Comments on: Modern English Usage

By: A.J. Sutter

A.J. Sutter — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 02:10:44 +0000

Mike: Thanks, I didn’t know that. But are you suggesting that the basketball usage means the same as, say, when some female character on a TV drama yells at her two-timing/lackadaisical significant other to “man up” (the only occasion I have to hear the expression, living overseas)? Does telling your boyfriend to stop cheating on you fit in with the basketball usage (see Dexter, Season 2)? or could the expression have shifted considerably in meaning?

By: Mike Zimmer

Mike Zimmer — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 13:53:25 +0000

I think the term “man up” originates in basketball, to go to man-to-man defense. For what it is worth, women’s basketball use the term that way. So, it is not gendered in basketball.

By: Howard Wasserman

Howard Wasserman — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 01:33:45 +0000

What if you “cowboy up” (as the 2004 Red Sox used to say). Can one “cowgirl up”?

By: A.J. Sutter

A.J. Sutter — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 01:29:51 +0000

I’d always thought that ‘mensch’ (in both German and Yiddish) was grammatically gendered, but not necessarily semantically so. OTOH ‘man’ seems to have become more clearly marked for semantic gender, esp. in the last 30 years or so (maybe other than as an interjection — though “dude” seems to be making it increasingly irrelevant in that usage). For as long as I can remember, one has been able to say admiringly of a woman that she has “more balls” than some guy — but that’s a kind of left-handed compliment, usually meant to shame the guy or guys in question. OTOH, “man up” suggests a deficiency of character, not a superfluity of anatomy. For a woman to use “man up” in reference to herself or another woman seems a bit sad, like an expression of what used to be called an oppressed consciousness.

By: Miriam A. Cherry

Miriam A. Cherry — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 00:08:10 +0000

I’ve actually thought about this. Can a woman be a mensch? (Yes, I think, in the non-literal use of that term). Can someone “person up”?