«Sand if you are a woman, in Italy you also die of language. It’s a civil death, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less. It is with words that make us disappear from public places, from professions, from debates and from the news, but we also die of unjust words in everyday life, where the prejudice that passes through language kills our possibility of being fully ourselves». Quotes Michela Murgia at the bottom (Shut up and nine other sentences we don’t want to hear againEinaudi 2021) the introductory document Of Barbara Peres, Equality Councillor, at Guidelines for gender-friendly administrative language in the metropolitan city of Milan. It is a series of rules and advice for public administration to draft documents in a gender-inclusive language: a booklet that aims to become a model. To transform equal rights into a daily and linguistic reality, starting from public offices.
The handbook for an inclusive language of the City of Milan
As the brochure for use by employees (and not only) reminds us, the assumption that gender language is also an effective tool for counteracting prejudices in Italian society dates back to 1986. When the linguist and feminist activist Alma Sabatini led the first study on linguistic sexismon behalf of the National Commission for equality and equal opportunities between men and women, established at the Presidency of the Council of Ministers (Recommendations for a non-sexist use of the Italian language).
The prevalence of the male gender in the language used in Italian was also felt at an institutional level
also with a double meaning to indicate the feminine (the so-called “neutral masculine”) and the lack of use of
institutional terms declined in the feminine.
The debate on inclusive language, from Alma Sabatini to Michela Murgia
Since then the debate on the issue has become heated and enriched by various contributions, the mentality has changed a lot.
Until we get to the guidelines (here the decalogue that summarizes them): strategies to be used in public offices to make a change in mentality a daily reality. Among the recommended techniques is the use of the feminine form of nouns that indicate professions or institutional positions (they can be derived by applying normal grammar rules).
Match the feminine articles with the nouns
Another indication present in all the language guidelines analyzed, as well as in the indications of the Accademia della Crusca, is to agree articles and adjectives with epicene nouns, that is, nouns that indicate individuals of both sexes (the president/president) .
In relation to ambigender nouns, we remind you to avoid using them alongside the word “woman” to form the feminine and to instead use the simple term with the feminine article (the manager, not the female manager).
Not “Meloni said” but “Meloni said”
Very often, it is used the definite article (“la”) preceding the surname to designate a womanwhile it is absent to indicate a man, this creates a different linguistic treatment of genders (not “Meloni said” but “Meloni said”).
The inclusive masculine must be overcome
Another goal, the overcoming of the inclusive masculine, or the masculine plural to refer to groups of people belonging to both genders. It can be implemented by making the masculine and feminine forms explicit (citizens and citizens) through doubling, both in the extended form and in the abbreviated form.
An alternative is gender blurring. Using collective neuter nouns (the staff / instead of the employees or workers, the management / instead of the managers), impersonal forms (“Users must enter one at a time” becomes “You enter one at a time.” or sentences in the passive voice (“Citizens must submit the application by May” becomes “The question has to be submitted within the month of May”). It’s true that for the simplification of the language active construction should always be preferred. So the advice is to resort to it if there are no alternatives.
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