Pronouns

[jgbrowning]

I like the term "it." We use it for every other animal so lets kill the exception.

What animal is it? It's a human!

joe b.

 

[jonesy]

I reccommend that we the following should be included in the english language:

Ve (subject), ver (object), vis (possessive)

And of course verself.

I'm liking this option very much. I've always had problems using he and she (I think I once even managed to refer to Margaret Weis as a he) because the Finnish language doesn't have them. All pronouns in it are neutral. Translating sentences with gender specific pronouns gets really annoying.

 

[Hypersmurf]

I've always had problems using he and she (I think I once even managed to refer to Margaret Weis as a he) because the Finnish language doesn't have them. All pronouns in it are neutral. Translating sentences with gender specific pronouns gets really annoying.

I remember this being a problem for an Estonian girl I knew, as well - her English was very good, except for the gendered pronouns, which were all over the place

-Hyp.

 

[mhacdebhandia]

:The last thing I want to add is a request for people to keep in mind that the use he/his/him for a generic pronoun is not an indicator of sexism. I'm not sexist, and my wife certainly isn't, but we both use "he" in its traditional, generic sense.

I hope I haven't given the impression that I believe you (or your wife) are sexist, because I don't. I have no indications on the matter one way or the other.

What I've been trying to communicate is that the "gender-neutral" usage of "he" is itself, inherently a sexist phenomenon. Not that it was deliberately established that way; most societies on Earth treat masculinity as normative without an explicit or conscious program to do so. Not that anyone who defends it is necessarily sexist themselves; people are capable of supporting the usage for other reasons, such as a desire to preserve the traditional way of doing things. Just that the usage is itself inherently, necessarily gender-biased.

Disagree with that if you like, but obviously I think you're wrong. I also think that the "singular they" is much more likely to become the prevailing usage for the sake of eliminating this perceived gender-bias than is a return to the traditional "gender-neutral" usage of "he". But then, since I'm a descriptivist when it comes to language (English major here, too), it doesn't bother me at all.

 

[mhacdebhandia]

I remember this being a problem for an Estonian girl I knew, as well - her English was very good, except for the gendered pronouns, which were all over the place

As I alluded to earlier, Mandarin Chinese uses the same pronoun, ta, for "he", "she", and "it". It is apparently a point of humour among English speakers of, for instance, Taiwanese descent that their older relatives misuse gendered pronouns in English. I saw it referred to in a play about the historical experiences of Asian-Americans, for instance.

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

I hope I haven't given the impression that I believe you (or your wife) are sexist, because I don't.

No, you haven't; thank you for the assurance, though.

What I've been trying to communicate is that the "gender-neutral" usage of "he" is itself, inherently a sexist phenomenon...the usage is itself inherently, necessarily gender-biased. Disagree with that if you like, but obviously I think you're wrong.

Yeah. I disagree. I think a "gender-neutral" use of he is exactly that: gender neutral (or ambiguous). I don't think using "he" when gender is ambiguous subtly and insidiously twists the way we see the world. I think people are smart enough to understand when such a word is being used in a masculine sense and when it is being used in an ambiguous sense.

I also think that the "singular they" is much more likely to become the prevailing usage for the sake of eliminating this perceived gender-bias than is a return to the traditional "gender-neutral" usage of "he".

I agree; "singular they" is likely to become the preferred usage. You could even argue that there shouldn't be a big problem with this; people are intelligent enough to understand when "they" is being used in a singluar sense and when it is being used in a plural sense...

 

[Hypersmurf]

I agree; "singular they" is likely to become the preferred usage.

I'm an individual, damn it.

I don't like my language implying that plurality is the default condition of humanity.

-Hyp.

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

I'm an individual, damn it.

I don't like my language implying that plurality is the default condition of humanity.

Oppressive, isn't it?

 

[prosfilaes]

I think people are smart enough to understand when such a word is being used in a masculine sense and when it is being used in an ambiguous sense.

I think smart enough is irrelevant here. The complaint is more about how it makes people think. If nurses are always "her" and doctors "him", then even people who may consciously know that there are male nurses and female doctors may assume that the woman who entered the room must be the nurse. People constantly make unconscious judgements, even ones they would know are wrong if they thought about it.

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

If nurses are always "her" and doctors "him", then even people who may consciously know that there are male nurses and female doctors may assume that the woman who entered the room must be the nurse.

It's not the use of "her" that makes people associate "nurse" with women. You've got it backwards. "Her" is often used because people tend to think of nurses as female. As I mentioned, earlier, the gender-baggage is attached to the subject, not to the pronoun.

Many professions got re-labeled somewhere along the way. Stewardess became "flight attendant." Fireman became "firefighter." Nurse just stayed nurse, which may be one reason we still tend to think of the word as being gramatically feminine.

Edit: Was thinking about the nurse thing some more. There has to more to it than just the word being unchanged, because I think the word doctor is no longer considered implicitly male, even though nurse is still considered implicitly female. I'd guess that's because nurses are still women, with few exceptions. Female doctors are quite common, though (much more common than male nurses). All of this is just my impression, though -- I'm not basing it on hard numbers, so I could be mistaken.