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Nov. 8, 2016
Nearly 100 members of the Linguistic Society of America signed an open letter to the public this weekend detailing “the necessity of desexualizing the word ‘girth,’” the Dealer reports. “Girth just means circumference,” the authors note. “Yet, one cannot refer to the girth of an object, no matter how innocuous, without imbuing it with sexual overtones.”
The letter goes on to lament the current shortage of synonyms for “width,” stating that “[we’re] basically limited to ‘breadth’ and ‘perimeter,’” which placesing major constraints on the ways in which one can discuss the measurement around the middle of something.
“The Sapir–Whorf hypothesis suggests that language determines the boundaries of thought, and linguistic categories determine cognitive categories,” the letter argues. “Thus, we contend that ‘girth’ should be used to describe something, nay, anything other than penises.”
“Girth matters,” the authors conclude. When reached for follow-up, they added, “No, not that way, goddamn it.”
