In the article “Wears Jump Suit. Sensible Shoes. Uses Husband’s Last Name”, Deborah Tannen claims that it is impossible for a woman to get dressed in the morning without inviting interpretations of her character because women are marked as either feminist or anti-feminist, male-basher or as an apologist for men. The writer assumes that women do not have the freedom to be unmarked like men; that is to be plain with no other meaning on her own. Tannen’s claim is unfair and inaccurate because using logic, both men and women are marked. The term marked is used to described women because women have to pay attention in how they dress and act in public, so that they are not misunderstood, while men do not need to worry about how they are perceived in public. Tannen believes that men are not scrutinized like women and that is unsupported in the article.
Deborah Tannen tries to sway the reader to believe that women are marked, a linguistically theory that alters the base meaning of a word, by discussing an example about how she scrutinized to herself how three women dressed at a conference years ago. There is no unmarked woman (Tannen). One woman had a classic look similar to Cleopatra. The next women was composed and dignified to separate her from the audience. The last women had a wild look that distracted from her lecture. The men did not dress in a special way to distinguish themselves from each other. Tannen leads the audience to believe that because men choose to be unmarked, so they do not have to worry about their looks distracting from their business. The writer’s argument is weak because women are not the only people that need to worry about how they are perceived in public. Men may not have to worry about as many stereotypes like looks as women, but men must and do need to worry about how other perceive them.
The writer even admits in the article that men’s looks too can be interpreted.
According to Tannen,”Take the men’s hair styles. There was no marine crew cut or oily longish hair falling into eyes, no asymmetrical, two-tiered construction to swirl over a bald top. One man was unabashedly bald; the others had hair of standard length, parted on one side, in natural shades of brown or gray or graying. Their hair obstructed no views, left little to toss or push back or run fingers through and, consequently, needed and attracted no attention. A few men had beards. In a business setting, beards might be marked. In this academic gathering, they weren’t.”
Men’s looks can be interpreted just like women looks can be interpreted.
Tannen claims that she wishes that the women could have dressed at the conference in a way that could be unmarked, but it is impossible because there is no hair style that is standard, shoes are either attractive or comfortable, and no women’s clothing that does not send a sexual message. A woman whose hair has no particular style is perceived as not caring about how she looks which can disqualify her for many positions, and will subtly diminish her as a person in the eyes of some (Tannen). I think there are many women hair styles that are appropriate for business and that do not send hidden messages. The woman who wore flat, laced shoes arrives first and the last to arrive was the woman in spike heels, shoes in hand and a handful of men around her (Tannen). Women should wear shoes in business that can handle all of their potential business for the day. If a woman’s clothing is tight, it sends a message of intending to wanting to be attractive, but also a possibly unintended one of availability and if her clothes are not sexy, that too sends a message, lent meaning by the knowledge that they could have been (Tannen). With all the sexual harassment stories in the news, a man would be an idiot to make many comments to women about how they are dressed without getting to know them first. Looks do send messages, but how a woman refers to herself sends hidden messages too?
Deborah Tannen correctly states that there are four titles and sometimes five for women. Most forms give four titles to choose from (Tannen). A woman who checks “Mrs.” or “Miss” says not only whether she has been married, but also whether she has conservative tastes and values. I have met many liberal women that want to be refered to as “Mrs.” Also; I have heard that Miss is for younger women or girls. “Ms.” declines to let on about marriage, but it also marks her as either liberated or rebellious. I do agree that “Ms.” is the most neuter or balanced of the terms. “Mr.” carries no meaning other than that the respondent is male (Tannen). I have never heard “Mr.” used for anyone other than a male. “Dr.” should be used when addressing anyone, male or female, with that degree. Women also have to worry about hyphens in their name.
The writer claims that surnames are marked. If a woman takes her husband’s name, she announces to the world that she is married and has traditional values. To some it will indicate that she is less herself, more identified by her husband’s identity (Tannen). I have not met anyone born in the last twenty years that believes that. If she does not take her husband’s name, this too is marked because she has kept her own name. A man is never said to have kept his own name and him using his own name is unmarked. A married woman may use her surname plus his, with or without a hyphen, but this too announces her marital status. It is marked (Tannen).
The most irrelevant example Deborah Tannen uses in the article is pointing out that men are born with nipples, so boys are modified female bodies. While two X chromosomes make a female, two Y chromosomes make nothing (Tannen). Also, there are no species that produce only males. This is no surprise, since any such species would become extinct in its first generation (Tannen). I really do not know where the writer is going with these examples because they do nothing for me other than say that Mother Nature must be a sexist. Such examples do not support the women are marked claim. We need both men and women to reproduce, so we are equally responsible for the continuation of the human race. The article states no scientific statistics that are relevant, irrelevant, accurate or complete.
Indeed authorities on this topic are mentioned by the writer. Tannen states that Fasold pointed out that if language reflected biology, grammar books would direct us to use “she” to include males and females and “he” only for specifically male referents, but they do not. “Me” means “he or she,” and that “she” is used only if the referent is specifically female. From at least about 1500, the correct sex-indefinite pronoun was “they,” as it still is in casual spoken English (Tannen). To Deborah Tannen the female was declared by grammarians to be the marked case because of these historical facts.
The argument is illogically because women and men do not have the freedom to be unmarked. Everyone uses other means to communicate with other people most of the time. What we say or write is only a small part of how humans communicate. Looks and titles can communicate for men and women. Tannen uses emotion to appeal to women by writing, “I felt sad to think that we women didn’t have the freedom to be unmarked that the men sitting next to us had”. The appeal is inappropriate because it makes women seems like victims in a man’s world. It really detracts and obscures the fact that men have perception problems too and it does not seem to be fair to attack men for the human nature of judging a book by its cover.
Deborah Tannen states that she is a doctor. “I sometimes try to duck these variously marked choices by giving my title as “Dr.”, she says. By doing so she risks marking herself as either uppity or an overachiever. I think she is a feminist looking to blame the world’s problems on men. Tannen does not give one example of man having the same issues with public perceptions as women, even though it is obvious that they do because of the discussion in the article addressing how the men looked.
I mostly disagree with the author because her women cannot be unmarked claim is too broad and men are often marked too. Women can be marked and men can be not marked, but they both can be anything, even special. Her view of how men are viewed is too generalized. She even describes how different the men look in the article and then goes on to state how they are not different because no one is looking at them.
Works Cited
Tannen, Deborah. “Wears Jump Suit. Sensible Shoes. Uses Husband’s Last Name.” New York Times Magazine. June 20, 1993.
