Taking the Shame Out of Female Anatomy

September 24, 2021 6:17 AM

Taking the Shame Out of Female Anatomy (SLNYT) Allison Draper loved anatomy class. As a first-year medical student at the University of Miami, she found the language clear, precise, functional.... Then one day she looked up the pudendal nerve, which provides sensation to the vagina and vulva, or outer female genitalia. The term derived from the Latin verb pudere: to be ashamed.

"In the beginning, shame knew no sex. First-century Roman writers used “pudendum” to mean the genitals of men, women and animals. But it was women to whom the shame stuck."

Read on for the misogynistic BS on why we shouldn't change the names of these body structures.

Wayback link

posted by kathrynm (44 comments total)

Sexism and misogyny are so persistent and it is so frustrating how many don't even see it, or think it doesn't matter.
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:25 AM on September 24, 2021 [13 favorites]

The term derived from the Latin verb pudere: to be ashamed

I don’t want to derail this right out of the gate into language stuff but the -enda (or occasionally -anda) suffix denotes it in Latin as a gerundive, telling you the verb stem is required to be acted on or performed. In this case, pudenda means supposedly the things you must be ashamed of.

There are a bunch of Latin gerundives in English: agenda are the things you must act on; a memorandum is the thing you must remember; dividends are the things you must divide among the shareholders; a referendum is a thing that must be referred to the people; corrigenda are the things that must be corrected; a reverend is the person who must be respected or revered. I was pleased one day to realize that it even filters into names — Amanda is the girl you must love (amo amas amat ) and Miranda (from the same root as “miracle”) is the girl you must wonder about.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:36 AM on September 24, 2021 [92 favorites]

Hello, I heard my name…?

Anyway, this is interesting and I think it’s great that so much of this stuff is being reconsidered. I don’t quite understand the argument why if pudenda as a name for female genitalia can be reconsidered that its use for other words relating to it can’t also be reconsidered. Maybe pudenda can be replaced with vagina and vulva but the other nerves and organs…they just don’t have ideas. Maybe they should incorporate some art students or something into this conversation or some feminist moms with daughters to think it through? Crowd source please!

Also, hilarious that penis is derived from “tail.” What the heck, ancient smarty dudes?
posted by amanda at 6:55 AM on September 24, 2021 [13 favorites]

Kind of like saying "naughty bits," except it's in Latin so everyone takes it very, very seriously.
posted by SoberHighland at 7:00 AM on September 24, 2021 [25 favorites]

(sort of related: the vagina museum is closing because their landlord is not renewing their lease.)
posted by i used to be someone else at 7:19 AM on September 24, 2021

The word "shame" formerly had a similar meaning in English. The Geneva Bible of 1560 has (for example) "Thou shalt not uncover the shame of thy father, nor the shame of thy mother; for she is thy mother, thou shalt not discover her shame" (Leviticus 18:7, modernized spelling)
posted by cyanistes at 7:20 AM on September 24, 2021 [10 favorites]

I remember being amazed as a teenage German student when I learned the word for labia in German -- a direct language never content to hide its connotations behind Latin or Greek -- is Schamlippe, "Shame Lips". I took it as a time as the influence of Luther et al, but now I know it's not just the Germans..
posted by Theiform at 7:25 AM on September 24, 2021 [12 favorites]

Shame Lips would be a great band name though.

Anyway, this is entirely solvable, old dude hand wringing aside.
posted by emjaybee at 7:33 AM on September 24, 2021 [16 favorites]

Also, hilarious that penis is derived from “tail.” What the heck, ancient smarty dudes?

And “vagina” is “sheath” in Latin. It’s great how the most clinical teams are just slang if you go back far enough.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 7:42 AM on September 24, 2021 [13 favorites]

Imagine being a species with such a wonderful gift as sexuality and sexual anatomy. And then deciding to cloak it all in feelings of shame and sin.
posted by Nelson at 7:47 AM on September 24, 2021 [16 favorites]

I remember being amazed as a teenage German student when I learned the word for labia in German

We must have been in different classes.
posted by Dr. Twist at 7:59 AM on September 24, 2021 [9 favorites]

We can have "freedom fries," but we can't rename a body part? We rename stuff all the time.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:04 AM on September 24, 2021 [7 favorites]

Also, hilarious that penis is derived from “tail.” What the heck, ancient smarty dudes?

And “vagina” is “sheath” in Latin. It’s great how the most clinical teams are just slang if you go back far enough.

Lol yeah that was a funny day in Latin class
posted by LizBoBiz at 8:37 AM on September 24, 2021 [1 favorite]

Language matters, so I was glad to read that they accomplished this change.

