Alphabetical Entries: U
49 entries found.
the United States remains the only significant industrialized country without universal health care (or a system of single-payer health care, under which government pays health care costs). Because the concept of universal health care coverage is poorly understood, it has been simple for opponents to inaccurately relabel it "socialized medicine," "nationalized medicine," "state medicine," or "nationalized medical insurance." (Ed Gillespie, former Republican National Committee chair, says in Winning Right, "We finally defeated Hillary-care by defining it as 'government-run health care.'") As a nation, we cannot make an informed decision about universal health care or a single-payer system unless citizens know what the terms mean. Spell it out.
this World War I soldier is a man.
see unfeminine for an explanation of the subjective cultural meanings attached to this word. For the vague and often inappropriate "unladylike," substitute insensitive, indelicate, awkward, uncharming, unkind, rude, undignified, ill-mannered, ungracious, impolite, abrupt, etc. These adjectives apply equally well to a man and are not synonyms for unladylike but rather reflections of what society tends to understand by the word.
unnerve, disarm, weaken, devitalize, incapacitate, disable, unhinge, undermine, frighten, paralyze, petrify, terrorize, appall, horrify, deprive of courage/strength/vigor/power, render hors de combat, attenuate, shatter, exhaust, disqualify, invalidate, muzzle, enervate, take the wind out of one's sails, put a spoke in one's wheel, undo. In the narrower sense of emasculate or castrate, use unman sparingly as it implies, unflatteringly, that the man is a passive victim. There are no parallel terms referring to women for unman, emasculate, and castrate. See also castrate/castrating, emasculate.
see unmasculine for an explanation of the subjective cultural meanings involved here. Replace these limp terms with descriptive adjectives: dishonesty/dishonest, cowardice/cowardly, deviousness/crooked, weakness/weak, fearfulness/fearful, timidity/timid. These words can be applied equally well to a woman and are not synonyms for unmanliness/unmanly but simply the stereotypical and unreflected notions of a sexist society on what it means to be a man.
remote-controlled/mission-controlled/control-operated/unpiloted/crewless/automatic space flight.
use single woman/single man to avoid implying that marriage is the default, the norm (if you need to mention their status at all). "Unmarried households (single people or partners who share an address and a 'close personal relationship') have outnumbered married households in the U.S. since 2005" (Ms.).
avoid this vague, self-contradictory cultural stereotype. A man's clothes, behavior, words, feelings, and thoughts are, by definition, masculine because a man is wearing them, saying them, feeling them, etc. Words like womanly/unwomanly, manly/unmanly, feminine/unfeminine, masculine/unmasculine, ladylike/unladylike, and gentlemanly/ungentlemanly are based on cultural, not biological, expectations. Language should not underwrite this illogic. The only truly unmasculine things are those things biologically reserved to women. Replace the unhelpful and inexact word unmasculine with descriptive adjectives: timid, craven, weak, indirect, fearful, soft, faint-hearted, gentle, overemotional, comfort-loving. These adjectives can apply equally well to a woman and are not synonyms for unmasculine, but stereotypical cultural notions of what it is to be a man.
see unwaged.
unsporting, unfair, unfair play/playing, unsporting behavior, dishonorable, underhanded, unprincipled, behavior of a poor loser.
undiplomatic, impolitic, imprudent, lacking stature/grace and diplomacy, showing poor political strategy/ineffective government leadership. No good substitute for unstatesmanlike exists, but then neither do we have very many real statesmen anymore.
Dalits (literally, "the oppressed") is preferred to "Untouchables," which is an extremely derogatory description,
not a synonym for unemployed, this term recognizes the contributions and economic issues of groups whose work is unpaid (for example, full-time mothers, community volunteers, activists). See also working mother/working wife/working woman.
in some instances, the more precise term is unwanted pregnancy; with those wishing to adopt children outnumbering adoptable babies, the child may be wanted, but by someone else.
mother, woman, head of household, single parent. Or use, if necessary and appropriate, unmarried parents. The term "unwed mother" disregards the also unwed (at least to this woman) father. In addition to not getting the label, the father also avoids getting the child, the poverty, and the social disapproval. According to an overheard radio news item, "More women than ever before are living with men without being married to them. And more unmarried women than ever before are having babies." Why not: "More men and women than ever before are living together without being married. And more unmarried couples than ever before are having babies." If it's not possible to speak of "parents" (perhaps because the father is no longer in the picture), at least do not linguistically stigmatize the woman who has accepted the consequences of her actions. An "unwed father" shows no external signs of his fatherhood—and thus does not make a good target for censure. Unwed mothers and their children, on the other hand, are all too visible.
see "unfeminine" for an explanation of the subjective cultural meanings attached to this word. Use instead cold, hostile, sharp, unloving, ungentle, uncharming, ungiving, unsupportive, ill-mannered, unmannerly, ungracious, undignified, indecorous, unattractive, unappealing. These adjectives apply equally well to a man and are not synonyms for "unwomanly," but rather reflections of what society tends to understand by the word.
unprofessional, unskillful, slipshod, unskilled, inexpert, inexperienced, untrained, inefficient, unsystematic, unbusinesslike, incompetent, sloppy, careless, unsuitable, irresponsible, unhandy, imprecise, unproficient.
upper-level student, returning student, third-year/fourth-year student, sophomore, junior, senior, upperclass student, class of 2025.
an epithet used by white people in the Jim Crow era to describe black people they believed weren't showing them enough deference, this loaded (black women and men were lynched by white mobs for seeming too "uppity") adjective was frequently lodged against President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama, usually by conservatives who claimed they were unaware of the word's racist origins. U.S. and British journalists have more recently used the term to describe Meghan Markle, who is biracial, after she became the Duchess of Sussex.
often a code word for black or inner-city. See inner-city.
riots.
although this term, meaning the killing of a wife by her husband, is not commonly seen, its parallel (mariticide, the killing of a husband by a wife) does not appear in any dictionary although mariticidal (wanting to kill one's husband) appears in a few.