A ship is called a "She" but why a tester is refered as "She"?

Not being a racist, that thought even did not cross my mind, I just want to know the truth behind the assumption. Is it a fair assumption that if a book is written by a female author then she will refer the tester as "She" whereas male author will use "He"? Who decides weather a tester should be addressed as 'She" or "He"? Your humble opinions please.

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Permalink Reply by Jonathan Kohl on October 15, 2009 at 22:07
No it's a writing style issue. Always using "he" in writing was used traditionally, but it's frowned on now, since it isn't inclusive of female readers.

There are options, such as "they", or for a few years, people decided to just use "she" as a generic word instead of "he". Some writers mix it up now.

This page touches on the subject: http://dissc.tees.ac.uk/Writing/style/Page11.htm
Permalink Reply by Joe Strazzere on October 15, 2009 at 22:07
"Is it a fair assumption that if a book is written by a female author then she will refer the tester as "She" whereas male author will use "He"? "

Why would you assume that? Authors can (and do) use gender as they choose, unless they are talking about a specific person.

In English, at least, there is no specific gender association for the word "tester". Other languages may differ.
Permalink Reply by Enrique T. Campita II on October 16, 2009 at 3:47
Im not sure with persons and Id use nonsexist like they or "the tester" but with entities like you said a ship is a she, what about a computer? or my system? should I say "my computer is fast, she did good in testing last night." or "Her test results showed 35 issues I need to look into." What about the application like Selenium? Should we call it a she/he? "I await her results"

Just a thought. :D
Permalink Reply by Parimala Shankaraiah on October 16, 2009 at 4:30
I usually use "he/she" to address as appropriate.

Regards,
Parimala Shankaraiah
http://curioustester.blogspot.com
Permalink Reply by Joel Montvelisky on October 16, 2009 at 5:33
I eco Pari here.
I try using both He & She whenever I write.
Permalink Reply by Yvette Francino on October 16, 2009 at 5:44
Testers should be male because they have a lot of testerosterone.
Permalink Reply by Enrique T. Campita II on October 16, 2009 at 10:32
:D
Permalink Reply by Stephen Hill on October 16, 2009 at 7:28
I think I would tend towards using he/she as appropriate if I know the gender of the tester I am reporting on but a generic 'the tester' if I do not. Where I work it is not an issue but I can see that it would be an issue in a very large testing team.
Permalink Reply by phil kirkham on October 16, 2009 at 9:04
I assume you meant 'sexist' rather than 'racist'...
Permalink Reply by Mohinder Khosla on October 16, 2009 at 9:31
I meant 'sexist' too tired to think straight that late in the evening but it did strike me when I was in bed by that time it was too late to edit.
It is a difficult call and a trivial one too. If you are reading a book and the author is presenting some facts and experiences of his/her own for you to keep in mind while testing but keep talking in different gender from you then it looks somehow odd. How can one go behind the mind of an author and figure out why did he/she describe a tester as “She” or “He” or do you think approach the author directly through their blogs? One probably has to live with the fact as Jonathan said it is a writing style issue and the author is not being sexist in anyway. Should the author be more aware of its audience and try to avoid such issues I don't know? I have come across a book by a male author on Rational Unified Process: An Introduction by Philippe Kruchten refers tester as “She” that makes me think there may be a connection here with the gender. The book has been translated in 8 eight languages and how it gone down with the audiences in those countries if tester is portrayed as a female is difficult to say. Here is a quote from his book appeared on one of the blogs,” A tester – out of all other persons concerned with the software development life cycle – possesses a distinguishable property. She is and has to be negatively biased. She is not striving for success but for destruction. At her best she will fail in crashing the program under test.This behaviour appears to emulate people who tend to overly critisize. They are generally not well beloved.” I wonder first software tester was a female and trying to trace the oldest book on testing to establish whether someone set a precedence.
Permalink Reply by Rob Lambert on October 16, 2009 at 10:26
I don't read anything at all in to why the author used he or she.

For me I would try to avoid gender and go for they or this person or something like that. But that is my personal choice. I've written chapter 1 of an ebook using she and chapter with he. Switching per chapter for no other reason than to keep a balance.

http://agileanarchy.wordpress.com/2009/06/25/testosterone-infected-...

Good post on why developers are men and testers are women. It's not so clear cut though. But fun post.

Rob..
Permalink Reply by Rob Seels on October 16, 2009 at 12:05
My dad always used to call our car "she", or "girl". It was a Morris Marina. Whenever we used to reach a steep hill it would slow down to a crawl and he would start whooping "come on girl!"

When I asked him why he always referred to her in the feminine (bearing in mind I was about 7, or 8 at the time), he told me "because she was tempramental and stubborn, just like my mother!"

Without wishing to cause offence to the better half of the readership, this is my father's view, not mine and an attempt at a joke as it's Friday. We do live in a very PC World these days and if I'm not careful, that's probably where I'll end up working!!

(This last comment is by no means an attempt to offend retail staf, who have always provided me with exceptional service)

I'll shut up now before the hole I'm digging gets any deeper!

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