Schamlippe, "Shame Lips"

I don't speak German (and this certainly wasn't covered in the one year of basic German I took in high school), but it looks like "Scham" is the basis for a bunch of other anatomy words like "Schamhügel" and "Schambein." It makes me wonder if there have been attempts to change that construction.
posted by Dip Flash at 8:48 AM on September 24, 2021 [1 favorite]

hilarious that penis is derived from “tail." What the heck, ancient smarty dudes?

Still a sang for it in French
posted by little onion at 8:57 AM on September 24, 2021

This article made me so mad. I don't understand why doctors care so little about women and their reproductive system in general. I think the stupid & dismissive pudenda name everywhere probably contributes to it. It reminds me of the horny little boys running around the playground yelling about pudendas all the time. (Did you guys not have those?)
I mean, this bit is just egregious, talking about shame, do these doctors even feel ashamed of themselves when they do shit like this?
"Leilani A., 30, never had trouble talking about her sexual anatomy. Then, in November 2018, she started feeling a persistent pain between her legs. “When I say burning vulva, I mean on fire,” she said. Sex was excruciating; doctors suggested she try a glass of wine."

These people should resign in disgrace.

Another thing that made me mad was the doctors whining about how we can't change the name because we use it every day. But wouldn't that make it easier to change? Aren't you just talking about a nerve in a certain place? Wouldn't a rose by any other name smell as sweet and a nerve by any other name still be in the same place & do the same things? Or did you just memorize some words by rote? They just memorize by rote & they don't really know anything. That's why we come in with pain & leave with more pain. I'm sick of it.
posted by bleep at 9:09 AM on September 24, 2021 [9 favorites]

On naming women’s body parts - often after men
posted by anshuman at 9:11 AM on September 24, 2021

This is the kind of thing that, once you actually see it, you can never unsee it. After you see systemic racism and sexism in action, you almost never fail to notice it afterwards. So there's hope: if we can make people actually see it, we can affect change.

It's challenging, but not hopeless.
posted by ivanthenotsoterrible at 9:25 AM on September 24, 2021 [3 favorites]

I remember taking an anatomy class in college where we learned a mnemonic to memorize the order of the cranial nerves (OOOTTAFVGVAH) that was so face-meltingly gross and sexist that I couldn't believe it was invented by an adult, much less passed on to students. That wasn't the only reason I decided not to go into medicine, but it probably didn't help.
posted by theodolite at 9:45 AM on September 24, 2021 [3 favorites]

hilarious that penis is derived from “tail." What the heck, ancient smarty dudes?

Still a sang for it in French

And in Mexican Spanish FWIW.
posted by Dr. Curare at 9:55 AM on September 24, 2021

I saw this on Twitter yesterday and immediately thought of the same grammatical point ricochet biscuit makes, as I do every time I see the word. (Then I started swearing about it, in English and Latin both: there are few words I hate like this one, and Latin has a few very satisfying ways to talk about a repulsive word that bruises and forces your mouth as it leaves.) Because of the way Latin works, the imperative meaning and the declarative meaning are equally valid ways to translate the word: this is a fact about the world, a fact about my body, and a response that society must maintain to my body. The word is a declaration of power and an intention to keep that power at once, a boast and a threat entwined in a nasal stop.

I feel about this word the way some people feel about the word cunt. It is a vile word that carries a vile heritage.
posted by sciatrix at 10:00 AM on September 24, 2021 [14 favorites]

Why does “acetabulum” — the hipbone socket — mean vinegar bowl?

Because it looks like one. So also pelvis sort of kind of looks like a basin, though arguably they could have gone with mortarium (cf mortar, as in "and pestle"). It gets complicated.

My classicist father-in-law was able to pass college level biology on the basis of a solid Latin and Greek vocabulary. So, at least, he said.
posted by BWA at 10:07 AM on September 24, 2021 [2 favorites]

bleep: "doctors whining about how we can't change the name because we use it every day"

Yes, it is impossible to use a different name for a thing you discuss with your patients daily. This is why as a grown-ass man my doctor refers to my "tummy" and I have to interrupt and say "I have taught anatomy, it is OK for you to say 'abdomen' to me".

