Sexist Language of the Characters in the Movie Colette

Sexism is a judgment made by society on how men and women are represented. This study investigates the use of sexism in languages called sexist languages and the reason why the characters uttered it in the movie Colette . Therefore, two theories are used in this study. The first theory is from Mills (2008) that divides sexist languages into overt and indirect sexism. Then, the second theory is by Weatherall (2002) who states that the usage of sexist languages is making women invisible, causing women to be defined narrowly, and making women get depreciated. By using a qualitative descriptive approach, this study explores sexist languages from the characters’ utterances. The research reveals that the movie Colette has six types of overt sexism, including naming, dictionaries, generic nouns, insult terms for women, semantic derogation, and sexism in name and title. Also, four kinds of indirect sexism of humor, presupposition, metaphor, and collocation are found. Both male and female characters use sexist language to show superiority as a result of making women invisible, to indicate one’s concern about their status because of society that defines women narrowly, and to point out one’s position as women always get depreciated by society’s prejudice.


Introduction
Men and women are often considered unequal in the eyes of society because of the prejudice made by society based on gender distinction called sexism. However, sexism often affects women negatively. Women are seen as inferior creatures and considered to be less important than men. This statement is supported by Nwaenyi (2020) who says that the word 'sexism' is used to show the notion of male superiority by saying that male is more superior both psychologically and intellectually over the other. As women are identified as inferior creatures, their social roles also cannot be seen higher than the men. This inequality makes women experience various forms of sexual bullying in their social life.
Sexism also penetrates to the use of language called sexist language in which our current study was set out to look more closely at sexist expression in the English movie Colette. English is a language that reflects gender differences, for example its nouns and pronouns refer to gender categorizations. For example, the word 'stewardess' refers to females and the term 'fireman' refers to males. The presence of sexist language supports a statement by Wulandari, Purwaningsih, and Hawasi (2016) that discrimination between men and women commences from sex to social role and finally to gender identity. Thus, the use of sexist language eventually happened to be a social problem since language is associated with the reflection of human thought.
Sexist languages encase stereotypical beliefs towards women and men as well. It also brings more negative appraisals to women. Lei (2006) mentions that sexism in language means that the language deliberately has favor in one sex whereas the other was treated in a biased manner. Weatherall (2002) divides sexist languages into three types: sexist languages that purposely define women narrowly, sexist languages that ignore women, and sexist languages that depreciate women. Thus, based on Weatherall's theory, it can be seen that sexist language is purposely used to lower women's value.
As stated previously, sexist language expresses prejudices on particular sex and thus discriminates against the other sex. Mostly, it is in favor of men and against women. Wardhaugh (1986) states that sexist languages also lead to stereotyping practices, yet by giving more detriment to women. Sexist languages discuss both the words used to depict women and the way they are used to what ends. A language that is considered to be sexist can be replaced with a gender-neutral language like 'spouse' as a change of 'husband' or 'wife. ' Parks and Roberton (1998) discover that sexist languages have an unnecessary word, phrase, and expression that distinguishes, trivializes, or insults the other gender. It causes women to become invisible and enhances society's view that 'male' is the norm. Jackson (1993) mentions that linguistic sexism not only refers to how women are referred to and labeled but also the way the language strategies in both sex interactions may serve to depreciate and silence women as interactants.
The other categorization of sexist language is proposed by Mills (2008) which falls into overt sexism and indirect sexism. The first category refers to a sexist language that can be directly understood through a contextual form. Mills (2008) divides this category further into (1) words and meaning and (2) processes. In terms of words and meaning, Mills (2008) classifies overt sexism into 6 parts: generic pronouns and nouns (to indicate both men and women), naming, dictionaries, insult terms for women, semantic derogation, and the use of name and title. Then, in terms of processes, there is transitivity in which women are depicted as a passive object that receives an action rather than an active one that does an action. Next, there is a reported speech where women utterances are cited in indirect speech, and lastly is the use of sexist language in the form of jokes. In contrast to overt sexism, indirect sexism is ironizing sexism since it disguises sexist languages in the form of innuendo, humor, and embedded sexism at the degree of presupposition. This makes one hesitate whether the words, clause, phrase, or sentence are included in sexist languages or not. Besides humor, presupposition, metaphor, and collocation, there is a conflicting message that causes people to be confused about whether the utterance is feminist or sexist. Subsequently, the last type of this sexist language, according to Mills (2008), is the androcentric perspective. This type of indirect sexism shows that everything is men-centered as there is no other point of view rather from this gender. Androcentric perspective presents men as representative of human experiences and conditions while showing the other gender as human's condition digression (Fandari, 2021).
Previous studies in the area of sexist languages have been extensive observing various forms of language use, especially those in a film. A study by Fi'aunillah (2015), for example, analyzed sexist languages used by the characters in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. The work of Sandra (2013) also investigated the same types of language in The Duchess using Sara Mills' theory. Meanwhile, Santi (2013) worked to find patterns of sexist language in The Twilight Saga Eclipse. Using different theories by Lakoff (1973), Coates (1986), and Holmes (2013), Widayanti (2014) compared the use of sexist languages between male and female characters in The Vow. Attempting to enrich the results of these previous work, this current study will extend the analysis using Mills's and Weatherall's framework and use Colette (2018) as the focus of analysis.
Studies about Colette (2018) is scarce, particular with a focus on the use of sexist language. The movie was directed by Wash Westmoreland and is a biographical movie of a famous novelist named Colette. In the movie which is set around the late of 19 th until the early 20 th century in France, men played a central role in society and had control over women. The gender inequality captured in the storylines has attracted our attention. Therefore, we seek to develop more understanding on this phenomenon by employing Sara Mills' theory of language and sexism and Ann Weatherall's theory of Language, Gender, and Discourse. There are two research objectives addressed in this current study. First, it is to explore sexist language used by the character in the movie Colette. Second, it is to examine the reasons why the characters in the movie Colette uttered sexist languages.

