The use of "male"/"female" (instead of e.g. "man"/"woman") in everyday speech

In contemporary English, the terms "male" and "female" seem to be almost as commonly applied to people as "man" and "woman". For example, I see people posting questions on certain StackExchange sites starting with "I am a 23 year old male" or similar.

As a non-native (but fluent) speaker of English, this usage still bothers me for reasons I will explain below. I would like to know if this is just because of a bias coming from my native language, or if native English speakers also perceive these terms in a similar way to me.

Both in my mother tongue and other languages I speak, the direct translation of "male" and "female" are either applied to animals only, or are used in technical or scientific contexts. "Male elephant" is natural. "Human male" also does occur in a scientific text, after all humans are mammals (a kind of animal, from a biological perspective). The police may use "male suspect", as this is again a kind of technical jargon (and it goes the extra mile to be strictly objective). Then it's easy to see how this can get shortened into just "male", e.g. "60 year old male", in a police communication.

But hearing these words used in everyday speech always leaves me with a bad taste. In a way, it feels like talking about people as if they were animals when using "male"/"female" instead of the more common man/boy/lad/whatever. It feels ugly and almost rude.

Thus my question is not about the literal meaning of these terms, but their connotations, and how (or whether) these connotations have changed during the past few decades.

Do native speakers sometimes perceive these terms the same way I do? Or am I just influenced by the bias from my native language?

Finally, is my perception correct that the everyday use of these terms has significantly increasing during the last decade? Are there differences in the nuances of these terms between countries (e.g. UK vs US)?

Solution 1:

I don't have a reference to cite, but in my experience I think people use "male" and "female" when their intent is to describe someone (or themselves) in more of a biological sense, or to seem technical rather than personal, while "man" and "woman" are used to refer to them culturally.

This is related to your experience of using the words to refer to animals rather than people.

For instance, when police describe a suspect they'll say "white male" rather than "white man", this expresses a sense of technical detachment.

It has become idiomatic to use this language in specialized contexts, such as personal ads, where the abbreviations SWM and SWF stand for Single White Male and Single White Female.

In addition, in many contexts, the words "man" and "woman" might suggest the connotation that the person is manly or very feminine. As in "man's man". The technical terms are not loaded with these nuances.

Solution 2:

In my opinion, your instincts are good. There is something clinical or scientific about "male" and "female". The terms are not just for living beings; they are also used in electrical construction to describe interlocking parts.

The terms "man" and "woman" mean specifically adult or nearly-adult persons. "Boy" and "girl" refer to children.

Back when I was doing online dating, I skipped right over the ads "seeking a female" because the sexual intention was just too obvious. "I would like to meet a woman" was more respectful, because it was seeking a full human connection rather than being focused on sex.

My bias: I am an older woman from a southern state of the USA. Good manners are extremely important in my culture.

Solution 3:

Very broadly, “man” and “woman” describe things while “male” and “female” describe characteristics of those things.

Who would not be happy to view a man as a male person?

Who would be happy to view a female as a woman person?

"I am a 23-year-old male", or such like, is accepted in every-day speech but that doesn't make it correct…