Language belongs to everyone: why inclusive language is so annoying
Language isn't neutral; it has an ideology. And inclusive language, in a way, came to challenge it.
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“Inclusive language confronts us with the ideological burden of language, which is usually invisible to us,” said Argentine writer María Teresa Andruetto in her closing speech at the International Congress of the Spanish Language (Córdoba, 2019). Because language is not neutral; it has an ideology. And inclusive language, in a way, challenged it, making it visible by highlighting the unequal relationship between language, thought, and gender .
Why use inclusive language?
Why use inclusive language ? Because language organizes, allows us to name and classify a world. Until recently, Spanish organized it in binary terms: feminine and masculine. But by naming people in a general way, it only resorted to the latter, reproducing the male hegemony that had ruled the world for years. On the other hand, for some time now, identities that had historically been relegated, discriminated against, and criminalized by the same patriarchal power have begun to become visible and occupy a political place. Since they were on the margins, it didn't matter if or how they were named.
What do those who oppose inclusive language resist?
Many trans, non-binary, and children don't identify with either pole of the gender binary. So what do we do with these rights-holders? Do we force their identity into a language that, in turn, is artificial? Or do we modify language usage to integrate everyone? Language is a tool of communication, and communicating implies otherness. We can use language as a way to establish power and subjugation, or as a bridge to others. We prefer the bridge.
Inclusive language doesn't change the world, nor is it a mandatory option in all areas. So what do those who oppose inclusive language resist? Why is it so annoying, and why do some people look at us strangely, smile, or mock us when we use it? Perhaps it's because language is a territory of contested meanings, where proposing new categories of personhood is a way of proposing other ideologies, of making another possible world visible.
We don't know exactly what will happen in the future with inclusive language. What we do know is that as long as we pretend that ideology is invisible to language, those who remain invisible—excluded—are people. And language belongs to its speakers, to all of us, as diverse as they are.
This article was originally published in The Future Is Genderless: Trans Stories from Colombia, Chile, and Argentina, edited by the University of the Andes, CEPER, Cuadernos de Periodismo, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, February 2021.
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