Methods
The data of this study were collected primarily from a historical-biography movie entitled Colette (2018) directed by Wash Westmoreland. This movie told about a married woman named Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette whose life is dedicated to becoming her husband's ghostwriter. The film is set in the late 19 th century until the first quarter of the 20 th century in France. At that time, it was very uncommon to become a female writer because of gender inequality.
By applying a qualitative descriptive approach, this study exploreed the use of sexist expressions from the characters' utterances in the movie. The qualitative approach is efficient mainly in investigating intangible elements like social status and norms, religion, ethnicity, and even gender roles (Mack, Woodsong, MacQueen, Guest, & Namey, 2005). Furthermore, the descriptive approach was used in this study to explain the category of sexist languages and the reason why the characters said it.
The data collection procedure includes non-participant observation using a qualitative approach. It was all ellicited from the spoken dialogues of the characters in Colette. There were three steps to collect the data. First, the observation was carried out by watching the movie Colette. The second step was exploring the sexist languages in the movie with the help of the movie transcript to prevent mishearing, mistyping, and misunderstanding. Then, the last one was identifying the reason why the characters uttered such sexiest expressions.
To explore the use of sexist languages, the theory of Sara Mills (2008) about language and sexism, was used. This theory is chosen as Sara Mills is a feminist that put forward feminism in her discussion (Sukaesih & Brida, 2017). Then, Weatherall's (2002) theory on the use of sexist languages to make women invisible, defined narrowly, and depreciated were also used to point out the characters' reason in using the language. In this context, Weatherall always takes a feminist approach to discuss gender issues in her writing (Stokoe & Weatherall, 2002). Weatherall also contributes to the key topics of social science like gender and sexuality, identity and prejudice in social interactions. Weatherall's theory on sexist languages fits what women characters had experienced in the movie Colette.

Finding and Discussion
This study explores the sexist language of the characters and the reason behind such expressions in the movie Colette. In addition, the role of women and men in society during that time, around the 19 th century until the 20 th century, can be portrayed through the sexist language uttered by the characters. After analyzing the data using Mills' 6 types of overt sexism and 4 types of indirect sexism, below are the findings.

