I come from a southern state (Texas to be exact) and was raised by a fairly religious and conservative family. I attended a catholic all-female high school that hosted fashion shows and had us graduate in long white dresses. Those experiences have shaped my feminist views.
Growing up, I was often admonished to 'act like a lady.' My co-ed schools invariably addressed female students as 'young ladies.' Boys could be 'guys' or 'boys,' but girls were 'young ladies.'
Being called a 'lady' and urged to act like a 'lady' are two things that simultaneously irritate me and make me laugh. There are some 'ladylike' qualities I admire. For example, one of the finest southern ladies I know served as the director of a nature center for years, crawling through dirt, catching snapping turtles and teaching hundreds of children about the earth and how to care for it. She is also unfailingly polite and kind, two ladylike qualities I deeply admire.
But the term 'lady' has also been used as weapon, particularly by my high school. They wanted to produce ladies who could room curtsy properly, didn't speak loudly and were submissive to the will of god (of course, this will is and was transmitted exclusively by the church). They also wanted us to be 'pure' by not having sex except in marriage and obedient to our elders, something that meant we should never argue with the rules, even stupid ones about calling the cafeteria the 'dining room.' Homosexuality wasn't ever mentioned in our joke of a sex education class and the school was one of the most homophobic places I have ever been.
I attend a fairly liberal college now and most of my friends are from the west coast or the northeast. Most of them laugh at my stories and I like that I am able to share them with people who are open and accepting. But I fear sometimes they see the world I come from as something from the past, out of Gone With The Wind, but not a modern day concern. But it is a 'modern day concern.' My high school hasn't changed in the five years since I graduated (I know this because I still have contacts there). Girls in the south are still urged to be 'young ladies.' Some of them may come to a healthy understanding of what that means. If being a lady means being like the director of the nature center I described above, sign me up. But if being a young lady means squishing myself into a box of conformity, I'll have to decline the honor.
I want to redefine the term 'lady.' I want it to mean something about being strong and brave, yet kind and polite. I want it to mean you can be sexual or not, like men, women, both or neither. I want 'young lady' to be an empowering term. Because currently it isn't and with the way the term is thrown around in the south, it needs to be. I am planning to return to the south someday, after graduate school. In some ways, the south is a different world. I want to have a hand in helping girls who, like me, were and are caught between different ideas of 'how to be a lady' and who need to know you can be a lady without cramming yourself into a box of conformity.
Has anyone else here been called a 'young lady' or urged to 'act like a lady?' What did that say to you? Do you think the term 'lady' can be empowering? How do you want it to be defined?
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I cannot stand the use of "lady" as you describe it. When someone calls me a lady, or tells me to act like a lady, or tries to discipline me by telling me I'm not acting ladylike, my stock response is "Oh, that's the problem. You're expecting a lady. I'm not a lady. I'm a woman." To me, "lady" conjures connotations of frailty, delicacy, submissiveness, and meekness. Totally NOT what I want to be. I like the graciousness and hospitality connotations, but they're way overshadowed by the other bits that just reek of restrictive traditional gender role enforcement. Perhaps it's just my experience of older men being patronizing while calling me "young lady", and my father's constant scolding about my language being inappropriate for a lady, that give me a thin skin on the subject. If it's used as a title, the counterpart to Lord, I don't mind it. Lord and Lady Somebody-or-other, that's fine. But I have only ever heard lower-case "lady" used as either a scold or a compliment, in both cases referring to the degree to which the object of the term complies with the requirements of traditional femininity.
Why not ditch the "lady" thing altogether? I can see why you might wish to redefine it, but I honestly think you're up against overwhelming cultural factors. Better to toss the whole "lady" construction and take on a new term.
