I feel this word’s significance significantly differs from words/phrases such as だろう・でしょう ・・ではないか（じゃないか）・・ですか・なのかな~・・のでは, in the sense that it calls under consideration the *possibility* of X without really “asserting” X itself at all, but without directly requesting an answer as a (non-rhetorical) question does.
勘違いしてないでしょうね？ それとも、キ違いしてるかしら？
I find myself wanting to use the word as shorthand to express a certain type of concern/unconfidence,
BUT Jisho.org has it marked as “usu. fem”, and off the top of my head I don’t recall a male character using the word once in any media I’ve consoomed.
どうかな
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I once asked the same question to a Japanese male friend of mine and he told me to just go for the “かな(ぁ)”. I really like かしら but whenever I used it I’d get funny looks. According to that Japanese friend of mine, かしら nowadays is either used by girls or effeminate guys.
Yes it’s definitely got a feminine nuance to it in modern Japanese. I’d also say it’s falling out of fashion in spoken Japanese but maintains popularity in anime/manga/tv.
かな is probably what you’re looking for.
Not to contradict the other answers, but I’d like to add that I personally know a few guys (mostly middle-aged men) who use it. It is somewhat feminine, but not exclusively used by women.
It’s feminine and *posh*. The image is either fancy lady’s, girls who want to give off a refined image, or gay guys/okama (crossdressers).
What about my name あしろ actually it’s my real name besides the -o
Don’t think I ever hear people using that in normal circumstances, even for females. In my experience it’s only used in non-serious situations when people are acting jokingly in a certain way.
It’s a little bit like “perhaps” in English. Imagine someone asking you “are you hungry, perhaps?”. It’s quite weird in daily situations.