Naming
This research finds that the movie Colette contains 6 types of overt sexism: naming, dictionaries, generic nouns, insult terms for women, semantic derogation, and sexism in name and title. According to Mills (2008), naming is the utilization of some words that are gender-biased. This means that the words are particularly identical to a certain gender. The example is when Colette, her parents, and Willy were talking about a show at an opera. Willy then commented on one of the stage players, Sarah, who acted as the main character of a tragic story.

Data 1
Willy: Sarah Bernhardt does her best, she always does. But it is melodramatic in extremis. (Karisen, Koffler, Litvak, & Vachon, 2018, 00:03:05) Supported by the word 'but' after saying 'best,' Willy's comment on Sarah's acting that she is 'melodramatic' brings a negative connotation on it. This word is used frequently to point to a woman who acted too emotionally. Weatherall (2002) mentioned that some adjectives are considered as a compliment when it is related to men and an insult when it is related to women. Willy uses this term to show that as inferior creatures, women always involve too much emotion. Brescoll (2016) argued that being emotional means that the person is still lacking in control of their emotion. It is still often considered weak for some people since it involves feeling rather than logic. In addition, Brescoll (2016) argues that involving too much emotion hinders women to succeed in the role of leadership in which realistic thinking is needed. Therefore, Brescoll (2016) indicates that it is hard for women to reach higher positions than men since women frequently use their feeling. Thus, Willy's word circumstantially depreciates women while he tries to show his eminence as a man who is rarely being so emotional.

Dictionaries
The next type of sexism in the movie is the dictionary that mentions some nouns that indicate only a particular gender. This refers to a sexist term written in the dictionary. The example is when Colette gives a response to Missy, a woman that dresses like a man, who wears trousers.

Data 2
Colette: It must have been very hard for you, putting on trousers, I mean. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 01:15:54) The word 'trousers,' according to Collins Dictionary, is defined as an outer garment mainly for boys and men, divisible into distinctive coverings for the legs, and lengthening typically from the waist to the ankles (Trousers, n.d.). Kass (2011) states that starting from the middle of the 20 th century, women eventually had the freedom to wear trousers. So, from the 1800s until the beginning of the 1900s, it was only men who could wear trousers. It was not appropriate for women to wear it back then. This means that during Colette's setting of time which is in the early 20 th century, it was very uncommon to see women wearing trousers. Colette gave this kind of response to Missy to implicitly asking Missy's position and struggles as a woman to wear such clothes, as according to Key (1975), the discussion on women is mainly emphasized on their appearance. When a woman does not dress like what society has determined, they will not be acknowledged as a good and obedient woman. Colette thinks that it must be so hard for women to go against the rules that have been set by the society where women should act elegantly by wearing a dress.

Generic Nouns
Generic nouns were also found in some parts of the dialogue in the movie. They are used to show the dominance of men in society. See the following example.

Data 3
Georgie: Lily, tell the coachman to go and ready the carriage. Lily: Of course (Karisen, et al., 2018, 00:51:09) The word 'coachman' is a compound word from 'coach' and 'man.' A coachman is known as a person who drives a carriage of horse-drawn. However, the use of the word 'man' in this term shows that it is only men who can do such a job or position. The attachment of '-man' at the end of the word also makes females linguistically invisible. Words that have the same form as 'coachman' and contain male-referred words to refer to an unspecified gender are called masculine generics (Weatherall, 2002). Even though it is grammatically correct, but the word is still masculine-specific and can be construed as women-excluded things. The movie Colette was set during the time where the politics and the work sphere were dominated by men while women entailed the sphere of private domestic (Kota, 2014). Accordingly, Georgie was saying this because she used to know that only men who could afford a position as horse-drawn carriage drivers at that time. Georgie's expression implicitly articulates men's superiority.

