Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Merriam-Webster's Definition of "Femininity"


Merriam-Webster’s Definition of “Femininity”


Ali Segel was looking for submissions to use in her zine assignment when she discovered Merriam-Webster’s definition of “femininity”.  The example sentence the dictionary used said: “She managed to become a female CEO without sacrificing her femininity.”



Segel uploaded this picture to Twitter and stated, “I decided to tweet it out because yeah, that’s nuts!,” she told Cosmopolitan. “Can you imagine: ‘He managed to become a CEO without sacrificing his masculinity.’” Merriam-Webster responded to her tweet apologizing and removed the offensive example.

At the end, Segel screenshotted her Twitter conversation and quoted “When u use ur femininity to change the dictionary”

In my opinion, Segel definitely made a great change in terms of reaching out to Merriam-Webster to remove the sentence. However, I do not understand the severity of the sentence. I definitely believe a better sentence could have been used as an example for the word “femininity”, but I am not understanding the entire harm in the sentence. I honestly feel bad for not seeing it. Would someone respectfully mind clarifying or giving their opinions on this article? Thanks!

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