Time magazine (March 13) carries AP’s report on North Korea’s radical reaction against ongoing U.S.-South Korean military drills under the headline, “N. Korea criticizes S. Korea President’s ‘Swish of skirt.’” The article begins with the following lines:’
“The body that controls North Korea’s military is dismissing South
Korea’s new president, Park Geun-hye, with a sexist comment about the
“venomous swish” of her skirt.”
Though “Swish of skirt” means to me just the sound of the fluttering hem of a skirt, and no more than that, I suspect this has special meaning as the words are put in parenthesises, and moreover they were discharged from the war-mongering country.
What insinuation does the word, S. Korea President’s ‘Swish of skirt’ have?
Is “Swish of skirt” unordinary expression in English? Does ‘skirt’ really have a ‘sexist’ implication as AP says in today’s gender equality world?
Best Answer
'Skirt' is not sexist by itself (where 'sexist' means derogatory by sexual connotation). The word 'skirt' simply refers to a short dress, a garment these days that is worn mostly by women.
'Swish of her skirt' is not sexist by itself, where 'swish' ostensibly means a swaying back and forth movement. But the two words together evoke a bit of coquettish imagery, that the wearer might intentionally be moving her skirt provocatively.
A 'venomous swish of her skirt' is definitely sexist as it implies metaphorically that the 'swish of her skirt' (with the coquettish interpretation, is poisonous and therefore dangerous because of its female attributes, implying an out of the ordinary danger or tendentious difficulty based exclusively on the one-sided sexual characteristics of being female.
The phrase 'swish of her skirt' is not an idiom, but it is metaphorical. With 'venomous' it becomes very negatively intentioned.
So the phrase altogether is very sexist.