【正文】 do. The lower the women’s position is, the more polite they are. And the standard language they use can show their submission and politeness. D. Sexism Caused by Culture 1. Social conceptions There are different customs and conceptions in different counties. But discrimination against women is mon in the world. Since childhood, social conceptions began to stipulate females’ DOS and DONT’S. For instance, parents will stop a crying boy immediately and ask him not to cry anymore in the future. Because in their minds, men will be laughed at if they cry. Contrarily, people sympathy females if they cry. In a word, social conceptions model men to be strong but women to be weak since childhood. Another example is that boys could be mischievous while girls must be gentle and quiet. Girls must stay at home and act as a fair maiden. Even worse, girls always play with dolls, while boys play with mechanical models. In a word, social conceptions form males’ strong temperament and females’ feeble temperament since they were born. Females ar e being forced to retain their inferior and obedient status in society. They have to submit to men and sacrifice themselves to men to help them succeed. “A woman must regard her husband as her king and serve him with her highest adoration. Submitting is the most important and persistent obligation of a woman.” 6 How low the status of women in family and society it is! Under this kind of custom in the menoriented society, how can women avoid being discriminated? 2. Literature and art Along with the development of civilization, literature and art play an important role in discrimination against women. “In literature and art, men’s characteristics are, full of aspiration, mighty and helpful, daring to take risks, decisive, indomitable, etc. While women are being regarded as weak, temperate, timid, passive and so on. It is easy to notice sex discrimination in the works of literature and art because sex discrimination is one of the most mon topics of literature and art.” 7 We can easily find out discrimination from literature and art because they are the mon medium. Literature and art model many meaningful discriminative images by the mon values, and conversely these images strengthen people’s social values. With the strength of literature and art, how can we avoid discrimination in society and language? Ⅲ. The Forms of Sexism in English Vocabulary A. Sexism in Morphology The famous linguist J﹒ Grenberg advanced the theory of Marked and Unmarked. This “Marked Theory” reflects sexism in English vocabulary. G enerally speaking, masculine language is usually unmarked while feminine words are marked. In other words, masculine words are generic and mon。 however, feminine words are usually derivation of masculine words or pound words of the masculine centered words. 1. Sexism in Derivation Unmarked (masculine words) Marked (feminine words) prince princess actor actress waiter waitress manager manageress undergraduate undergraduette editor editorette hero heroine landgrave landgravine tragedian tragedienne edian edienne aviator aviatrix executive executrix Usually, the use of feminine affixes indicates female’s identity, profession, position, etc. These words are in a subordinate or inferior position. The above are the examples: From the above table we know that the masculine words are unmarked. But for the feminine terms they add suffixes like, ess, ette, ine, enne, ix, etc. along with the masculine words. These suffixes indicate women’s position, subordinate to men. It is obvious to sexism in English vocabulary from this aspect. It is true that there are some feminine words which are unmarked and the corresponding masculine terms are marked. For example, “bride and wid ow” are feminine terms and the relevant masculine words are “bridegroom and widower”. In fact, these two unmarked feminine words reflect gender discrimination against women from another aspect. Since ancient times, “bride” is regarded as men’s private property, so the word “bride” is unmarked, while the word “bridegroom” is marked. The reason why “widow” is unmarked but “widower” is marked is the same. In the man centered society, women whose husbands die must remain widows. As a result, “widow” normally ex isted. But a widower can marry another woman to drop the title “widower”. In fact, the two words “bridegroom and widower” are marked structurally. 2. Sexism in Compounding Compounding is two or more words bined together to form a new word. Sexism in English feminine words is reflected not only in derivated words but also in pound words, especially from the following two aspects: Firstly, there are many “ man” pound words referring to both masculine and feminine gender. For example, the whole world is only for men as the words “mankind, human” suggest. Similarly, only men belong to the ancient times because the word is “history” but not “herstory”. From the words “statesman and chairman” we can guess it seems that there are only men in politics. Even worse there are only men in some countries because “Englishman, Frenchman, Irishman, Dutchman, etc.” refer to all the people in these countries. How ridiculous! Secondly, some careers, especially the prestigious ones, are manoriented (for example, science, technology, business, etc). As a result, if you heard someone says, “My cousin is a doctor (or a lawyer, or the president of the country, or an engineer),” you would no doubt conclude that the cousin is a man. While if it refers to women, it will add “l(fā)ady”, “female” or “woman” before the masculine words. The following table will be a case in point: Common gender Masculine gender Feminine gender doctor doctor woman doc