An attempt to make the lyrics of the Canadian anthem gender-neutral raises a number of questions about gendered language in song

An attempt by a Liberal backbencher in the Canadian parliament to make the lyrics of the country’s national anthem, O Canada, more gender-neutral is likely to fail following opposition by several Conservative MPs.

The debate isn’t the first time sexism has been associated with a country’s national anthem. In 2012 Austria changed its anthem after a campaign by a group of MPs was backed by a majority in parliament. The first verse of the Austrian anthem now references “sons and daughters” instead of just “sons” and the third verse uses “jubilant choirs” instead of “fraternal choirs”.

Other attempts to change lyrics that are often more than a century old have been less successful. In 2010, for example, a Costa Rican woman failed in her attempt to convince the supreme court that the country’s anthem was sexist.

Can a national anthem be sexist, or is the debate in Canada political correctness taken one step too far?



Gendered language

Sometimes the language itself is more gender-neutral. The English version and the Maori version of New Zealand’s national anthem differ (the Maori lyrics were adapted to fit the melody), leading to verses which were written with similar intent but carry different meanings.

Where the second verse in English says “men of every creed and race”, the Maori version has “let all people”. Similarly, in the fifth verse the English version goes “guide her in the nation’s van, Preaching love and truth to man.” While in Maori it’s “let it never be ashamed, but rather let its name be known”.

One characteristic of Maori as a language is that pronouns are all gender-neutral.

However, in other cases sexism within language is inscribed in the history of a country’s use of words. A national anthem is but one manifestation of a nation’s past – and often, of its present.

As an illustrative exercise, we analysed the lyrics in a small selection of national anthems. In instances in which masculine terms were used without a feminine equivalent we assigned a score to the “more male” column. For example, if “men” is included in a sentence, but “women” is omitted from that same sentence.

Vice versa, in verses where feminine words were used unaccompanied by their male equivalent, one point was placed in the “more female” column. For example, where “daughters” are used without reference to “sons”.

Finally, cases where a gender-neutral form was adopted instead are tallied up in the gender-neutral column.

The chart visualises the net score of these calculations*.



In some cases the gender bias is about how a country refers to itself. Germany and Russia are respectively the Vaterland and Otechestvo - meaning the “fatherland”, a notion whose roots date back to the Ancient Greek patris and the Ancient Roman word patria.

Other nations among those analysed have opted for a more gender-neutral “homeland”.



In the national anthems of countries such as Italy and Turkey**, similarly to O Canada, lyrics reference “men” and “sons”, omitting women and daughters. Italy may be feminine, but “every man has the heart and hands of Ferruccio” in the Song of the Italians.



When it comes to national anthems that lean towards the gender-neutral column, this is, broadly speaking, mainly driven by three factors.

First, where countries refer to themselves as “homeland” or in the feminine. An example of this is South Africa’s national anthem:

God Bless Africa Raise high Her glory Hear our Prayers God bless us, we her children

In several cases, such as Serbia, this possibly has more to do with a lack of gender-related themes – beyond the country itself not being referred to in masculine terms – than to genuine equality in choice of words.

Second, when the national anthem directly refers to a country’s present-day monarch, lyrics may change depending on the gender of future monarchs.

Third, as in the case of the Maori version of the New Zealand anthem, a language is inherently gender-neutral.

Language itself is often biased and discriminatory – and not just in terms of sexism. But language, as other aspects of society and culture, can evolve. In Sweden, a debate has been going on since the mid-1960s over the use of the word “hen”, which was recently included in the the official glossary of the Swedish Academy, as a gender-neutral pronoun intended to replace, to an extent at least, the gender-specific hon (“she”) and han (“he”).

A country’s choice of words carries meaning - and it isn’t just a matter of political correctness.

*Phrases that are repeated multiple times within an anthem have only been counted once. The gender by which a country refers to itself has been included in this exercise. No judgement was inferred on any possible disparaging or discriminatory use of a gender-specific term: the words were simply counted and placed in the relevant column.

**Update: a reader on Twitter points out that in Turkey’s national anthem, instances of “man” and “men” could equally apply to women as the term in Turkish is gender-neutral. The same applies for the Turkish pronoun “o” which is used for both “he” and “she”. The anthem includes the gender-specific variant of the term “son/s”. The chart has been updated to reflect this.