Yeah, in my experience acting like a lady meant "fall in line". I don't like to hear things described as "ladylike" because it generally means conforming to (as Jadelyn said) traditional concepts of how a female "should" act. Therefore I find it restrictive and not empowering. I think the opposite term for men is "gentlemen". I never really cared for this term either for the same reasons. They both are terms used to try to get people to conform to gender roles and also to conform to society. For instance, as you said, acting like a "lady" besides some of the more sexist connotations, means being "polite". Well, in my experience being polite is generally a good thing but sometimes it is not. (See the Friday Feminist Fuck You as an example). I'm more for throwing the term out the window than trying to get people to assign a new meaning to it. Why can't both genders just be told to be good people?
"Gentleman" may be the male counterpart to "lady," but I don't think it's the equivalent. A gentleman conforms to gender roles, true, bit he is also powerful. Traditionally a gentleman was a wealthy landowner. A lady, in most cases, was just the gentleman's wife.
Oh, I agree. By saying that both "lady" and "gentlemen" mean conforming to traditional gender roles I realized that a "gentlemen" is considered more powerful. Power, generally, is a term that in those rigid traditional roles was associated with men.
"I want to redefine the term 'lady.' I want it to mean something about being strong and brave, yet kind and polite. I want it to mean you can be sexual or not, like men, women, both or neither. I want 'young lady' to be an empowering term..."
Good points.
"...Has anyone else here been called a 'young lady' or urged to 'act like a lady?' What did that say to you?..."
Personally, I don't remember having that experience. Maybe someone did call me a "young lady," but wasn't pushy enough about it to be memorable.
"...Do you think the term 'lady' can be empowering? How do you want it to be defined?"
One thing that came to mind was Neal Stephenson's novel (and distant sequel to his novel Snow Crash), The Diamond Age or, A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer. It's a cyberpunk coming-of-age story about a girl who goes forth to seek her fortune. I like the way Stephenson didn't have Nell stay home and discover boys (doesn't it seem like coming-of-age stories usually have the boys go forth to seek their fortunes and the girls stay home and worry about puberty/dating/marriage?), and he seems to have painted himself into a corner this way (he barely mentions Nell's sexuality at all - maybe he was afraid that if he said more about it reviewers would focus on it at the expense of everything else Nell thinks and does?)
Word on Diamond Age, and I haven't read it in ages but I don't remember getting the feeling that Stephenson painted himself into a corner on Nell's sexuality--more like it just wasn't part of the plot he was interested in writing. God knows he's written kickass female characters who were sexual without letting that define them or overshadow their role in the story; when I think of Y.T., plenty of things come to mind, and the fact that she accidentally took out the Baddest Motherfucker In The World with a vagina dentata is maybe a distant fifth on the list.
...but I digress. ;) The boys' coming-of-age stories I've read may or may not involve the hero discovering his sexuality, and I didn't feel like Nell was "missing something" because Stephenson didn't explore that. What would you say the reclaimed definition of "lady" was in Diamond Age though? Like I said, I haven't read it in a while, so I'm not remembering the details. Certainly resourcefulness, problem-solving, and adaptability were part of it...
"...but I digress. ;) The boys' coming-of-age stories I've read may or may not involve the hero discovering his sexuality, and I didn't feel like Nell was 'missing something' because Stephenson didn't explore that."
Actually, I didn't feel DA was missing something by keeping Nell's puberty offstage, but I noticed some other readers complaining about that part so I thought I should acknowledge that aspect of the book it in my comment here.
"What would you say the reclaimed definition of 'lady' was in Diamond Age though? Like I said, I haven't read it in a while, so I'm not remembering the details. Certainly resourcefulness, problem-solving, and adaptability were part of it..."
Also subversiveness, right?
Anyway, I got the impression that the whole series is
Snow Crash (1992)
"The Great Simoleon Caper" (Time magazine, Spring 1995)
The Diamond Age / or, A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer (1995)
"Excerpt from the Third and Last Volume of Tribes of the Pacific Coast" (Full Spectrum 5 anthology, 1995)
""
My mother when she uses the word lady it has a more positive meaning not as someone submissive but as someone polite, well educated and worldly and well traveled. I remember seeing Of human bondage were this little conversation
Thorpe Athelny: I was married to a lady once. Good heavens! Never marry a lady, my boy.
