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Woman
A woman is a female human. The term ''woman'' is usually reserved for an adult, with the term girl being the usual term for a female child or adolescent. However, the term ''woman'' is also sometimes used to identify a female human, regardless of age, as in phrases such as "women's rights". "Woman" may also refer to a person's gender identity instead of their sex. Women are typically capable of giving birth from puberty until menopause, although some sterile, intersex and/or transgender women cannot. Throughout history women have assumed or been assigned various social roles. ==Etymology== The spelling of woman in English has progressed over the past millennium from ''wīfmann''〔"wīfmann": Bosworth & Toller, ''Anglo-Saxon Dictionary'' (Oxford, 1898-1921) p. 1219. The spelling "wifman" also occurs: C. T. Onions, ''Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology'' (Oxford, 1966) p. 1011〕 to ''wīmmann'' to ''wumman'', and finally, the modern spelling ''woman''.〔''Webster's New World Dictionary, Second College Edition'', entry for "woman".〕 In Old English, ''wīfmann'' meant "female human", whereas ''wēr'' meant "male human". ''Mann'' or ''monn'' had a gender-neutral meaning of "human", corresponding to Modern English "person" or "someone"; however, subsequent to the Norman Conquest, ''man'' began to be used more in reference to "male human", and by the late 13th century had begun to eclipse usage of the older term ''wēr''.〔(man ) - definition Dictionary.reference.com〕 The medial labial consonants f and m in ''wīfmann'' coalesced into the modern form "woman", while the initial element, which meant "female", underwent semantic narrowing to the sense of a married woman ("wife"). It is a popular misconception that the term "woman" is etymologically connected with "womb", which is from a separate Old English word, ''wambe'' meaning "stomach" (of male or female; modern German retains the colloquial term "Wampe" from Middle High German for "potbelly").〔(Germanic Etymology )〕〔(dict.cc, DT-EN, entry: Wampe )〕 Nevertheless, such a false derivation of "woman" has appeared in print.〔e.g. (''The Woman's Bible'', By Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the Revising Committee, 1898 )〕
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