The World in Words   /     Is Mx here to stay?

Summary

When a word first enters the language, it sounds weird to some, radical to others and comforting to just a few. Only later does it seem 'natural.' So it was with the honorific Ms in the 20th century. So it may be with the non-binary Mx. Today, British banks and utilities routinely give customers the option to use Mx. Will American companies follow suit? And what might Shakespeare have thought? His gender-neutral 'master-mistress,' is arguably more poetic than Mx, but it might be a bit of a mouthful for our times. This episode was reported by Leo Hornak and Nina Porzucki. Music by Stationary Sign, The Freeharmonic Orchestra, Podington Bear, Josef Falkensköld and Silver Maple. The photo of performer Justin Vivian Bond, who uses Mx, is by Rhododendrites via Creative Commons. Read a transcript of the episode here. Sign up for the Subtitle newsletter here.

Subtitle
When a word first enters the language, it sounds weird to some, radical to others and comforting to just a few. Only later does it seem natural. So it was with the honorific Ms in the 20th century. So it may be with the non-binary Mx. Today, British bank
Duration
00:29:02
Publishing date
2023-11-29 05:02
Link
https://subtitlepod.com/is-mx-here-to-stay/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=is-mx-here-to-stay
Contributors
  Quiet Juice
author  
Enclosures
https://subtitlepod.com/podcast-download/2661/is-mx-here-to-stay.mp3
audio/mpeg

Shownotes

When a word first enters the language, it sounds weird to some, radical to others and comforting to just a few. Only later does it seem 'natural.' So it was with the honorific Ms in the 20th century. So it may be with the non-binary Mx. Today, British banks and utilities routinely give customers the option to use Mx. Will American companies follow suit? And what might Shakespeare have thought? His gender-neutral 'master-mistress,' is arguably more poetic than Mx, but it might be a bit of a mouthful for our times.

This episode was reported by Leo Hornak and Nina Porzucki. Music by Stationary Sign, The Freeharmonic Orchestra, Podington Bear, Josef Falkensköld and Silver Maple. The photo of performer Justin Vivian Bond, who uses Mx, is by Rhododendrites via Creative Commons. Read a transcript of the episode here.

Sign up for the Subtitle newsletter here.