Show me one doctor who refers to the nerve as the "pudendal nerve" when speaking to a patient, instead of saying something like "the nerve that provides sensation to your genitals" or some other simplistic stand-in.

theodolite: "I remember taking an anatomy class in college where we learned a mnemonic to memorize the order of the cranial nerves [that was] so face-meltingly gross and sexist that I couldn't believe it was invented by an adult, much less passed on to students"

...which is why when teaching it, we always stuck with the classic "On Old Olympus' Towering Tops..." It's one thing if the sexist mnemonic exists, it's entirely another thing if it's presented as the Correct Way to Learn This from the people teaching the class - that's a person in a position of authority crossing a line.
posted by caution live frogs at 10:57 AM on September 24, 2021 [3 favorites]

there's no need to get hysterical over mere words
posted by Iris Gambol at 11:00 AM on September 24, 2021 [4 favorites]

I'm an anatomist and you can imagine this article made the rounds and sparked a lot of discussion in my professional community (it's ongoing). My general sense is that people are fairly evenly split, either ok/enthusiastic about re-naming some structures, or dogged in wanting to keep the current names. I have some issues with the article, but I appreciate the spotlight it's providing. I'm sure it will prompt a lot more discussions at upcoming conferences, which is good.

Personally, I'd welcome a renaming of many anatomical terms. Lots of names are fun or informative when translated. But there are many that are problematic, for being sexist, judgmental, antiquated, confusing, too similar in sound or spelling to other terms (words get wholesale reused when they don't need to be), or for being named after the rando who "found" them. The latter—eponyms—are some of the most worthless, uninformative, biased names for structures. I'm doing my best to rid students of eponymous terms, but practicing clinicians just keep using them. . . .

(There's an accompanying NYT article by the same author that details many of the eponyms used in female reproductive anatomy. I take issue with that article only because it cherry picks eponyms, when the list of egregious eponyms is VERY much longer. Arbitrary dude names scattered all over both female and male bodies, and they still get used even though EACH ONE has a standard anatomical term. We should nix them all.)

I don't recall if the article mentioned this but the male body has the same pudendal nerve, with the same name and same functions. In clinical practice, the male pudendal nerve (and internal pudendal artery) are not encountered or treated as often as in female bodies. But there are conditions where males present with pudendal nerve issues, and students learn about them in both female and male contexts.

Perhaps the thing I'm most sympathetic to from the article is that the male external genital area is not referred to with any single term such as pudenda (or vulva). Technically "pudenda" can be used to refer to the male-shaped external genital region, but it's just not used that way. The male area is usually just called "the genitals". Maybe that's why I don't like using "vulva" or "pudenda", even though both are acceptable and specific terms. If there's no word for the collective "male external genitalia", why don't we treat female-shaped bodies the same and just say "female external genitalia"? (Frankly, I prefer "perineum" which is used in both males and females. The perineum is a clearly defined area in both sexes; it has well defined borders. It's just that male and female perinea contain different—yet highly analogous—external anatomy.)

But so just last week a fourth-year medical student told me that when he was learning anatomy, one of the hardest parts was simply getting through the vocabulary. I'm sympathetic to that. One way to cut through the words is to translate them, which helps provide context, and context helps us remember things. All the more reason for good names! Certainly, I'll be talking about this specific naming issue with my students when they're studying repro anatomy.

Anyway, this all seems like a great opportunity for a naming competition.
posted by cyclopticgaze at 12:04 PM on September 24, 2021 [22 favorites]

Perhaps we could put the names to an Internet vote. And that's how we get to calling the clitoris the Little Man in the Boaty McBoatface.
posted by Nelson at 12:39 PM on September 24, 2021 [8 favorites]

Also, hilarious that penis is derived from “tail.” What the heck, ancient smarty dudes?

...well, it does often wag the dog.
posted by lapolla at 1:20 PM on September 24, 2021 [4 favorites]

the male external genital area is not referred to with any single term

Whoa, wait: have I been misusing the word "junk" all these years?
posted by armeowda at 1:20 PM on September 24, 2021 [3 favorites]

We can never, ever, ever, ever get away from the whole "women are dirty dirty whores and we hate them" 'tude, can we?
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:33 PM on September 24, 2021 [3 favorites]

I don’t want to derail this right out of the gate into language stuff but the -enda (or occasionally -anda) suffix denotes it in Latin as a gerundive, telling you the verb stem is required to be acted on or performed ...

Romanes eunt domus ...
posted by ZenMasterThis at 8:14 PM on September 24, 2021 [1 favorite]

The word I hate is masturbation. What an ugly shaming word for such a pleasurable occupation. (Maybe it sounds so shameful to me because I was raised Catholic.)
posted by a humble nudibranch at 8:44 PM on September 24, 2021 [2 favorites]

Vagina as sheath, most favorite.

