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old maid: a single woman regarded as too old for marriage. Source

spinster: a woman who is not ​married, ​especially a woman who is no ​longer ​young and ​seems ​unlikely ​ever to ​marry. Source

These 2 above words refer to female, but now I want to find the similar term for male.

You can say that we can use "unmarried man" which is similar to "unmarried woman"

However, unmarried woman is "a woman who is not married" Source and it does not have the connotation as of "old maid" or "spinster".

It is because that "unmarried woman" could be the sister in a church who just do not want to marry because her religion. On the contrary, "old maid" or "spinster" means she is not attractive enough to get a husband or noone wants to marry her.

Tom
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  • Simply old bachelor. The lack of stigma attached to this word, and the difference in connotation with spinster, simply reflects an asymmetry in gender roles at he time the words were coined. It was ok for men to never marry. Women were expected to marry. Note: confirmed bachelor was a euphemism for a man who was never expected to marry, because he was gay (one did not talk about homosexuality directly in those days). – Dan Bron Sep 25 '15 at 16:06
  • @Dan, there is no such word "old bachelor" in dictionary. Can you provide the resource? – Tom Sep 25 '15 at 16:09
  • old bachelor: a bachelor who is old. Again, there is a single word for an old unmarried woman because there was an asymmetry in expectations, and a woman's age was considered pertinent to her prospects for getting married. A man was not considered unmarriageble simply because he was old, nor was it such a big deal if a man never got married. The word hours looking for is bachelor, if you want to say (in addition) he is old, then you must (in addition) say that. – Dan Bron Sep 25 '15 at 16:28
  • What about elderly bachelor? https://theasylum.wordpress.com/2009/01/28/franz-kafka-blumfeld-an-elderly-bachelor/ –  Sep 25 '15 at 16:33
  • @Dan, can I say "40 years old unmarried man" an "old bachelor"? How old is old enough? like 50 or 60 years old? – Tom Sep 25 '15 at 16:36
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    @Tom There is no fixed definition of old. A woman could have been labelled a spinster at 25, and when I was 7 years old, 30-year old mean seemed inconceivably old. It is you who want to label these men old bachelors, so it is you who has to decide which men to so label. – Dan Bron Sep 25 '15 at 16:37
  • @Tom - Note that bachelor does not have the 'negative' connotation that spinster has. –  Sep 25 '15 at 16:38
  • Related: What do you call someone who chooses to stay single for life? – Nathaniel is protesting Sep 25 '15 at 17:05
  • @Josh61 Not any more but there was a time when it carried the occasional implication of homosexuality (particularly in the phrase "confirmed bachelor"). – biziclop Sep 25 '15 at 21:14
  • Since it's derogatory anyway, why not just use spinster? – Mazura Sep 26 '15 at 02:35
  • @DanBron spinster originally meant unmarried woman without reference to age or prospects. An unmarried 21 year old woman is also a spinster, even if beautiful and engaged to be married. – phoog Sep 26 '15 at 06:18
  • @phoog According to the OED, the original meaning of spinster was merely descriptive: one who spins (yarn). Then it meant one who spins professionally, for a living. But by the time it took on the sense of "unmarried woman", it already had the pejorative sense, a woman who was still unmarried, on beyond the usual age for marriage; an old maid. So no, a 21 year old woman engaged to be married was not a spinster (in any sense related to marriage: she might be a spinster in terms of profession): she was a maid or maiden (=unmarried aka virgin). – Dan Bron Sep 26 '15 at 10:51
  • In case the evolution of the pejorative sense is unclear: most women spun at one point in their lives, but those who married had children and raised families. But spinsters never did; their daily lives consisted of spinning yarn instead of [society's expectation that women] produce and raise a family. In other words, they were still spinning. And of course there were layers and layers of connotations and implications on top of that (unattractive perhaps, or past their prime, still virgins, didn't know what sex was like, uptight, and so on). – Dan Bron Sep 26 '15 at 10:54
  • Similarly, 'misogyny' has – it seems to me – a much rarer female counterpart: 'misandry', as if women could honestly not do without men! 'Misogyny' dates back to 1650, and 'misandry', to 1878! (source: Online Etymology, 'misogyny' and 'misandry') I didn't even know the word existed in French, my mother tongue! – user58319 Mar 10 '16 at 18:45
  • Obviously, since "spinster" is an unmarried female of age, the male equivalent would be a "spinstress". – Hot Licks Mar 10 '16 at 21:40

3 Answers3

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Confirmed bachelor doesn't necessarily have the same connotation of "not being attractive enough," but it does indicate a sense of permanence. It sometimes is a euphemism for homosexuality, but more generally:

Any man uninterested in committed relationships. (Wiktionary)

A couple more:

  • the phrase “confirmed bachelor” describes a man who is having so much fun being single that he’ll probably never marry. (Vocabulary.com)
  • A confirmed bachelor is a man who shows little or no interest in women. It can be used to suggest that they're gay. (UsingEnglish.com)

As mentioned, homosexuality can be implied, but it is by no means the only way to understand this. For example, a Washington Post headline reads:

Confirmed bachelor and 2016 hopeful Lindsey Graham promises a ‘rotating first lady’

But Graham is not openly gay, and the Post is not insinuating that.

