the suffix -man

Put off means delay or deter.

Changing the preposition of a phrasal verb to the opposite may not give the opposition meaning.

You swallow in something, but excrete out something instead of swallowing out.

Man in the Germanic languages (in all of them in one form or another, I think) was originally a neuter term. Society shaped the language not the other way around.

The French have no female world for a "ministre"or a "docteur". They call a female minister "madame le ministre" and a female doctor "la doctoresse" (or le docteur Marie Dupont). La doctoresse sounds odd and isn't very common.

Sorry 'no female word'

Jim, there is a difference between what the dictionary says and how people colloquially speak and how they semantically interpret words. My point is that in the US, at least, people normally construe "man" as ALWAYS meaning, a male. Hence, using the word "policeman" means that the listener automatically assumes that the person is referring to a male.

It makes more sense to allow either both the words "policeman" and "policewoman" in order to determine gender, as gender is not indicated by the presence of a masculine or feminine article in English as it is in some other languages. Or, one can use a gender neutral word like "officer" if one doesn't want to specify a certain gender of the cop in question.

If you told me, an American, about a run-in that you had with a policeman, I would NEVER ask you if the policeman was male or female. I would always assume the former. Because there has been differentiation between the words "man" and "woman" in the sense of meaning "male" and "female," this has caused confusion in the language and in the traditional "dictionary meanings" of words.

Ryan

Changing the subject slightly.....

I think it's interesting how the pronunciation of this suffix can change (at least in my American English).

For example:

Say "policeman" or "fireman"....I pronounce the suffix as a schwa.

In words like "handyman" or "candyman"...I pronounce the suffix (using the ASCII guide: "me..n" (in my case, the normal pronunciation of the word man).

Oh yeah...in case Dotman is wondering....I pronounce it following the second example I gave.

I pronounce "policeman", "fireman", "postman" somewhat like "policemun", "firemun", "postmun". Therefore, to me, these words become more titles of the occupation and don't allude to the gender, since the "man" part isn't the normal pronounciation of the word man. When someone refers to a "policeman", I usually just take this to mean that they are calling "someone" in law enforcement, whether male or female.

Pronunciation

Fireman=firemun
policeman=policemun
handyman=handy-man regular man pronunciation
postman=postmun
garbage man=garbage-man
pizza man=pizza-man
mailman=mail-man

Sometimes when people say fireman and firemen they sound really similar, but, some people say firemun and for firemen they use they regular men pronunciation.

In US, we tend to say " please-mun" in stead of 3-syllable " po-lice-mun",or at least in Virginia.

Do you pronounce the suffix -on always the same way. Like in Clington, Newton, London, Washington, Jackson,...... ?
And is it pronounced like /Jack-sén/ (for Jackson) ?

Fly,

I don't think "please" is a good word to represent the beginning of "policeman." It doesn't sound like "please" to me.

I say puh-lees-mun i've never heard it pronounced like pleasemun

How about the pronounciation of the suffix "land" in words such as "highland", "lowland", "Queensland", "midlands". To me, the "land" part is pronounced as "lund", so that these words sound somewhat like "highlund", "lowlund", "Queenslund" (although I sometimes pronounce it with the normal pronounciation of the word land, i.e. Queens-land), and "midlunds". Basically, the "land" part is pronounced in the same way it is in "island" or "England"/"Ireland"/"Scotland".