Latest update December 23rd, 2024 3:40 AM
Freddie Kissoon on the subject of “gonads”
DEAR EDITOR,
I fear that Mr. Freddie Kissoon was not paying attention in his Biology classes at school. Note what he writes – “The plural noun, gonads, have (sic) been used been used historically, traditionally, journalistically and in common parlance to mean the male testicles. Gonads in the plural cannot be used to mean the sperm-producing organ in a woman. It has to be singular because gonad means a reproductive organ in the human. In the female, it is the ovary. A woman carries one womb in her body. That is her gonad. When used in the plural and the subject is a man, it means the male testicles.”
Okay. So let us start at the beginning. Mr. Kissoon, please look up the meaning of “gonad” in a dictionary.
You will find that whether in the singular or the plural the word, regardless of whoever uses the word, whether historians, traditionalists, journalists or anyone else, the word means: an organ that produces gametes; a testis or ovary (Oxford English Dictionary). And a “gamete” is a male or female germ cell that unites with one from the opposite sex in sexual reproduction.
I agree with Mr. Kissoon that, “Gonads cannot be used to mean the sperm-producing organ in a woman”. Indeed, it cannot, since women do NOT have a sperm producing organ. Sperm is produced by the male of the species. Ovaries do not produce sperm; they produce ova or eggs.
The egg moves from the ovary to the Fallopian tube where it is fertilized by sperm from the male to create an embryo, which then travels down the Fallopian tube to the uterus or womb where it embeds itself to grow into a new human being.
The uterus or womb is therefore NOT the gonad as Mr. Kissoon says. The ovary is the gonad. And as all women have two ovaries (unless one was removed for a medical reason) then yes, the woman has gonads, in the plural.
Testes (singular testis) and ovaries are both gonads. Each produces a germ cell, the two germ cells uniting to form the new offspring. The womb is the organ in which the multiplying cells grow and diversify, being nourished from the mother’s body until they are capable of independent existence as a newborn baby.
If you speak of “the female reproductive system” then yes, the womb is part of that. But the gonad it is not. In fact, without ovaries the womb is useless – unless, that is, one utilizes the very modern method of in vitro fertilization. But, historically and traditionally that option was not available.
Pat Robinson Commissiong
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