Why is actress no longer used

By saying you want a "level playing field" do you mean that either gender should be able to audition for parts of either gender?

How else could you have a level playing field? Do we go back to Shakespeare when all parts were played by men? That's illogical. Our priest begins prayers with "Sisters and Brothers" which is frowned upon by traditionalists and loathed by feminists who say "don't patronise us" so which is right?? Personally I think too much has been made of this distinction. Saying 'actor' when you mean 'female actor' is stupidly self conscious.

Female actor? It almost sounds vaguely medical. We have 'actress' and 'actor' in the language so that we can use one word to mean female, one word to mean male. Now that we have 'actor' to mean actress I find myself in conversations with people where everyone is interrupting the other person to say, Do you mean male or female?

What a bloody waste of time. Who cares, frankly. Just be clear. I don't know any men in the business who would regard a 'great actress' as in any way less than a 'great actor'. I was always told that the suffix -ess means 'little' and any word that takes that suffix was originally intended to mean a lesser form of the original word.

Such terms helped to justify lower pay for women in the past. I agree with Marc, 'actor' is the job so is the right word to use. Great thread! I agree with that it is a new day and the old terms should stay in the past. We call wait staff "servers", not waiters or waitresses. Churchill said that the English and Americans are divided by a common language. Here we have waiters and waitresses.

In Europe they are proud of a skilled profession and are not servile, as they are not our serfs. A server is a computer providing your browser system. And yes, most people here do know a duck from a drake, we have some beautiful mallards on our village pond and a cow from a bull, which is handy when walking through a field.

Depends who you ask, same as in America. Everyone I know calls them actors, but not everyone else does. It's no ones business. That is equality more so than male actor and female actor. By the same token, if you do not use the word "actress," then you can't use the word, "waitress.

If we feel that using the term "actress" is degratory because it conjures of negative images and that's why we don't use it, then really, whose fault is that? Marilyn Monroe was an actress, size 10 and considered one of the most beautiful women in the world. And now, we don't want to be an actress or a size 10 but we still want to be beautiful. So what has changed?

Our constructs? Or has politically correctedness ruined us? Which may be another thread altogether. I think reality is Americans are too soft and can't bare to be insulted nor bare the thought of insulting someone else. If the Academy wants to nominate me for Best Actress, I am certainly not going to argue with them and say, "no, I'm an actor. Acting is my passion - I would love for it to be my job- and I have no qualms about saying, "I am an actress.

Personally, I see no reason to genderfy the term. A female doctor is not a doctress. We are Actors. Just what I was thinking, I"m a teacher, not a teachress. When I was learning Finnish I was pleased to discover that they have no gender pronouns and hence no need for gender agreements with nouns and adjectives, as so many languages have. Everyone and everything is the equivalent of 'it' which makes life a lot easier. Languages are evolving all the time, and are always pushed on their way by changing society.

Just because 'historically' certain words were used in certain ways, doesn't mean they have to be for ever. No problem. I prefer actor. In school, we all just referred to ourselves as actors, so it always just stuck with me. I introduce myself as an actor, but often when people discuss my profession in conversation with me, mainly when they aren't in the business, they refer to me as an actress. I don't really mind either, but I do tend to lean towards actor. I always say actor. Sometimes people "correct" me, but I just keep saying actor and eventually they let it go.

Peter Corey Evolve means to develop gradually, which is what languages do, surely? I put 'historically' in quotation marks, because I was quoting, from you.

Not that hard to understand, I would have thought. And no, I don't use the gender-specific name my parents gave me - I use a version of it that I adapted because I liked it better, and that most people I meet seem to assume stands for Stefan, so it clearly doesn't seem feminine to them.

Not that it matters either way. And at no time did I say I was embarrassed by anything labelling me as female, just don't see why it needs to happen. Can we agree to disagree now? My sister's an actor as well- and when it comes up, I always say "She's an actor as well".

I don't know who's correcting you- but that's a little cheap in the first place : I'd stick with ACtor- esp. I always saw "actor" as a universal term.

I agree with you, I think it sounds more professional, too. I really don't like being corrected by people - especially those not in an entertainment field haha I think you should call yourself what you want; it's your craft, and you should choose by what you would like to be referred :. As much as I dislike needless debates with cyber bullies, here goes: None of my sister's diplomas proclaim her to be a female doctor.

