Vera Gheno is a sociolinguist, or rather a social linguist. She studies the evolution of the Italian language through the behaviours we exhibit day after day, including on social networks. On Instagram she is @a_wandering_sociolinguist, but the recommendation is to follow her on Facebook too, where she creates posts that in a few years' time we will be calling "educational".

On the occasion of the extensive coverage LifeGate produced for the tenth anniversary of the adoption of the Istanbul Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence, Vera Gheno's contribution helped us understand the role that language and our linguistic behaviour play in building a more equitable society, one in which gender equality is no longer a distant mirage.

Among Vera Gheno's works, Femminili singolari – Il femminismo è nelle parole, published by Effequ, confronts and dismantles Italians' linguistic convictions by "tracing their irredeemably sexist inclination", as the back cover reads. An inclination that, like any other drift, can be overcome through instruction, education and knowledge. Because only by improving linguistic competence can we move beyond the status quo, the product of a society that has leaned too heavily towards the masculine.

In your book "Femminili singolari" you recall how the first recommendations for a non-sexist use of the Italian language date back to 1987 (Alma Sabatini). What has changed in all this time in the push towards a more inclusive, equitable and fair language?
I can't see it as a battle. I see it as a predictable and expected linguistic progress that goes hand in hand with social progress. Over the past 50 years we have changed enormously in how we view society. There was a period when we were quite comfortably post-colonial and that seemed perfectly normal to us.

Today sensibilities are shifting, society's needs are changing, and language is travelling — more or less — in parallel. Steps forward have certainly been made, and they coincide with the steps forward taken both by women and by minorities who have until now been left in the background. Also because women cannot be thought of as a minority, given that they are the majority of the global population.

We are in constant motion, as evidenced by the fact that ten years ago there were two issues: the linguistic representation of women and political correctness — that is, awareness towards minorities such as gay people. Then a new front opened up: that of transgender and non-binary people. We must never rest on our laurels and think it's over, because society is in constant transformation. It's like growing up, when your bones ache precisely because you are growing. The same happens at a social level. Change always generates irritation, suffering and fear. So it is entirely natural that people find it hard to change their habits.

How does the progress of language towards gender equality fit into the current context? I'm thinking, for example, of the Zan bill (ddl Zan) on violence or discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation or gender identity.
Those who dismiss the linguistic question do so by saying they are "only words". Many people seem to forget that we human beings are made of words. Words are the means through which we communicate with others, but also the means through which we identify ourselves. Words are therefore a very powerful act of identity. Having no words to define oneself is a problem; it creates a problem of visibility within society. The apparent rush to name minorities as well is consistent, is in harmony with the fact that these minorities are claiming new spaces within society. Many may experience this as traumatic because ours is a "normalising", "normo-centric" society — in a somewhat Judith Butler-esque sense — whereby all those who stand out or deviate in some way from what is perceived as normality have had, or still have, additional difficulties at a social level, or even fewer rights, less visibility and less recognition.

Naming things well helps give them greater concreteness; naming the various categories within society well gradually steers us towards a society in which differences can coexist on an equal, law-based footing. On the other hand, if naming things allows us to make them tangible and see them more clearly, we can also understand why there is such insistence on the need to use the word femicide. Femicide is not simply a murder committed against a woman; it is the murder of a woman as a woman, and therefore as a reflection of a vision of women as the property of a man — be he a father, a husband, an ex-husband, or even a brother or a son.

What the Zan bill underlines is that just as it is not right to offend, denigrate or strip a person of rights because of their ethnicity or religion, it is equally wrong to denigrate a person because they are homosexual, transsexual, or do not fit the heterosexual, cisgender model we are used to. In my view this is an entirely legitimate matter. It seems absurd to me that there are people who experience the issue as a gag, as though from the heights of our privilege it were normal to be able to insult those who are different from us simply because they are different from us. It makes my head spin in some ways, yet I do understand those who struggle to give up privileges they don't even know they have.

