manspreading

English

WOTD – 10 May 2016

Etymology

A male commuter engaging in manspreading

From man +‎ spreading. Popularized in 2014.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈmænˌspɹɛdɪŋ/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

Noun

manspreading (uncountable)

1. (informal, derogatory) The practice of men splaying their legs open wide when sitting on public transport, thus occupying more than one seat.

   Coordinate term: womanspreading

   • 2014 December 20, Emma G. Fitzsimmons, “A scourge is spreading. M.T.A.’s cure? Dude, close your legs”, in The New York Times‎^[1]:

     The new ads — aimed at curbing rude behavior like manspreading and wearing large backpacks on crowded trains — are set to go up in the subways next month.

   • 2015 January 10, Margaret Wente, “Advice to younger women: Practise manning up”, in The Globe and Mail‎^[2], Toronto:

     Manspreading is certainly bad manners in a crowded subway – and so is other stuff, like people wielding giant backpacks.

   • 2015 January 16, Natasha Devon, “The rise of stranger shaming: How humiliating others became acceptable”, in The Independent‎^[3], London:

     Twitter, Snapchat and Instagram show thousands pictures of men engaging in this behaviour, and New York's transit authority launched a campaign against ‘manspreading’, with a Tumblr dedicated: Men Taking Up Too Much Space On The Train.

   • 2016, Kelly Starrett, Deskbound: Standing Up to a Sitting World‎^[4], page 190:

     Manspreading creates stability for your pelvis and lower back. You can either position your feet together and let your knees fall to the sides or spread your feet wide.

Quotations

• For more quotations using this term, see Citations:manspreading.

Synonyms

• man-sitting

Hypernyms

• seat hogging

Translations

practice of men splaying their legs open wide when sitting on public transport

• Finnish: äijähaara
• Japanese: マンスプレッディング, 大股開き (ōmatabiraki), 大股座り (ōmata suwari)
• Norwegian:

  Nynorsk: breibeint sitting m

• Russian: мэнспрединг m (mɛnspreding)
• Spanish: despatarre masculino m
• Swedish: manspreada

Verb

manspreading

1. present participle and gerund of manspread

Further reading

• manspreading on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• ampersanding