Insult Terms for Women
Some evidence of overt sexism in terms of insulting words for women were also indicated in the movie dialogues. For example, when Willy paid some money to a girl after fulfilling his sexual desire, it seems that the woman was not satisfied with the amount Willy gave to her.

Data 4
Lotte: Do you want me to look cheap? Willy: But for that money, I can get laid five times a day by a prostitute. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 00:17:46) When talking about a prostitute, the word is generally intended for a woman who engage in a sexual activity for various reasons. Even though it is a job, many people perceive prostitutes to contain a negative connotation. Hunter, Alliance, and Victoria (1991) mention that the word 'prostitute' is uttered as a derogatory characterization of a person who is doing something that is noted as sexually morally disgraceful and taking benefit from it. Thus, a person who is doing sexual intercourse for money is perceived to be low in the eyes of society. Willy used the term 'prostitute' to Lotte to degrade her position, that the money he paid to her was more than enough compared to what he could give to the other women of the same profession. Willy also intentionally said the word so that the woman knows that she cannot be paid higher because of her status.
The insult terms for women in the movie Colette can also be used by women. This was when Georgie said that her husband has already paid the publisher to destroy Claudine's book since Colette refused to change a salacious story about her. Her statement, of course, makes Colette furious.

Data 5
Colette: You duplicitous bitch. Georgie: I had a good teacher. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 01:01:08) The term 'bitch' in this scene is a derogatory word addressed to women who have behaved in a bad or unpleasant way since the relationship between Colette and Georgie is worsened due to personal conflict. Kleinman, Ezzell, and Frost (2009) state that 'bitch' was related to degrading the image of a woman as a divine and powerful creature and associating them with a sexually depraved beast. Colette used the word to insult Georgie who has treated her badly as lower as prostitute indicating that Georgie's social role is such a disgrace in Colette's eyes.

Semantic Derogation
Semantic derogation involves the words that have the suffix -ess, -ette, -enne, or -trix that makes the term possess a pejorative meaning. So, adding those suffixes can derogate the meaning. One of the scenes is when a girl named Lily was asked to deliver an invitation to Colette and Willy.

Data 6
Willy: Wonderful! Please thank your mistress and say we accept her invitation and look forward to her delightful company. Thank you. Lily: I will! (Karisen, et al., 2018, 00:49:51) The term 'mistress' was generally uttered to a woman who has power, yet the meaning was degenerated. The equivalent word of 'mistress' which is 'master,' however, still holds a positive value (Schultz, 1975). The term 'mistress' in this dialogue referred to a positive value. However, as Byrne and Barling (2017) viewed, woman is perceived not to have higher social status than their spouse in a heterosexual marriage which means that men is the one to hold a more superior role in marriage. Thus, the word 'mistress' that Willy used implies that the woman, Georgie, was under the authority of her husband with this proving that her social role is inferior to her husband.
Non-parallel form of semantic derogation is also appeared in some parts of the dialogue. For example, when Colette went back to her hometown after knowing that Willy has slept with another woman, she started to confirm her mother about women's roles.

Data 7
Colette: Did you ever feel like you were playing a part, Sido? Sido: In what way? Colette: As a wife or a mother. Like you were just going through with it. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 00:19:30) The term 'wife' and 'mother' seems to contain negative meaning to describe women (Romadhon, 2020). It is because, in these terms, women were percevied a lower social status and patronize them from their partners. Colette was mentioning these words as she was concerned about doing her gender roles in society given that women were usually addressed by referring to their family relationship (Key, 1975). She assumed that being a wife and mother are the roles she should play to make their partner happy so that they could be happy too. Those two roles seem to bind women after their marriage like they do not have the freedom to do anything they like other than what a wife or mother should do. Moreover, Willy's accepted behaviors after Colette caught him spending his money to sleep with another woman makes Colette sure that in marriage it is only women that are bound by their spouse while the men can do anything they like without being tied to their marital status.

Name and Title
In English, most women's names and titles are bound to their spouse. Thus, the following is an example of the use of sexist language in terms of degree. The dialogue comes when Colette told a story about her school day.

