Cardiff Metropolitan University bans certain words in favor of 'gender neutral' terms.
To give you some examples of the words and phrases which have been banned:
Instead of 'heterosexual' or 'homosexual', the official policy suggests using 'same sex' and 'other sex' relationships'.
'Mankind' should be replaced with 'humanity'.
'Workmanlike' should be replaced with 'efficient'.
'Christian' name should be replaced with 'forename'.
Instead of 'polio victim' students should use the term 'polio survivor'. To make an obvious observation, in decades-gone-by polio killed thousands of people each year, so when talking in a historical context the term 'polio survivor' seems rather inappropriate.
Readers of George Orwell's 1984 will know that in his classic work, the language of Oceania was 'Newspeak', a controlled language of restricted vocabulary which was created to limit freedom of thought, self-expression, and free will. George Orwell's 1984 was of course a work of fiction1, but apparently Cardiff Metropolitan University appear to have mistaken it for an instruction manual.
1 Although it is becoming closer to real life with every passing day.
Communication should be about communicating. If Cardiff Metropolitan University are worried about people getting offended, then I've got bad news for them. People will always be offended over trivial things.
The answer to people getting offended isn't to replace words every few years, and then once people start getting offended by these new words, to then replace these replacement words with other new words, and then repeat this cycle for eternity.
The answer is for people to toughen up, and regain a sense of priority. There are some horrific things in the word which are genuinely upsetting, but anyone who gets upset over the use of the word 'forefathers' rather than 'ancestors'needs to examine their life. They need to appreciate how lucky they are that the biggest problem they have in their life is the fact that they can't cope with the word 'forefathers'.
Here is the full list of banned words and phrases, along with the suggested alternatives:
Best man for the job – Best person for the job
Businessman/woman – Businessperson, manager, executive
Chairman/woman – Chair, chairperson, convenor, head
Charwoman, cleaning lady – Cleaner
Craftsman/woman – Craftsperson, craft worker
Delivery man – Delivery clerk, courier
Dear Sirs – Dear Sir/Madam (or Madam/Sir)
Fireman – Fire-fighter
Forefathers – Ancestors, forebears
Foreman/woman – Supervisor, head juror
Gentleman’s agreement – Unwritten agreement, agreement based on trust
Girls (for adults) – Women
Headmaster/mistress – Head teacher
Housewife – Shopper, consumer, homemaker
Layman – Lay person
Man or mankind – Humanity, humankind, human race, people
Man (verb), eg. man the desk – Operate, staff, work at
Man in the street, common man – Average/ordinary/typical citizen/person
Man-hour – Work-hour, labor time
Man-made – Artificial, manufactured, synthetic
Manpower – Human resources, labor force, staff, personnel, workers, workforce
Miss/Mrs – Ms unless a specific preference has been stated.
Policeman/woman – Police Officer
Right-hand man – Chief assistant
Salesman/girl/woman – Sales assistant/agent/clerk/representative/staff/worker
Spokesman/woman – Spokesperson, representative
Sportsmanship – Fairmess, good humor, sense of fair play
Steward/stewardess – Airline staff, flight attendant, cabin crew
Tax man – Tax officer/inspector
Waitress – Waiter, server
Woman doctor (or feminine forms of nouns, eg. actress, poetess) – Doctor (actor, poet, etc)
Working man, working mother/wife – Wage-earner/taxpayer/worker
Workman – Worker/operative/trades person
Workmanlike – Efficient/proficient/skillful/thorough
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Footnote: The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide for 2016 ranked Cardiff Metropolitan University as 103 out of 127 universities.2
2 https://www.ukuni.net/articles/UK-University-Ranking-2016-Times
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