An article in the Wall Street Journal inviting the future First Lady to give up her degree before her name triggers the controversy: does it only happen to women?
“Madame First Lady, Mrs. Biden, girl: a little advice on something that may seem insignificant but which I think is a matter of no small importance. Is there any chance that you will give up the “Doctor” you always put before your name? “Dr. Jill Biden “looks almost like a fraud, not to mention comical.” Thus Wall Street Journal reporter Joseph Epstein apostrophes Jill Biden , wife of President-elect Joe Biden and future First Lady of the United States, in his disputed article titled “Is there a doctor in the White House? Not if you need a doctor “. In his editorial, Epstein argues the futility of emphasizing an honor, reserved for anyone who has obtained a doctorate but generally associated with doctors, which would have lost all its symbolic value in recent years.
The article caused a great deal of fuss in America and beyond: social media were in fact filled with indignant reactions, which defined it paternalistic and sexist, while Jill Biden replied on Twitter : “Together, we will build a world in which the results of our daughters will be celebrated instead of being belittled ». Over the past weekend, thousands of women listed their academic achievements on their profiles, arguing that the tone of the article was derogatory and how important it was to emphasize women’s professional merits.
“Anyone who gives birth to a child can be called a doctor,” says Epstein in his article, a sentence that has become one of the most contested: “I gave birth to my first child, I wrote a doctoral thesis in English literature, in 2008, and I had my second child, a human, in 2014. You can call me Dr. Jones. And I’ll call you Dr. Biden, ” Vanity Fair Us Director Radhika Jones commented on Twitter .
The battle over language …
The controversy that accompanied Epstein’s article is just the latest of the controversies that today we see more and more often arising around language, especially when it comes to feminine declensions or, even more complicated, on the need to introduce phrases that are not make gender distinctions, as the recent case of actor Elliot Page demonstrates . In Italy words such as “advocate” or “minister” or “director” still create a sense of disorientation, because they are not perceived as part of the common language, while in America there is now squabbling over the term “doctor” and its historical meaning.
As the New York Times explains , in fact, «When women began to graduate from medical schools in the mid-19th century, they called themselves“ doctors ”[in the male, ed .]. But newspapers and critics often gave them a more contemptuous title – “doctoress” – to indicate that they were women ». “Doctor” therefore became the universally accepted honorary title, which from that moment women began to claim for themselves. This explains why Jill Biden – a graduate professor in English Literature – cares about that title, despite not being a doctor, and prefers it to the “Madame First Lady” that traditionally reserves for the wives of American presidents.
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… And its contradictions
Many have pointed out that the future First Lady focuses on the qualification but then has the surname of her husband, a very common custom in America. Why claim a prefix and not the more radical choice of keeping your name and surname even after marriage? It is certainly a legitimate objection and it shows once again how complex and multifaceted the debate is. However, this does not mean that what we are trying to do about language today, that is to introduce a broader vocabulary that takes into account the evolution of society , is an operation that has always taken place in history and is part of the evolution of language itself, which society reflects and shapes it at the same time.
Honorary titles no longer mean anything, Epstein argues in his article, not without reason, since they are also granted by universities to celebrities who have little to do with their career and academic merits, but the symbolic value of the word remains, at least for women who have Jill Biden’s background and who are part of her generation . It is a choice, certainly criticizable but consistent with that of not abandoning his teaching career, and as such it is worthy of respect. Time will tell if and in what other ways Jill Biden will want to modernize her role as First Lady, a goal that appears to be at the top of her list.