Nathaniel is protesting
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    but "Confirmed bachelor" is more about a "gay man" – Tom Sep 25 '15 at 16:16
  • @Tom That's one connotation, but not the only one. – Nathaniel is protesting Sep 25 '15 at 16:18
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    Can you find other term because other dictionary only has 1 meaning for "Confirmed bachelor" which is a gay man? – Tom Sep 25 '15 at 16:20
  • @Tom See updates. – Nathaniel is protesting Sep 25 '15 at 16:38
  • @Nathaniel - MFL is from the 50's, language can change a lot in a few decades. Could the sentence actually be from the original Pygmalion (1913)? –  Sep 25 '15 at 16:44
  • @Josh61 I agree, but it hasn't in this case, as the Post headline suggests. Slang dictionaries bear this out as a legitimate option as well, but I'm not sure how many more references it's worth adding. – Nathaniel is protesting Sep 25 '15 at 16:47
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    @Natheniel, but "confirmed bachelor" does not say that the man is so unattractive that no women want to marry him – Tom Sep 25 '15 at 16:52
  • @Tom No disagreement there. One could potentially make the argument that it implies that the man is "unattractive" in his pride, selfishness, etc., as opposed to physical appearance (as often implied by spinster). But even that is a bit of a stretch. Unfortunately, I'm not currently aware of any better term. – Nathaniel is protesting Sep 25 '15 at 16:56
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    "Confirmed bachelor" has been a well-known and commonly used term for 200 years, at least, and only in the past 20 or so has the connotation of being gay been (rather loosely) attached to it. (And, of course, a lot of "spinster aunts" of the past were gay, but that was largely ignored by society, while any hint of male homosexuality was grounds for social shunning.) – Hot Licks Sep 25 '15 at 17:24
  • I'll add that, in movies of 40-50 years ago, the 30ish male lead in the movie was often referred to by others in the movie as a "confirmed bachelor" because he preferred being a "playboy" to "settling down". (Of course, by the end of the movie the female lead would have him lassoed and hogtied.) (And, of course, movies have no relation to real life.) – Hot Licks Feb 18 '16 at 00:43
  • For once, French is not being sexist: you would have 'vieille fille' for 'spinster' and 'vieux garçon' for 'confirmed bachelor', without any 'gaiety' hinted at! – user58319 Mar 10 '16 at 18:31
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    In the usual nuanced difference in how the sexes are treated, one difference in the terms seems to be that a "confirmed bachelor" is assumed to be so by choice. That is not necessarily assumed for old maids or spinsters. In fact, often the opposite. – Michael Broughton Mar 10 '16 at 19:29
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Lonely old man

Not a single word but this is a common phrase; if you do a Google search the top results are:

  • 10 ways to avoid becoming a lonely old man
  • The Myth of the Lonely Old Man
  • Tips To Avoid Becoming A Lonely Old Man

There is even the notion of lonely old man sitting in a park bench (references).

enter image description here

Sridhar Ratnakumar
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    A lonely old man is far more likely to be a widower or divorced than a bachelor. – phoog Sep 26 '15 at 06:18
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    @phoog - perhaps, but two things stand out: a) nothing in the phrase "a lonely old man" suggest anything about past marital status, b) more and more people are choosing to remain single for much of their lives and as such more and more men will end being that 'lonely old man' without even having married in the first place. Besides, this phrase perfectly captures the tacit social judgement against men of this condition than "confirmed bachelor" does. – Sridhar Ratnakumar Sep 27 '15 at 23:23
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I would say that on the shelf conveys both the same meaning and a very similar connotation.

According to the Cambridge dictionary:

If someone, usually a woman, is on the shelf, she is not ​married and is ​considered too ​old for anyone to ​want to ​marry her.

This phrase was initially coined in for women exclusively, but nowadays can be used for men too, although the phrase confirmed bachelor is used (as Nathaniel pointed out).

Pantelis Sopasakis
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