Though it may, at times, be useful in specific conversations we are discussing general usage. More specifically, we are discussing how a young woman refers to herself. And no, genderfy is not a traditional word though autocorrect didn't happen to catch it this time It has, however, been used with increasing frequency over the years in the psychological community.

So expect to see it used more often. Being a fan of history I have enjoyed your posts on this thread, seriously, I love the information. But as an actor one of the first things they teach you is not to be so "judgey" also not a word. All in good fun :. I believe that until the Oscars combine them, it's not important.

Until then, if you get a paycheck, let them call you what they will, as long as they call you ;. I feel women should be proud to be female. We are special people and therefore should be seen as women and actresses. The whole debate argument? You must all accept that they are now different, and both are correct for their respective countries.

On the Queen Mary however, US owned! Just accept that there are differences. In England we prefer to treat women as equals rather than patronise them with fake titles. These straw man arguments are clouding the real topic at hand here.

The issue is with gender marking job titles. This isn't about actor vs actress, it's about every gender marked job title that's out there and trying to bring universal equality. Actress is one of the least offensively sounding examples, mainly because being a good actress is seen as highly feminine and thus feminising the title is attractive to many.

As I wrote previously, it catches me out from time to time and I didn't even realise it was a demeaning term until I was part way through writing a blog post in support of gender equality. So I do appreciate the jolt learning this can cause, especially considering that the vast majority of people using the term actress mean no sexist implications whatsoever.

At the moment it's a two sided coin. While it's not cool to use the term, it's not cool to call people out on it either.

The awareness isn't really there yet. The more apparent issue is with positive male gender marking in job titles. A chairman does not have to be a man, a fireman does not have to be a man. When a woman joins the fire-service she is not trying to show the courage and strength of a man.

When a woman chairs a board she is not trying to show the competence and leadership of a man. These qualities are not exclusive to men. But let's just take a look at the action we're being asked to take here. We're being asked to use a different variation of a word. That's it. Nothing more. It's no hardship. Next time you go to use the term actress you use the term actor. If you really need to specify the gender you use the term female actor. The energy being expelled to argue against this tiny change screams volumes to me.

I don't care what the tradition and history is. Because history and tradition is the whole freaking problem. I can understand adversity to change. I can sympathise with being a laggard. But I have to question any proactive resistance to what is blatantly a progressive and positive movement, especially when that reasoning is little more than convenience and tradition. There's a few males in this post who really need to go put on their big boy pants and grow up.

As for the comment on women being treated equally in England. Let's not even go there. And to my current antagonist: Oh Kay, u winn. Yu mist the poynt intirely butt eye cunseed. Thank you all so much for your interest and comments. I really enjoy reading all of your opinions! I always say you wouldn't call a doctor a doctoress, or a president a presidentette. We do the same thing. Why make the distinction? I call all of my friends "actors", female or male.

I don't think there needs to be a special designation for women, let's make it an equal playing field. I prefer to be called an actor. Just like I prefer to be called, in my profession, a massage therapist and NOT a masseuse. Look, if you want to call yourself an actress, do it! It's a matter of preference.

I personally refer to myself as an actor. The only people who try to correct me are not in the business. I find that amusing, actually. So, I do the whole explanation and ask them what they do and add an -ess or -ette to it and it sounds funny and we all chuckle. I think I have worked out why you call some female thespians 'actors' and some 'actresses'. The only difference is that the former are 41 and 30 respectively and the latter are 65 and 51 respectively.

Does this mean that you believe that an actress becomes an actor after the age of 41? Why can you not give women the dignity that our separate identity deserves rather than treating some of us as men?

Our style guide editor responded: "Most of the impetus for adopting this style came from younger female actors and we certainly do not have a policy of applying it only to older ones. Most female actors these days, young and old, do not see why acting should be treated differently from medicine or any other profession.

We described Harriet Walter as one of our greatest actors. Calling her one of our greatest actresses is not the same thing at all and, I would argue, a much greater affront to her dignity.

But to redress insult and imbalance, language sometimes stumbles into less-than-graceful territory. The inflexible adoption of corrective vocabulary can also stir up amusing clouds of confusion. All Sections. About Us. B2B Publishing. Business Visionaries. Hot Property. Times Events. Times Store. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options.