Philip Carey: Oh really? Why?
Thorpe Athelny: Because a lady has a point of view, a personality and an individuality, all to double you with!
I mmmmmm, then I am a lady!
I can't always think of a good response, so it usually comes out to a very "American" quip about there being no aristocracy in the US. "Oh, I'm sorry, I thought this was AMERICA. We don't have lords and ladies here, we're all equal." (At least, supposed to be.)
It's obnoxious, but so is being told to behave like a young lady. I don't usually say anything, (unless it's to my parents who I hold to a higher standard of reasonability) but the few times I do, I try to be ridiculous to point out the ridiculousness.
Hm. This kinda makes me sound bratty. I swear I'm not. :)
I have to say that I LOVE the word lady. I've always found it empowering and a great counterpart in a lot of ways to the word "guy."
Let me explain. I'm a soccer player. I've played girls'/women's soccer most of my life. When on the field and around the age of 16, when I wanted to talk to my whole team at once, saying "Come on, girls, let's pull this together," felt as though I was addressing children. However, saying "Come on, women, let's pull this together," sounded completely wrong. So, for me, it was always "Come on, ladies..."
My sister plays soccer, too. We're both more tomboy than refined girly-girl. We curse and spit and wrestle and shout. My dad always tells us we've turned into such "ladies." The thing is, though, he sounds totally proud and approving of us as he says it. So while "acting like a lady" is something that is usually brought down to correct and conform women's behavior, to me, it's always meant the subversion of that connotation. I'm every bit a lady and proud of it. And I can spit further than my husband without trying.
Yes YES YES.
Of course I've been told to be more ladylike, sit like a lady, talk like a lady, etc. as a kid, and resented the hell out of it. Despite that, this word doesn't get an emotional response out of me.
HOWEVER, you bring up an good point. What makes you not a lady, just because you spit, wrestle, curse and kick ass on a soccer field? None of this negates or lessens your being a woman, and being a woman doesn't lessen your ability to spit, wrestle, curse, etc.
It makes me think of all the times you hear say, drill sargeants call their recruits "ladies", or "you hit/throw like a girl", to make the feminine represent weakness. Well HELL, as we represent half of the speaking/writing population, we have a say in the meaning of this word, right? This is important. We must claim this word, because I don't think we'll ever be rid of it. So let's re-brand it, just like the word "queer".
Excuse me, but when a Drill sergeant uses the term "ladies" or "you hit like a girl" it is not a reinforcement of the idea that femininity represents weakness, it is simply highlighting the fact that men naturally have more muscle mass and muscle density and thus need to put it to better application in the use of force.Also as a point to make is what would they say otherwise, as anything can be seen as offensive to one group or another and then you would eliminate the entire training regime.
Like, ElleStar, I've been reclaiming the word "ladies" for years. It probably began with sports for me as well, but I also use it with my girlfriends, as in "Hey lady, whatcha doin today?"
I think I use it as the female version of "guys". I could call a group of my girlfriends/teammates "guys", since it has evolved into a unisex identifier (I believe). I could also say "girls" just to be more accurate. But I feel like there is a sense of pride when I use the word "ladies," like it says "hey, we're all females here and that's awesome!"
The term already feels empowering to me. And after reading of JoanOfArc's high school woes, I hope that everyone can take back the word and feel as empowered as I do about it.
(although I must admit, I have no idea how one goes about "taking back"/culturally redefining a word)
Did you go to Incarnate Word?
No, but right city. My school started with 'D.'
Joan
But I fear sometimes they see the world I come from as something from the past, out of Gone With The Wind, but not a modern day concern. But it is a 'modern day concern.'
