I need to know when 「女性観」 was coined and, more importantly, when it became widely known/used. Was 「女性観」used in the early to mid-19th century? Did it replace 「婦人観」later on?
Nitobe Inazo used 「婦人観」 in his early to mid-20th c. writing and I have not, so far, seen him use 「女性観」.
I searched for "女性観" 造語 in Google but I could not easily find an answer about the origin of 「女性観」.
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Answer
It's surprisingly easy to trace the origin of 女性観 since 日本国語大辞典 (日国) cites its first appearance.
＊吾輩は猫である〔１９０５〜０６〕〈夏目漱石〉一一「古来の賢哲が女性観を紹介すべし」
But I don't much think it's appropriate to say it was "coined", because it's but an ordinary idea to put them together if you know both the words 女性 and 観. By the way, 女性 itself seems to have gained the meaning "woman" quite recently. Again from 日国:
＊英和双解字典〔１８８５〕〈棚橋一郎〉「Womankinds. female sex; race of women 女人（じょじん）。女性（ジョセイ）」
The dictionary also suggests that this usage of 女性 has spread from the translation of grammatical "feminine" gender. So it can be said that 女性 was a brand new neologism at that time, while 婦人 for "adult woman" has more than 1,000 years of history having this meaning.
(1)成人した女性。おんな。
＊律〔７１８〕名例・婦人有官位条「凡婦人有㆓官位㆒犯㆑罪者 各依㆓其位㆒従㆓議請減贖当免之律㆒」
Then,
Nitobe Inazo used 「婦人観」 in his early to mid-19th c. writing and I have not, so far, seen him use 「女性観」.
this part of your post doesn't seem right to me, because I believe Nitobe Inazo, who was born in 1862, was not able to author a writing in "early to mid-19th c." Anyway, from the reasons above I can safely assume that 婦人 was a steady word to refer to "women" through the lifetime of Nitobe. Besides, I found Japanese WP states that 婦人 was once revived during women's lib movement in interwar period, which can be taken into account.
Quite aside from question, but of course 婦人 is mostly outdated today except a handful of surviving proper names or fixed terms like 婦人服, 婦人科 etc.
No comments:
Post a Comment