Alphabetical Entries: B

bartender/bar helper, bar assistant/server, waiter.

with drinking age limits, the "girl" is obviously inappropriate, and the term has come to usually mean a prostitute who works out of bars. Note the different path "bar boy" has taken.

these terms refer both to the ceremony and to the young person initiated into adulthood in Judaism. Bar mitzvah is for boys and has been a part of classical Judaism. Bat mitzvah is for girls, was first celebrated in 1922, and has been popular since 1960. It is found only in Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist Judaism.

see primitive.

almost half of all barbers are women, and the woman cutting your hair is not a "lady barber," "barberette," or "barberess." She is a barber.

not itself gender-based, "bard" has acquired masculine overtones, probably from its close association with "the" bard, Shakespeare. Therefore you may sometimes want more inclusive-sounding alternatives: poet, poet-singer, epic/heroic poet, heroic versifier, minstrel, ballad singer.

barge hand, deckhand.

barge captain.

bartender/bar helper, bar assistant/server, waiter, cocktail server.

bartender, bar attendant, barkeeper, barkeep. Nearly 60% of U.S. bartenders are women (Data USA).

this title is used for a woman holding the title to a barony or for the wife or widow of a baron.

sterile, infertile. The alternatives are used for both sexes. "Barren," which is used only for women, carries an unwarranted stigma and many negative associations (synonyms include words like impoverished, desolate, arid, fruitless, unproductive, meager, ineffective, incompetent, useless, worthless, valueless, devoid, deficient). Describing someone as "childless" or as "having no children" is not recommended as it implies that having children is the norm. See also childfree/childless, infertile, sterile.

woman or man.

base player, baser; first/second/third baser; first-base/second-base/third-base player; first, second, third; first-base/second-base/third-base position; 1B, 2B, 3B (baseball notation); first/second/third sacker. There is good traditional support for the alternatives. According to Stuart Berg Flexner (Listening to America), "first base, second base, and third base" have referred to both the positions and the players since the 1840s, while "first," "second," "third," and "base player" were already being used in the 1860s. Other baseball terms use the common -er ending: outfielder, infielder, pitcher, catcher, batter. Base players may be girls/women or boys/men; Marcenia Lyle Alberga, or "Toni Stone," the first woman to play professional baseball (not softball) on all-male teams, got a hit off pitcher Satchel Paige; in 1974, nine-year-old Maria Pepe integrated Little League baseball; in 1989, Victoria Brucker competed in a Little League World Series, the first girl to do so.

when you mean someone whose parents were not married at the time of their birth (and you really, really need to mention this), use "offspring/child/son/daughter of unmarried parents/of single parent/of unknown father." When you mean "bastard" in the sense of "a wretched and repellant male" (Richard A. Spears, NTC's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions), you'll have to be creative—most alternatives are unacceptable on grounds of sexism, handicapism, ageism, or unprintable language. Try ignoramus, saphead, stinker, ratfink, snake in the grass, creep, heel, jerk, bum, lowlife. "Bastard" is sexist because it is used only for men and because the insult also slyly impugns the man's mother. See also bad guy, illegitimate/illegitimate child.

batkeeper, bat attendant/tender/fetcher.

aide.

batter.

retain sex-specific terms: battered wife/woman or battered husband/man. When inclusive terms are needed, use battered spouse/partner, spouse/spousal/domestic abuse, domestic/marital/family violence. Gender-neutral terms obscure the pattern of explicit violence perpetrated on overwhelming numbers of women compared to men. Because violence in the family and household normalizes violence, there is a move to call battering and domestic violence "original violence," but so far, the earlier terms prevail.

find a more precise way of describing the issue. This cliché reinforces an adversarial approach toward relationships, and is outdated in its assumption of just two sexes. See also opposite sex.

tyrant, grouch, bully, petty despot, ornery/quarrelsome/domineering/strong-willed/high-handed/combative/hostile/battlesome/hot-tempered person.

prostitute/house of prostitution. See also prostitute.

despite the connection with "bawd," this adjective can be used for all genders.

stand on one's own two feet, be one's own person, be independent/inner-directed/self-ruling/self-reliant, self-regulated/individualistic/outspoken/self-confident, be a free-thinker/free spirit, be at one's own disposal, be nobody's lackey.

beau and belle are the masculine and feminine forms of the same French word, but the English meanings for the two words are nonparallel. For a sex-nonspecific word, use friend, lover, sweetheart. See also belle/belle of the ball, boyfriend.