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Question for Linguists

#8
It depends on how you look at it.

From a merely anatomical perspective, vaginal is correct or at least. I have heard of many cases of bleeding from the penis and vaginally but I honestly have yet to see the word phallus or phallic used in a medical setting at least where I work. Maybe Mike Mulcahy can shed some light on this aspect.

From a sociolinguistic perspective, vaginal is not correct. He used it in reference to how we use the term phallic symbol. Women tend not to publicly hype up or personify their genitals the way that men do. They tend not to judge themselves based upon the size of their genitals. Perhaps it has to do with how male genitalia are more prominent and females' are hidden (and thus adding to the mysteriousness?). That said, there is no opposite of phallic symbol that I can think of when we look at it from this perspective. There is no vaginal symbol.

And for what it's worth, I was kidding when I said clitoric. ;)
 
#9
Opposite are weird things. The opposite of "uncle" can be aunt, or it can be nephew or neice. The opposite of white can be black, or it can be red (as in wine).

What do you mean by opposite?

What about aphallic. Antiphallic. Non phallic.

"phallic" is normally used in the phrase "phallic symbol". There is no such thing as a vaginal symbol. So how can that be the opposite?

Perhaps the opposite of "phallic" would be something like "in tune with his feelings" or "mature and developed person not fixated on the penis"....

But really, it's an unanswerable question, as there is no context to provide background.
 
#11
Andy Daventry said:
"phallic" is normally used in the phrase "phallic symbol". There is no such thing as a vaginal symbol. So how can that be the opposite?
Click to expand...

Hmmm, I don't know about that, I've seen art that seems to contain vaginal symbolism (does anyone really want me to link to examples?). It's certainly not as rampant as phallic symbols which are darn near ubiquitous. I would however define it as a female or feminine corollary as opposed to an "opposite" perhaps (as others have suggested above).
 
#12
Right. I didn't mean to imply that there isn't such imagery intended or otherwise, out there in art or just in the everyday world. I meant that we don't have a more specific term for it that is in the very same vane as "phallic symbol." If people see a black and white picture of a canoe, an open fault, or a cave (vagina is actually derived from the latin for cave), I don't think vaginal symbol is one of the first terms that would pop into everybody's mind regardless of whether or not that's exactly what they are thinking. Show a steeple, or a tower, or anything vaguely resembling a shaft (not the movie Shaft, wait, there's another prevalent phallic symbol) of some sort and you'll get a bunch of people pointing out it's phallic nature and most likely use that very term.
 
#13
well the oposite of the penis is no penis, or the vagina.

so the oposite of a phallic symbol would be something that reminds us of the absence of a penis, or a vagina.

and i dont think there is a word for this.

so should we come up with one? or is there a word already?
 
#17
lmao.



this is a freebie just for me to say that you guys freakin' crack me up. It's 4:19 a.m. and I'm about to fall out of my bed from laughing so hard.

cunning linguists.......tee hee.

arse=mike money=vagina

lmao



intriguing discussion, by the way.

FWIW, I take pictures of all phallic symbols I find with my camera phone. there are TONS on my campus, and i see plenty around town as well.
 

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