Data 8
Colette: She was clumsy, more than anything. One day in winter, when the first snow started, I made a compact little snowball and smuggled it into the classroom. As Mademoiselle Terrain was writing on the blackboard. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 00:23:21) 'Mademoiselle' in French is equal to the word 'miss' and the honorific 'Madame' is the same as 'Mrs.' In English, the use of honorific by women depends on their marital status. If they have not married, they will use 'miss' while 'Mrs' is for married women. However, a title of a man will remain 'Mr' whether they have married or not. This case shows that women's statuses are dependent on men. Not only in the use of honorific title, marital status can also change the the way people address women. See below for the example.

Data 9
Ollendorf: Madame Willy! Colette: Monsieur Ollendorff! (Karisen, et al., 2018, 01:35:23) The word 'Madame' is the French equivalent of 'Mrs' and the word 'Monsieur' is the same as 'Mr' in English. Then, the focus of the discussion is on the way Ollendorff addressed Collette using her husband's name. Mills (2008) states that taking the surname of the husband seems to show that marriage changes woman's possession by her husband. Baron (1986) adds that if a woman is addressed by her husband's first name, it makes the woman socially inferior. Even though Willy is the nickname and pen name of Colette's husband, but the fact that Colette was approached by her husband's name has already supported Mills' statement. Accordingly, the reason why Ollendorff uses the terms is that he wants to show Colette's status as Willy's wife. On the other hand, Ollendorff wanted to emphasize men's superiority. This situation points to women's dependency upon men (Hellinger & Pauwels, 2007).

Indirect Sexism in the Movie Colette
Humor Turning now to the other type of sexist language, this study discovers that the movie Colette contained 4 kinds of indirect sexism, namely humor, presupposition, metaphor, and collocation.

Data 10
Veber: Gabrielle. It's cold out there today. Colette: I wouldn't know. I'm under house arrest. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 00:12:44) On this occasion, Colette used a sarcastic humor. She uttered this because she has been at home for a long time to become Willy's letter ghostwriter. However, in the 19 th century, women did not have so much choices in their life. Alamsyah, Pasaribu, and Sahri (2017) state that women in the 19 th century must not disobey men because men have every resources. The statement implies that at that time, a woman's life depends significantly on their husband during marriage; everything that women have become their husband's. So, to maintain a good relationship with their husband, a woman should obey their spouse. In the movie, Colette could not go out of her home only with her husband's permission. She did not even have any job so that all she could do was obeying their husband particularly to be the goshwriter for her husband. Colette's expressions was clearly to show Willy's superiority as a man that takes control over her as a woman in marriage. Colette knew that there is nothing she could do other than being submissive to Willy.

Presupposition
The other kind of indirect sexism appeared in the movie dialogue is presupposition.

Data 11
Colette: I need my name on the book Willy: No. Willy is a brand. And in any case, women writers don't sell. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 01:18:54) During the 19 th century to the early 20 th century in France, there were only a few women writers that had made a success. It is because men, at that time, thought that it was appropriate for women to hold 'needle' than 'pen' (Lauter, 2013). In addition, Howell (2015) argued that in the 19 th century, the literary world rarely took women writers seriously. Women writers often received critics and disrespect from readers and male writers. Thus, based on this fact, Willy believed that if Colette used her own name in the novel, it can downgrade the popularity of the art work. Willy uttered this sentence to show men superiority in the eyes of society. It implies that it is men that could be able to make certain work popular. Another reason that makes Willy say the words is that he wants to underline Colette's position as a woman writer in the future which did not seem engaging if Colette still insists to become one of them.
Another example of presupposition is when Colette and Willy are debating about Colette's new hobby in pantomime. Colette then asked Matilda's opinion.

