Too much information?

[tim]

Poll #2586

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 21

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Suppose you are a researcher and you collaborate with your husband, wife, domestic partner, boyfriend, girlfriend, partner, lover, mistress, gigolo, inamorat{o|a}, sweetie, fuckbuddy, or baby mama. Suppose you are giving an academic talk. Which of the following do you consider reasonable ways to refer to your joint work with your collaborator (named, say, Dana Q. Zygomorphism), when used more than once in the same talk?

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"In work with my wife..."
3 (14.3%)

"In work with my husband..."
3 (14.3%)

"In work with Dr. Zygomorphism..."
16 (76.2%)

"In work with {Mr.|Ms.} Zygomorphism..."
6 (28.6%)

"In work with Zygomorphism..."
11 (52.4%)

"In work with Dana..."
18 (85.7%)

"In work with my collaborator..." [when credit is given by name in a slide]
17 (81.0%)

Something else
2 (9.5%)

None of the above.
0 (0.0%)

Which of the following phrases would you consider unprofessional to use one or more times during an academic talk (assuming it was true)?

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"In work with my wife..." [speaker is male]
13 (68.4%)

"In work with my husband..." [speaker is female]
13 (68.4%)

"In work with my wife..." [speaker is female]
13 (68.4%)

"In work with my husband..." [speaker is male]
13 (68.4%)

"In work with my partner..."
10 (52.6%)

"In work with my significant other..."
14 (73.7%)

"In work with my boyfriend..."
18 (94.7%)

"In work with my girlfriend..."
18 (94.7%)

"In work with my girlfriend's other boyfriend..."
18 (94.7%)

"In work with my friend with benefits..."
18 (94.7%)

"In work with my gay lover..."
17 (89.5%)

"In work with the mother of my children..."
18 (94.7%)

"In work with the person with whom I have sexual intercourse on a regular basis..."
18 (94.7%)

"In work with my partner in a full-time BDSM relationship..."
17 (89.5%)

"In work with your mom..."
13 (68.4%)

None of the above
0 (0.0%)

Comments

[tim]

Is it that you haven't found one, or is it that "wife" and "husband" are really equally suggestive but we've been socialized to believe deeply that a relationship's level of social normativity determines its acceptability to mention in public, while superficially claiming sexual suggestiveness as a reason for not mentioning some kinds of relationships?

[miang]

I think it's somewhere closer to being socialized to divorce (heh) the idea of sexuality from the idea of marriage: all those old sitcom tropes about how the sex stops the minute you walk in the door after the honeymoon. (Semi-relatedly: I get highly weirded out when friends and colleagues discuss honeymoon plans but not wedding plans, likely for the same reason.) Whereas we're socialized to believe marriage is a foundation of family and home and other G-rated topics, we're also taught that the difference between dating/partnered and "just friends" is the sex. (Well, at least those of us who learned about this stuff before friends-with-benefits gained common usage.) Obviously this is highly problematic in and of itself, but that's a separate topic.

For my sake at least, I honestly haven't found a term that isn't bothersome to me in some way. I generally refer to tcdohl as my boyfriend, despite cringing at what I perceive to be the immaturity of that label. But "partner" feels like a business transaction, "significant other" takes too long to spit out and feels awkward in conversation, "SO" is shorter but still feels awkward, and yeah, not touching the rest of those descriptors with a borrowed, latex-wrapped pole. (Obligatory exception for your mom.)

[luinied]

Have you tried "main squeeze"?

...actually, we may have had this conversation before, and I seem to recall you not liking any of my ideas.