Pudendal/shame, not so much.
posted by firstdaffodils at 11:27 PM on September 24, 2021

pudor doesn't map simply and perfectly to the English shame.
posted by Hadrian at 1:58 AM on September 25, 2021 [1 favorite]

We were just taught to call it the Tower of Shame (for boys) and the Gulf of Sorrow (for girls). Sometimes the old ways were the best.
posted by Joe in Australia at 7:45 AM on September 25, 2021 [2 favorites]

"On naming women's body parts after men"

When I first heard of Braxton Hicks contractions I was absolutely sure they were named after some man. They were! Guess who else knew about early false labor way before ol Braxton Hicks? Every midwife for 1000s of years! I don't have proof on me but I feel confident they knew about this phenomenon.
posted by Emmy Rae at 8:27 PM on September 25, 2021 [4 favorites]

"Most medical textbooks, they found, showed the male body as standard and trotted out the female only when it came time to show the reproductive system, genitals and breasts."

Another thing - when I was getting CPR certified, I asked if we could also practice on a mannequin with breasts. (CPR practice mannequins are just a torso with a head, and have a light that turns from red to green when you are properly doing compressions.) I was told no, because the mannequin company does not even make them! People are too awkward about exposing a person's breasts, even on a mannequin.

In every video we watched, a man wearing a generic button down shirt (and nothing underneath) needs CPR. I had to clarify that YES you take the bra off, especially if you have to use an AED to deliver a shock! It's mainly described as "remove the patient's shirt". But cutting a bra seems much harder than cutting off a t-shirt, for example.

Anyway apparently women* are more likely to die of heart attacks than men.

*Not all people with breasts are women
posted by Emmy Rae at 8:39 PM on September 25, 2021 [12 favorites]

Following on to Emmy Rae, a study from a few years ago: When cardiac arrest occurs outside the home, men are more likely than women to receive cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) from a bystander—and are more likely to survive, found a study team led by Audrey Blewer, MPH, who is assistant director for Educational Programs at Penn’s Center for Resuscitation Science and is pursuing a PhD in Epidemiology at Penn. These preliminary findings were presented at the American Heart Association Scientific Sessions 2017. Steps for performing CPR and using an AED on [people with breasts]; first-aid instructors in the comments take issue with the "hand placement is the sternum between the nipples" advice.
posted by Iris Gambol at 9:23 PM on September 25, 2021 [5 favorites]

For some reason I thought the resusci-annie was somehow professional-grade -- my Red Cross seminar trainings always have the version Emmy Rae's mentioned.
(The "Annie" face being modeled on a 19th century French death mask will never not be creepy.)
posted by Iris Gambol at 12:10 AM on September 26, 2021 [2 favorites]

Mod note: One deleted. Please read the guidelines, including the microaggressions explanation. No, really, do read it all carefully. If you are thinking of stepping in to explain with your compelling male logic why [thing that adversely impacts women] must nevar be changed because inconvenient / doesn't affect you personally / you're fine with it the way it is, go read those pages instead. (Yes, even if you once knew some girls who had the relevant body parts.)
posted by taz (staff) at 1:33 AM on September 26, 2021 [4 favorites]

In Japanese the pubic bone is called "恥骨", and the mons pubis is called "恥丘".

恥: shame "chi"
骨: bone "kotsu"
丘: hill "kyuu"

This page says it's not clear if the shame was imported or was the result of convergent evolution.
posted by The genius who rejected Anno's budget proposal. at 3:08 AM on September 26, 2021

I first encountered the word pudenda in Umberto Eco's The Name of The Rose. There it is referring to male parts -- I think exclusively. I always felt the word had a nice dangly feel to it, and never bothered to look up the etymology.

Anyway, this suggests (because Eco did his research) that it wasn't always in asymmetric usage. If so, I wonder when that changed?
posted by dbx at 5:06 AM on September 26, 2021

FPP article: In 1895, anatomy officially recognized a pudendal region in both men and women. But 60 years later, only the “pudendum femininum” — the female shame part — was still listed. It would later be simplified to “pudendum” and used as a slightly more formal synonym for vulva. Today, the word appears in almost every medical textbook, including recent editions of “Gray’s Anatomy,” “Williams Obstetrics,” and “Comprehensive Gynecology.”

Synonyms for impudent: cocky, cocksure.
posted by Iris Gambol at 11:28 AM on September 26, 2021 [1 favorite]

> Synonyms for impudent: cocky, cocksure.

Which brings us to my favorite binomial name for a mushroom ever, that of the common stinkhorn:

Phallus impudicus

(It didn't taste bad, actually!)
posted by The genius who rejected Anno's budget proposal. at 8:18 PM on September 26, 2021

My art has been commended as being strongly vaginal, which bothers some men. The word itself makes some men uncomfortable. Vagina.
posted by kirkaracha at 10:59 PM on September 28, 2021 [4 favorites]