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[natsume]

[quote="rusmeister"]That kind of makes my point for me, Sally - the assumption that 'gender-inclusive language' is necessary, or that anyone would deliberately choose to understand that as intended to exclude women. That is a conscious choice, influenced by conscious or sub-conscious awareness of one's driving ideology, which strives to ignore the speaker's intended meaning while promoting the respondent's ideology. (This is precisely what I mean by one's beliefs driving their responses.)

I have been following this thread with great interest. rusmeister, there is something that confuses me about where you are coming from. I know that by your definition, I have been "indoctrinated", because I understand the world in terms of plurality, multiple centers of truth, am probably, by your definition, a feminist and I have very strong positive feelings about gay rights, etc., etc. I could go on. As a thinking person in the 21st century, I can't not try to think about the world from multiple perspectives. I think our strengths, if we are to survive, will be in reconciling and learning to live with our differences. And what I don't understand, from where you are coming from, is where your own philosophical grounding lies. I find that accepting the challenge of living in a multicultural world forces me to re-negotiate my "preconceived" notions. Everything that was taught to me to be "common sense" demands some critical thinking, since I cannot reconcile the great injustices that have been propagated by what were seen as ideologically correct ideas throughout human history.

Where does your faith in your own "philosophy" come from?

My world view may not inform every aspect of my pedagogy, but it will absolutely inform the attitude of my teaching. If questions were to come up in class having to do with "gender-inclusive language", if appropriate to the level and situation, they will be addressed, consciously.

[Henry_Cowell]