Rewriting sentences with inclusive language .....need help on a few?

Question

It's a college course on business communication in regards to inclusive language/making language nonsexist, nonracist, nonagist, and quoting from biased sources...Here are the few I need help with...
1. The minister joined the couple together as man and wife. (I said no change on this one, what do you think?)
2. It's hard to believe that a woman her age could accomplish so much. (I have no idea how to change this one, but it's defienetly agist.)
3. The law from the 1800s mandated that men could buy alcohol and cigarettes only from a state store. (I put no change on this one as well, but it is under the category of quoting biased sources)
4. The employee guide indicated that men could add their spouses to their health care plan. ( I put: The employee guide indicated that "Men [sic] could add their spouses to their health care plan." (I have no idea if that is right either!) Please help...Assignment due tomorrow! Thanks...PS: I got all the other's with no problems at all!

Answer 1

I'll try a few:

1) change to husband and wife.

2) It seems to me you have to change the meaning of this one; the problem isn't the language used. It is also hard to tell if the person is young (accomplished a lot despite few years) or old (despite not being youthful) Perhaps "It is remarkable how much she has accomplished in so few years" or "The amount of her accomplishments is remarkable."

3) Again - can't tell what the law actually said. Perhaps it meant anyone, perhaps it meant adults, perhaps it mean adult males. Without seeing the source law, we can't tell. It may be that you are supposed to write: "The law from the 1800s required that alcohol and cigarettes be purchased only from a state store."

4) I assume you are supposed to write: "The employee guide indicated that employees could add their spouses to their health care plans." It probably didn't say or mean "men" as it used the neutral word "spouses" and as hiring only men would almost certainly be illegal.

Answer 2

Sounds like political correctness gone wild! But I'll see if I can help you out.

1. Personally, I think only one change is needed--"man" should be changed to "husband." It keeps the man and woman on equal footing. However, if this is for a very politically correct professor, you will probably need to account for the possibility of same sex marriage.

2. I'm with you, this is a difficult one! I don't know how much you can change the sentence, but if you could just focus on the facts that would eliminate the editorial nature of the sentence ("hard to believe"). Something like: At age 67, the woman runs 2 miles a day. In this way, you would be stating the facts without indicating ageism.

3. I don't see that this needs to be changed--as long as it is an accurate statement of the law. Of course it specifies men (ignoring women), but that is to be expected of a law from the 1800s. An additional sentence could be added to emphasize this.

4. This one seems straightforward--you don't want to forget about female employees! I would simply replace "men" with "employees."

Hope this helps!!

Answer 3

To my ideas, the concept "it is stressful to have self belief" is fairly the pejorative bit that must be rephrased. It assumes a female of her age ought to not generally achieve this lots, and that the reader could proportion this view, hence the age-gender bias. The objective is compliment and set her up as a place sort, spectacular? indexed under are some innovations, inspite of the incontrovertible fact that some greater context could have been effectual: it is impressive that at that age, she had performed lots. achieving lots at that age is definitely impressive.

Answer 4

1. this is geared solely towards heterosexual couples, so you would want the statement to include homosexual couples.
2. meh
3. should change the "men" to a non gender specific term.
4. again, change the "men" to a non gender specific term and change "spouses" to "spouse or life partner" or something like that.