was after. I use "person" a lot myself.
Re: pet peeve
Date: May. 10th, 2007 08:00 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 10th, 2007 08:06 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 11th, 2007 01:00 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 11th, 2007 01:15 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: May. 12th, 2007 04:39 am (UTC)From: