As soon as I read the title of this article from a 1922 newspaper, I knew I would be in for a fun ride. Yes, the article is, of course, insulting to women (because we only use small words and don’t have anything to occupy our brains), but if I were a man, I’d be rather put off by this article, as well (since men’s brains are scattered and can’t seem to get their shit together).
Women Talk More Than Men
There’s a Reason, Says Professor
Dr. Brill of N.Y.U. Says She Never Had to Perform Acts That Absorb All Her Intellectual Energy
Why do women talk more than men? Dr. A.A. Brill, professor of psychology at New York University and well known psycho-analyst, told the National Association of Teachers of Speech why at their convention at the university today.
“There is no question that women are more voluble than men,: said Dr. Brill, and, strange to say, none of the women delegates rose to argue with him. “Many discussions and explanations have been offered.”
Dr. Brill offered one by Dr. Jespersen, the eminent philologist. It was couched very scientifically, but the meat of it is that woman’s vocabulary is smaller and more centralized than men’s, but always on tap. She can get at it very quickly, and does so frequently. Now man’s lingual abilities are scattered. He cannot always get at it in time to have a comeback.
Does this make it clean? Maybe it would have been better to give Dr. Brill’s quotation of Dr. Jespersen verbatim. But Dr. Brill’s own explanation was much better, and there is a lesson in it for every wife and every woman who hopes to be a wife.
“It is known,” he said, “that in psychopathology, as in normal traits of character, there is a certain selectiveness when it comes to the formation of symptoms. The active, aggressive man has to struggle too hard to do much talking. On the other hand, the passive, attractive woman never had to perform acts that absorbed all her intellectual energy. Women of today, like their more primitive sisters, can cook and talk at the same time, and giving so much time to the child with whom she babbles and teaches to talk, she has developed her own speech.”
It was not explained, however, why a woman must always have the last [the article ends abruptly].
[Source: The Evening World (New York City, NY newspaper). December 28, 1922.]
