Men Explain Things to Me

Amelia

I am in a group chat, and have been for some time, called “Mansplains”. The group has 10 members, myself included, 5 of whom are men. Most of the discussion in the group is among the women, I think because the type of men who self-select to be in a group called Mansplains are there to learn how not to engage in the behaviour and are thus fairly good listeners. I did not know until I read the postscript to the titular essay in Rebecca Solnit’s 2014 collection Men Explain Things to Me that (after the essay was originally published in 2008, made the rounds, died down and resurfaced again, going viral in fits and starts) Solnit had been credited with the term Mansplain, which was one of the New York Times’ words of the year for 2010. She did not, in fact, coin it and explains in the postscript: “I have my doubts about the word and don’t use it myself much; it seems to me to go a little heavy on the idea that men are inherently flawed in this way, rather than that some men explain things they shouldn’t and and don’t hear things they should” (Solnit, p.13).

The essay describes, in beautiful concision and precise description, an instance of a man explaining something to a woman that seems so absurd as to be exaggerated to fiction… if you are a male reader. I discussed the story with a male friend who asked whether I thought at least some details were embellished, but reading the story as a woman, it only seems too familiar and utterly believable.

Solnit and a friend attend a party, a greying male host corners them at the end of the evening and, upon learning what Solnit has been writing recently, begins telling her about a recent book on the same topic “with that smug look I know so well in a man holding forth – eyes fixed on the fuzzy far horizon of his own authority” (Solnit, p.2). Her friend attempts to clarify several times to the host that the book he is describing is Solnit’s recent work, but he presses on. When it is finally clear that he is telling the author about her own work, it is also revealed that he has not in fact read her book, only a review thereof.

This type of behaviour is so commonplace that we don’t notice it happening and we actively participate in reinforcing it. “It trains us in self-doubt and self-limitation just as it exercises men’s unsupported overconfidence” (Solnit, p.4). I was recently in a conversation with a male friend I have known since we went to art school together. He has been in the arts since and now works in film. I, having retrained many times, mainly in things-to-do-with-language am now a Speech-Language Pathologist. Something came up in our conversation about a sound particular to eastern Canada and a couple of other places in the world. We were discussing it and he said “but that’s not really language”, to which I replied “it is language” and was about to continue when he interrupted to contradict “is it, though…”. Before continuing with my explanation, and because we had just been discussing the function of privilege in another context, I pointed out (something along the lines of) “you work in set decoration for film and I am a Speech-Language Pathologist. You are questioning my knowledge of what counts as language based on your authority as… a man”

I am currently enrolled in my 5th university program. I have studied fine arts, film, translation, speech-language pathology and now second language education. All environments I have studied and worked in have been female-dominated to varying degrees save film, which was quite the opposite. In my Master of Science program at McGill there were two men in our class of 26. In my current classrooms there tend to be about 4-5 men of 30-35 students. This proportion is not at all represented in speaking time; while men make up approximately 5% of the student body, they take up about 90% of the airtime offered to students in any discussion that is not specifically mediated to redistribute speaking time artificially. While I appreciate the comments of male classmates, I understand that their comments take space that is, given our limited time and the inflated class sizes at McGill, finite.

When one professor pointed to this disparity, a male student among those who had just spoken interrupted her to explain some research on this “interesting phenomenon”. I held up my copy of Men Explain Things to Me.

Even as we, as students of language, observe these instances of what Robin Lakoff proposed to be forms of linguistic crosstalk based in and representative of women’s place in society (Lakoff, 1975) we nevertheless perpetuate these patterns, all these years later. One space where I observe an inversion of these patterns is a group made up of equal numbers of men and women but heavily dominated by the female voice… called “Mansplains”.

References

Lakoff, R., & Bucholtz, M. (2004). Language and woman’s place : Text and commentaries (Rev. and expanded ed., Studies in language and gender). New York: Oxford University Press.

Solnit, R. (2014). Men explain things to me. New York: Haymarket Books.


13 thoughts on “Men Explain Things to Me”

  2. Amelia, your post takes me back to 1976, when in my final year of high school I happened on a 1975 book called Male / Female Language by Mary Ritchie Key and became hooked on what was soon going to be known as “feminist linguistics”! That book was a very early salvo in what would become a well-researched and vigorous volley of attacks on the unequal playing field of language, where the gender of speakers is concerned. Solnit is writing in a well-established and, I think, powerful tradition! There was the work of Robin Lakoff and Mary Bucholtz, as you mention…Dale Spender, Julia Penelope, Cheris Kramarae, Suzette Haden Elgin (in her science fiction, women linguists save Earth from alien attack!)…many others I don’t know enough about, and of course Deborah Cameron, who I have mentioned in class. Her blog is here: https://debuk.wordpress.com

    And I see that Key’s 1975 book was re-issued in an expanded 2nd edition in 1996!
    https://rowman.com/ISBN/9780810830837/Male-Female-Language-With-a-Comprehensive-Bibliography-Second-Edition#

    Now if only one could imagine that all that good work was going to result in some real CHANGE on that playing field…

    But at least the concept of being non-binary has entered the discussion and is moving around on said field. That’s got to be a good thing.

