Is Gender Accurate translation a good thing?

[PloverWing]

Only to persons who either intentionally subscribe to such a bias, or who are not well-versed in literature written before the late 1970s.

If someone is well-read in pre-1970s literature and rejects the politically correct ideology that sought to suppress words like “mankind”, man still means man, and not male. Likewise, chairman should never have been replaced by “chair.” These changes are particularly silly when we consider that many languages, such as French and German, have masculine, feminine, and in the case of German and other Germanic languages, neutral words, but English lost these, along with grammatical cases, making it a semi-analytical language almost like Mandarin Chinese. And these changes, as George Orwell pointed out, make the English language vulnerable to abuse.

I am of an older generation and I prefer terms like steward and stewardess, as well as actor and actress, because they specify gender. The term 'actor' for females can be misleading, and alternatives like 'act-person' or 'stew-person' feel awkward. In my school days, 'man', 'men', and 'mankind' were inclusive terms unless context specified males only. It wasn't until the late 1970s that these terms began to be seen as exclusively male. While 'it' and 'its' are gender-neutral, some might find these terms insulting when applied to humans.

I also am of an older generation, and I've read lots of literature written before the late 1970s. I'm reading a book from the 1970s right now, in which the author talks a lot about God and "man". The language is a little distracting, but it's like reading Dickens or Poe or Shakespeare. The English language changes over time, and you get into the mindset of whatever century you're reading from, and you cope with the language differences as you read.

For a while, I favored the option of holding onto words like "chairman" and making them gender-neutral. What eventually swayed me to the other side was a story about Susan B. Anthony that I bumped into. This is a 40-year-old memory for me, but Wikipedia is helping me out with the details:

She drew attention to the inconsistent way that gendered words were used in the law. She pointed out that the New York tax laws referred only to "he", "him" and "his", yet taxes were collected from women. The federal Enforcement Act of 1870, which she was accused of violating, similarly used male pronouns only.

[ Source: Trial of Susan B. Anthony - Wikipedia ]

The point is that there's ambiguity about when "man" means "human" and when it means "male", and that ambiguity can hurt people. If I talk about the "men on the committee" or the "men of the jury" or "vestrymen", am I talking about males or humans? Are women allowed to serve on a jury, or on the vestry? That's not something to be taken for granted.

I agree that words like "chairperson" are clunky. It's good to find gender-inclusive words that keep the music of the language. I actually like "chair" for that reason, although I admit it sounds like furniture.

Regarding other languages: English is different from languages that have grammatical gender for all their nouns. In a language where tables and windows and coffee cups all have gender, it doesn't matter as much if the word for the leader of a committee is masculine or feminine. But in English, words tend to have gender only when we really mean it, when we're talking about people or (sometimes) animals. So I think it matters more in English. I'll leave it to native speakers of other languages to figure out how they want to express gender-inclusiveness in their own language.

Regarding pronouns: In English, we coin new nouns and verbs all the time and throw them into the language, and English happily absorbs them. English pronouns are different: there's a set list, and that's it. As much as I like the philosophy of the neo-pronouns (I'm especially fond of xe/xem/xyr), they're just not going to work. English doesn't absorb new pronouns the way it absorbs new nouns and verbs. So we're stuck with {he, she, it, they}, all of which have strengths and weaknesses as non-gendered personal pronouns.

Returning to Bible translation: Unquestionably, the Old and New Testaments were written in patriarchal cultures that would not be safe for me to live in. The story of the Bible is God's self-revelation to broken, sinful people, and there's plenty in the Bible that shows that human sinfulness, and translators need to tell that story truthfully. But translators shouldn't add any new patriarchal language that's not demanded by the text. Where the Greek and Hebrew phrasing is talking about people (not just male people), then using words like "humans" or "people", instead of "men", makes it clear to me, as a non-male reader, that God's message and God's love are for me too, and not just for my male colleagues.

 

[Paul4JC]

The CSB states that it is a gender accurate translation, similarly ESV 2011, NIV, and some others are in varying degrees gender accurate, is this a good thing?

In my opinion, it's dangerous ground that translators have gone into.