Campus Feminist Groups Taking up Alternative Spelling of ‘Womyn’ and ‘Womxn’

Campus Feminist Groups Taking up Alternative Spelling of ‘Womyn’ and ‘Womxn’

The goal here is to avoid including the word ‘men’ in the spelling.

The College Fix reports:

‘Woman,’ ‘womxn’ or ‘womyn’: Campus feminist groups opt for alternative spelling

Campus feminist groups across the United States are increasingly adopting an alternative spelling of the word “woman,” replacing it with variants such as “womxn” and “womyn” in part in order to avoid spelling the word “man” or “men.”

The University of Iowa’s Women’s Resource and Action Center utilizes the spelling of “womxn” in their “Womxn of Color Network.” Simone Fernandes, the operations coordinator of the university’s Women’s Resource and Action Center, told The College Fix that the alternative spelling was inspired by the website Everyday Feminism.

“Womxn removes the sequences of m-a-n and/or m-e-n from the term ‘woman/in’ that sheds light on the prejudice, discrimination, and institutional barriers womxn have faced, but to also show that womxn are not a subcategory of men, while providing active resistance to transphobia to include transwomen, trans*femme, and other gender non-conforming womxn,” Fernandes said.

She told The Fix that, in spite of the new spelling, the word is still pronounced “woman.”

The Undergraduate Womxn in Economics Society at the University of California, Davis also opted for the alternative spelling “womxn.” Undergraduate programs supervisor Anya Gibson told The Fix via email that the spelling is meant to “be more inclusive to all students who may identify as women.”

Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.