fair sex
English
Alternative forms
- the fairer sex
Pronunciation
Audio (AU) (file)
Noun
the fair sex
- (idiomatic, dated, now sometimes offensive) Women collectively.
- 1728, Daniel Defoe, chapter 8, in Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton:
- The younger Gentry, or Dons, to express their Gallantry, carry about them Egg-shells, fill'd with Orange or other sweet Water, which they cast at Ladies in their Coaches, or such other of the fair Sex as they happen to meet in the Streets.
- 1820, Sir Walter Scott, chapter 23, in The Abbot:
- "Permit me rather to perform my duty in attending them," said Roland, anxious to show he was possessed of the high tone of deference prescribed by the rules of chivalry towards the fair sex, and especially to dames and maidens of quality.
- 1881, Bayard Taylor, The Lake Regions of Central Africa, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, page 147:
- Our entrance was attended with the usual ceremony, now familiar to the reader: the warmen danced, shot, and shouted, a rabble of adults, youths and boys crowded upon us, the fair sex lulliloo'd with vigor[.]
- 1922, D. H. Lawrence, "The Blind Man," in England, My England:
- And he had his friends among the fair sex—not lovers, friends.
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Usage notes
- In contemporary usage, this term may be regarded by some as patronizing toward women, though it was not originally intended thus.
Translations
women
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See also
- weaker sex
- weaker vessel