This. I'm an Oklahoma girl at a fairly liberal NE school and I feel like my friends think that I must be exaggerating because no one lives like that now. :/
hi, also from texas here (dallas), and yes, i have mixed feelings about this term. but, like you, i've known many wonderful women who fully embodied the word "lady" without giving up their sense of self. i believe that being a "lady" means showing respect for yourself and for others. it means teaching by example and never letting others lower your standards for you. it means speaking up when it's appropriate and encouraging others to do so as well. i believe that it's defined by your approach to life, rather than any particular action at any particular time. to me, the most important thing about being a lady is not letting other people tell you that you aren't one, just because you did "blah".
Sort of off topic, but I'm from the South too (Dallas, Texas) and I'm currently taking a Joan Of Arc summer course at SMU. I just wanted to tip my proverbial hat that way cause I noticed that your username was JoA.
I've always disliked the term "lady" for at least two reasons: the sexist connotations of delicacy and being "ladylike"; and the implicit class comparisons (and here in the UK, we still have a financially privileged aristocracy!) [ Incidentally, whenever I hear someone say "I like a man who knows how to treat a lady" I see red and want to say something like "you mean, a man who confiscates her stately home and redistributes her wealth among the poor?" ]
But a lot of the women I know, including some feminists, use "lady" generically to refer to any woman they don't know and are well-disposed towards (as in "that lady at the shop"), and I've fallen into this usage too.
It still seems a bit dubious to me, because "lady" suggests that the person is a step above just being a "woman", and hence implicitly sort of denigrates ordinary womanhood.
Without wanting to get too pretentious about it, I think the use of "lady" in "act like a lady" or "ladylike" shows some of the interplay between class and gender. Precious delicacy is a demonstration of wealth as well as conventional femininity: if you are a heavy manual worker, a charming frock will get in the way of your job and consequently your ability to pay the rent.
My friends and I have actually taken to using the word as a term of affection... the same way you would use hun or sweetheart when addressing a loved one.
But yes, when I was younger my mother (a self-proclaimed feminist) would constantly tell me to act like a lady because I had a mouth like a sailor. She cursed, my father cursed, my brother cursed, but I was the only one who was not supposed to. So i would always whine, "Why should I not say fuck just cause i'm a girl?!" and my father would respond, "because its not becoming of a young lady." so i decided if thats what a lady was, i didnt want to be one.
We definitely need to reclaim lady.
How do you guys feel about 'cunt'? I've done some research on the actual origins of the word and it seems that its meaning was dubious from the very beginning. Here's a summary of the etymology:
Middle English queynte, queynt, queint, quaint. Meaning- either punningly after cunt n. or as a euphemistic substitution for that word. Anglo-Norman cointe, cuente, cuinte, kointe, quaint, queinte, quint, quointe and Old French, Middle French cointe clever, astute, quick-witted, experienced, expert (11th cent.), crafty, cunning (12th cent.), brave (12th cent.), gracious, elegant, pleasant, smart, fashionable (12th cent.), devious, underhand, arrogant (12th cent. in Anglo-Norman), (as noun) trick, deceit (13th cent. in Anglo-Norman), ingenious (c1272 in Anglo-Norman). In continental French gracious, elegant, pleasant, smart, fashionable is the dominant sense from the Middle French period onwards. coint, also cointe nice, pleasant; this sense appears to have spread to Old French from Old Occitan coinde, cueinde, conge, etc. Quaint adj.; after Anglo-Norman cointer, cointier, quienter, cointoier and Middle French cointier, cointoier, cointir, cointer to adorn, to make fine or beautiful (13th cent.)
My friends and I also call each other "lady" as a term of affection. As in, "Hey there, Lady." But it definitely pisses me off when used in basically any other sense.
Also, my cunt IS very quick-witted and fashionable.
When I think of the term "lady" my first thought is of Mina Murray in Alan Moore's "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" series. She's strong, independent, assertive, intelligent and even when she's in the middle of a fight she's self-composed and has this certain poise and grace.