I worked in the signalling grades for four decades, and when Railtrack changed the name of Signalman to Signaller in the 1990s, the amount of uproar from many of the Signalman. "I'm a Signalman, not a Signaller!" To me it made no difference, it was just a name for a job I did, the job didn't change. Now you would think it was the older generation that refuted the change of name, but it wasn't. We had newer staff who joined after the name change and even some of them would say I'm a "I'm a Signalman, not a Signaller!", and be quite agressive about it. Railtrack changed it because they were very up on gender specific job titles, ahead of their time. But even though Signaller was gender neutral, we even had female Signallers insisting "I'm a Signalman, not a Signaller!". And nearly a quarter of the way into the 21st Century we still have, "I'm a Signalman, not a Signaller!" being said.
I wondered if a similar thing applied in other grades?
A Train Driver is non gender, but they were called Enginemen on locomotives or Motormen on Multiple-units. When did their job title name change? And was there the same stance by staff, "I'm an Engineman not a Driver!"?
S&T were Linemen, but now Technicians. Pway were Trackmen, now Track Operatives, etc.
I wondered if a similar thing applied in other grades?
A Train Driver is non gender, but they were called Enginemen on locomotives or Motormen on Multiple-units. When did their job title name change? And was there the same stance by staff, "I'm an Engineman not a Driver!"?
S&T were Linemen, but now Technicians. Pway were Trackmen, now Track Operatives, etc.