Data 12
Colette: Wague thinks that I'll be ready to go on the stage in a few weeks. What do you think, Matilde? Matilde: I have to agree with Monsieur Willy, Ma'am. It's not very lady-like. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 01:22:07) In the 19 th century, all the things that a woman could do were serving men and their children by getting married, giving birth to children, raising and taking care of them, nursing, also teaching at the level of elementary (Alamsyah, et al., 2017). Matilde thinks that women are not supposed to play pantomime which is a job outside of household affairs, that is why she said that it is not 'very lady-like'. Moreover, being a lady-like person means that the woman should act feminine, elegantly, and in a manner. In the 19 th century, women pantomime players started to wear breeches (Victoria and Albert Museum, n.d). It was considered risqué to act in tights and shorts in an era when covering legs with long skirts is an obligation for women. So, that is the reason why the pantomime was considered to be not lady-like as it could let women wear and act anything to support their role at the stage without paying attention to the norm in society. Another implication that Matilde said in this utterance is that playing pantomime is not courteous for women. She said this to remind Colette's position as a woman that should not work but instead complies with what her husband said.

Metaphor
An example of the use of metaphor in the movie dialogue was when Willy and Colette were in a verbal conflict, Colette seemed about to leave him. Then, Willy said words that he thought could make Colette stay.

Data 13
Willy: Because you're the only woman I could ever love and because you're at your most brilliant when you're with me. Colette: Am I? Willy: Yes, you know you are. You still need your headmaster. (Karisen, et al., 2018, 01:33:31) The term 'headmaster' in this context means someone that can lead and help Colette. Willy believed that because of his guidance, Colette could become a woman that shines brightly. He also believed that it is him who brings out and hones Colette's talent for writing. Because of him, Colette could write stories and published popular novels in Paris. As a husband, Willy helped Colette publish her work to be known by the public since before the late 19 th century, women were not allowed to publish any written work (Claro, 2020). Buzwell (2020) adds that before the middle of the 20 th century, publicity in women was odious. This implies that even though women are legally allowed to publish their work after the late 19 th century, society was still reluctant to accept a work by women writers. Thus, in this scene, Willy signified that as a woman, Colette needed him to lead and helped her life. His utterance showed that as a woman, Colette is an inferior creature who cannot do anything without man's help.

Collocation
The last type of indirect sexism in the movie Colette found is collocation. It is in the scene when Colette was feeling sad because Willy betrayed her by sleeping with another woman. Colette's mother tried to calm her down.

Data 14
Sido: My little kitten. No one can take away who you are, no one. You're too strong for that. You always have been. Just trust no one but yourself. Colette: I know Sido: So what's he done to upset you? (Karisen, et al., 2018, 00:20:13) Since a long time ago, women have always been perceived to be 'weak'. Mills (2008) indicates that the term 'strong' to generally be associated with men. Furthermore, the use of the word 'too' in this situation conveys that women are not supposed to be strong. As it has been stated before, women are usually examined in terms of their appearance. Because women generally have smaller bodies and physical features than men, they are considered to be weaker. In the previous scene, when Colette found Willy sleeping with a prostitute, Willy said that it is a normal thing for men in Paris to do such thing since prostitution was legal in the 19 th century of Paris and many of the clients were married (Dailey, 2019). It seems like marital status does not limit men's freedom. Thus, Sido said this to Colette to show her concern to Colette who is a newlywed woman with limited knowldge. Sido who has already married might know that it must be the women who struggle in the marriage life as they should obey their spouse while their husband could do anything they want despite their marital status.

Conclusion
To explore the use of sexist languages in this movie, a theory by Mills (2008) that divides sexist languages into overt sexism and indirect sexism is used. It is found that the movie which was set in the late 19 th century until the early 20 th century contains 6 kinds of overt sexism, they are naming, dictionaries, generic nouns, insult terms for women, semantic derogation, and sexism in name and title. However, the writer did not find the use of indirect sexism in terms of processes. Furthermore, there are also 4 types of indirect sexism uttered by the characters in this movie. These are humor, presupposition, metaphor, and collocation. Given that the sexiest expressions in this study were observed from non-natural language use, it is highly suggested for future research to have in-depth exploration in some authentic linguistic data, such as everyday verbal interaction and investigate how the overt sexism and indirect sexism take shape.