Re: punctuated abbreviations // was english spelling reform
From: | Muke Tever <mktvr@...> |
Date: | Friday, October 18, 2002, 20:19 |
From: "Tim May" <butsuri@...>
> It doesn't mean either. The point behind "Ms" is that with only the
> terms "Mrs" and "Miss", it's impossible to refer to a woman by means
> of an honorific without specifying her marital status. This was felt
> to be discriminatory, and "Ms" (pronounced, in my experience, /mIz/ or
> /mz/) was introduced as a direct counterpart of the male "Mr". It was
> coined in 1949, but didn't become popular until the '70s.
But I think (in my limited experience) that "Ms" and "Miss" have merged, /mIz/
everywhere, with /mIs/ in direct address (I don't think one could hear
[Iks'kjuwz mij mIz]...I could be wrong).
I think we need "Msr" or "Mtr" as a direct counterpart of the female "Mrs".
Just for fairness sake.
*Muke!
--
http://www.frath.net/
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