ABSTRACT
In January 2023, the Commission for the Protection of Child Rights in the state of Kerala in India issued a directive stating that school teachers may henceforth be addressed only using the gender-neutral and generic term “teacher.” Although replacing gendered dyads such as “sir/ma’am” with the gender-neutral term “teacher” challenges the normalisation of binary, cisnormative and exclusionary forms of language use, the directive’s insistence on gender-neutral language invalidates the gendered identity of educators and is tantamount to gender erasure. This study critically examines the directive using these frameworks: the Althusserian and Butlerian assertion of the primacy of address in the interpellation of subjects; LGBT linguistics; critical pedagogical practices and the dynamics of a language classroom; the teacher–student relationship as envisaged in the National Education Policy 2020 and in the 2023 directive in question; and the feasibility of implementing it in the socio-cultural milieu of Kerala. Informed by these interdisciplinary frameworks, this study critiques the practice of gender-neutral addressing of educators and advocates instead for a gender-inclusive language policy which validates the gendered subjectivity of educators and fosters a gender-just linguistic praxis in education.
