Lexicon’s sexist examples

On medium.com, Michael Oman-Reagan recently pointed out sexist usage examples in the Oxford Dictionary of English: for "rabid," "a rabid feminist"; for "grating," "her high, grating voice"; for "nagging," "a nagging wife": for "Doctor," "he was made a Doctor of Divinity."

Elisa Gabbert explains in an essay for Smart Set the two schools of linguistics: precriptivism, which includes judgments on social correctness, and descriptivism, which shows how language is commonly used. Oxford Dictionary, which adheres to descriptivism, defended the examples.

I looked up words on oxforddictionaries.com and found these: for "bossy," "a bossy, meddling woman"; for "feisty," "a love story with a feisty heroine who's more than a pretty face"; for "rational," "Ursula's upset – she's not being very rational"; for "brilliant," "his brilliant career at Harvard."

Thoughts? Email connie.post@coxinc.com

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