How should one respond to those who use verbal violence, especially on social media, to defend these kinds of privileges within a debate on these topics?
We would need to agree on what constitutes debate here, because this is not debate — this is provocation. There is no right way to respond. The parameters by which I decide whether to respond are: "Can I say something that is useful to those who are reading — to the silent multitude that surrounds us when we are on social media?" Because it is never just me and the other person; there are a lot of people around us who are reading. If it is simply what I call sea lioning — that is, people who sea-lion on other people's accounts and leave very long comments that take up a great deal of time, but who in reality have no interest in understanding anything and simply want to advance their own idea or ideology — in that case I do not respond and I hide the comment so that the discussion does not end up polluted.

Those in politics or in high-profile sectors of society often use reactionary language deliberately. Can this affect the question of gender equality and gender-based violence?
Absolutely yes. No one uses language in a disinterested way. We are not talking here about the natural evolution of language; we are talking about steering language in a direction that suits certain purposes — rather as Benito Mussolini did during the twenty years of fascism, when he used language for propaganda, political and marketing ends. None of these uses is actually natural. Language is bent to serve something.

If the media prefer to use language that perpetuates gender stereotypes and violence, they are doing a disservice to society and to people. In Italy we have a serious problem with territoriality: many people would like the language to stay as it is, they don't want it to change, and every time linguistic change is discussed, there is a stiffening of resistance.

I'd like to add one more thing. The obsession of linguist Tullio De Mauro was to bring all people to a decent level of linguistic competence so that they could be fully-fledged citizens of their own country — that is, participate in the life of the polis. Obviously, investment in education and instruction is needed. That does not seem to be what is happening today. It seems that the preference is to keep people in a situation of not particularly high competence. When the World Health Organisation used the word "infodemic", its meaning was that part of the work must be done by us — that is, we have to be able to tell whether a piece of news is true or false. Those who govern us should raise people's linguistic competence, because the vast majority of fake news and hoaxes are caught precisely in that way. By improving people's linguistic competence, fake news would have less "breath" in it.

The Istanbul Convention against violence against women and domestic violence is a binding treaty for the states that have adopted it — it is not something one remembers only from time to time. Do you think an instrument of this kind can help change things?
It is certainly useful, though it is a shame that not all states wish to embrace it. Some refuse to ratify it, some have never ratified it — it is a very fluid situation. I have the impression that there are countries, nations and people who pretend not to see the problem and who prefer a woman who stays in the background. They truly prefer the status quo.

Indeed, some countries want to withdraw from the Istanbul Convention because it would be "an attack on the natural order of the family". Yet what it actually addresses is not using domestic violence — it concerns women, but also children and the elderly.
This idea of the natural order is a falsehood. As biologist Barbara Gallavotti has said, homosexuality is present in around 1,500 animal species. The question one must therefore ask is: natural in what sense? Natural because it suits certain social orders, not because it is natural. So perhaps the Istanbul Convention can serve as a spur for patriarchal societies which, as such, see the woman who wants to emancipate herself as a nuisance, just as they see the man who does not want to be virile.

What are the three words that we can finally say "have made it" — that have entered common use — and which are the three words that are still a real struggle?
Femminicidio: because, for better or worse — despite there still being people who object — people use it, so the concept is becoming established.

Sindaca, thanks to the double act of Virginia Raggi and Chiara Appendino.

Inclusività is a word I hear used far more than before, and one that people generally have no objection to. I actually prefer "convivenza delle differenze" [coexistence of differences], as Fabrizio Acanfora puts it, but I hear "inclusività" pronounced more and more often.

Among the "difficult" words, cisgender is certainly one, because people who are cisgender often do not want to have a label. "I'm normal — it's them who are trans."

Then there is definitely mestruazioni [menstruation]. There are still many taboos around saying the word "menstruation".

And for the third I would say linguaggio inclusivo [inclusive language], which is different from "inclusività". Because "inclusività" is something everyone talks about in theoretical terms, but then when you go to touch language itself, there are those who think language is untouchable. "Inclusività" is experienced as an opportunity for disabled people, as consideration for foreigners, for migrants; we are all inclusive — but then when you go to touch language… that is simply not done.