    Reply

  5. Thank you so much for sharing both in class and in this blog post. Especially as someone raised and (generally) read as female, mansplaining is something I’ve experienced first hand on many occasions. It’s going to take a lot to get through the self-doubt and anxiety its caused. I’ve also had my fair share of other class-related “‘splainings”– cisplaining, whitesplaining, you name it. I really wish people knew when to…Just. Not. Talk. I apologize for any unexplained seismic activity my classmates may have experienced; it is most likely due to the force of my eyes rolling at various entitled, ignorant comments coming from places of privilege.

    I have been trying to figure out the best means of calling people out in a way that adds instead of takes away from class discussion and serves as a teaching moment. I’ve become a lot better at bringing folks’, pardon my French, B.S. to their attention, but sometimes I get shy or unsure of myself, for reasons listed above, especially when the other person (typically a man) decides to defend their offensive words.

    Needless to say, I’d been mentally preparing A LOT for the sort of things folks could say in relation to race, language, cultural appropriation, etc. during the class discussion, and I am thankful to have a little bit more time to prepare myself thanks to the snow.

    Reply

  6. Thanks Brian and Max! I’m looking forward to next week’s TWO seminars—one featuring each of you, with equally provocative classmates at your sides. And I was fascinated to learn about the Guardian article. The mansplaining flowchart is brilliant…the yarn art is beautiful…reading the Guardian article reminded me of another highlight of my high school years, American artist Judy Chicago’s “The Dinner Party” installation. Walking through that exhibition at the age of 18 or so (it was touring North America) was, I swear, a religious experience for me.
    https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/eascfa/dinner_party/place_settings
    Anybody going to “The Vagina Monologues” this weekend? They could tell us about it next week…

    Reply

  7. Oh goddess! I can’t help but chime in Mela, I remember going with my mother to see “The Vagina Monologues” in Florida. Kind of a mother/daughter thing to do. (Depending on your mother I suppose). It was excellent and ground-breaking at the time, (like the Dinner Party), disturbing and funny.
    Beatrice

    Reply

  8. Beatrice, how perfect that you are chiming in on “V-Day”! And how heartwarming that someone else in the class remembers Judy Chicago’s “Dinner Party.” It changed my life…REALLY.

    Reply

  9. I find the male/female discussion-time-disparity issue most interesting, and I think it should be discussed in class. In fact, I will ask Mela if, with her permission, we could hold an open discussion on this specific matter. I believe students from countries other than the US and Canada (which, perhaps share more similarities culture-wise, in comparison to South America and Asia) could profit from insights we could reach to through honest and professional discussion.
    I also think this discussion could help us come up with ideas to ensure all voices in our classroom be heard if this was not the case.
    Hector

    Reply

  10. The ability to just sit back and listen to other people talk is one sadly lacking in many people. The intersection of gender with it is very interesting, but I’ve also noticed its connecting with race, religion, age, etc. One of the best examples I can think of is when Black Lives Matter was still a relatively young movement and there was a rally in Ottawa, my hometown. A Facebook event was inviting people to attend and the event page made it explicitly clear that white people were free to attend as allies. However, it was requested that they be silent and let black people be the ones to make their voices heard, as it was, after all, a Black Lives Matter event. You would think by the reaction that white people had been asked to go throw themselves into traffic. The outrage, the whining, the references to freedom of speech, it was staggering to witness. Privileged groups, whether men or white people, seem to have a hard time wrapping their heads around the fact that sometimes, their (and our) voices are not wanted or prioritized. When we insist on injecting them, we run the risk of mansplaining, whitesplaining, all the -splaining, and ultimately overstepping our roles. I think we should all practice the art of simply listening and learning by going into spaces where we are not in the majority (provided we are welcome.) It can’t hurt!
    -Victoria

    Reply

  11. Hear, hear 🙂
    Victoria, you are taking me back to my days of more active feminist activism, when at my community centre (South Asian Women in Montreal https://www.sawcc-ccfsa.ca/EN/about-sawcc/ ) I was often present at meetings where men were allowed to be present provided they agreed to remain silent. These were South Asian men! It wasn’t easy for them, but for the most part they were pretty good sports about it.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

css.php