h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

O magistra, what we should do is ask! this is the policy adopted in certain areas of the Language thing and seems to be a great ice breaker!

Vale!

It's easy (although somewhat socially awkward ) when conversing to say 'Is you a he or is you a she?' Wouldn't it be nice, though, if our profiles had a field where we could indicate which we are/prefer to be?

I have a harder time with our entries in Peer Review where we're supposed to use the plural pronoun to indicate indeterminate gender. I also hate it. It's grammatically wrong. It grates on the ear. When I write, I use 'he or she' or similar wording if possible, but if you use this wording several times in the article, it also sounds awkward. Sigh...

I vaguely remember reading a sci-fi novel where the characters used pronouns like 'te', 'tes' (possessive) and 'tem' (objective). It was weird at first but you got used to it as you went along.

I've heard of that te/tes/tem thing too. We must have read the same book, though I don't remember what it was.

I've started automatically using the plural 'they' now, which is starting to bother me because I usually think of myself as a grammatical person. But now this error is creeping into my English! Ah well, in ten years or so maybe it won't be an error. Language does change - I've got nothing against that.

Couldn't you try rephrasing the embarrasing or difficult phrase?

eg instead of 'Echo said that the sky is blue, didn't he/she/it/Echo?'

you could try 'Didn't Echo say that the sky was blue?'

atomic iguana



...please be gentle with me, it's my first typo...

That makes sense, Iguana. But when you have to keep using the person's name in every sentence, instead of switching to personal pronouns like we usually do, it does start to sound rather odd. I have the feeling I'm starting to sound deliberately difficult about this, but it is, I feel, a prescient concern.

I can see how it might be a problem over an extended piece, if you are talking about someone rather than to someone!

If your repeating the pronoun instead of the persons name, are you not just disguising the repetetive structure with shorter words? I mean, spoken language has a place for this kind of structure, but is it also the case for written language? Maybe there is a place for this in written speech?

Maybe it's just a matter of personal style? I know several people who repeat a persons name in RL conversation, where I would tend to avoid that and use the personal pronouns.

Can you show me a fuller example of what you mean by switching to personal pronouns?

BTW I don't think your being deliberatly difficult at all, and I enjoyed reading this article

Okay, say I was talking to some other scouts about Researcher X's entry, assuming that I knew X was a female:

My concern about X's entry is that it doesn't include enough detail about the subject. X really needs to flesh out her writing and include more under the last two headers. I understand that she considers herself an expert on the subject, but most of the readers of this entry aren't going to have any idea what she means by some of her information, and so she needs to add to it to make it more accessible to the average reader.

Now say I were to replace every instance of 'she' with the Researcher's name, X:

My concern about X's entry is that it doesn't include enough detail about the subject. X really needs to flesh out X's writing and include more under the last two headers. I understand that X considers herself an expert on the subject, but most of the readers of this entry aren't going to have any idea what X means by some of X's information, and so X needs to add to it to make it more accessible to the average reader.

Okay, so some of it doesn't sound too bad in parts, but there are also bits where this way of writing just isn't feasible.

I've been using 'they' for years... decades really, and probably for that reason it doesn't grate on my ear; it certainly grates less to me than 'he or she' or any of the more artificial forms which have been created.

It is also useful because it can fly below the radar. I am quite good at hearing it in conversation: I remember an entire evening spent in a pub with a man referring to a previous partner as 'they' - I assumed he was gay, my ex simply didn't hear it and assumed he was straight, which was probably the intention.

There are people here who are gender-ambiguous for a whole variety of reasons, and it gets easier to deal with not knowing what their gender is as you get used to it.

Ben

Well, if we assume you are writing about the entry, and not X, we could rephrase something like this:

My concern about X's entry is that it doesn't include enough detail about the subject. It realy needs to be fleshed out and include more under the last two headers. I understand that X considers themself an expert on the subject, but most of the readers of this entry aren't going to have any idea what some of this information means, it needs something added to it to make it more accessible to the average reader.

Note how the sentence about X being an expert is thrown sharply into relief by this exercise - there is no way of rephrasing this without refering X's opinion of themself, and begs the question - are you realy talking about the entry, or about X? Personaly at this stage I would just scrap that phrase, it doesn't matter how much of an expert someone is, or thinks they are, if they've written a load of rubbish.

What your realy expressing is your opinion

My concern about X's entry is that it doesn't include enough detail about the subject. It realy needs to be fleshed out and include more under the last two headers. I dont think most of the readers of this entry are going to have any idea what some of this information means, it needs something added to it to make it more accessible to the average reader.

What do you think?

atomic iguana

It's quite fun being gender free online: some people choose to be gender free: but no so fun being gender free in real life. Do you think I used too many colons in that sentance?

Being a transsexual I sometimes get refered to with a gender free pronoun in real life and it's usually meant as an insult.

It's saying 'you're not a real man, just because you didn't start out as one'.

Being gender-free online has never been particularly attractive to me. Being female is an important part of who I am, so I'm always quite sure to make my gender clear - hence my recent adoption of the Gender Code in the end.

Yes, I think you did use too many colons in that sentence. That's okay, though.

People do tend not to notice 'they' anymore, Ben; I'm guilty of that myself. And then I wonder why it matters. I suppose the word is becoming common enough that we can consider it a part of language and not just an ungrammatical error. Everyone understands what we mean; and it's not as if language doesn't change.

Your points make sense, Iguana. I was just making something up off the top of my head to illustrate a point; I wouldn't really say that in PR. My point was about the personal pronouns being used in the context where I most often run across them. But thank you for your comments anyway.

Hi EMR

*waves*

*Really* interesting piece. I happen to think that the way that 'they' are used these days is so common place that it's become grammatically incorrect.

Correct even..

I think in some ways I have to agree, Z. 'They' still grates on my ear, but as an amateur linguist I understand that language changes and I'm open to that possibility.

Interesting..

I happen to think that..


Given that we need a gender neural pronoun and that given that the alturnatives hir sie etc are so awful that 'they' is the best of a bad lot.

When I first came here it was important to me that people got my gender right; I think I saw it as a matter of courtesy to other people and also I wanted to be liked and accepted.

Now I am not nearly as bothered about either thing, and don't mind what assumptions people make about me. I assume that people can work out who and what I am from what I post, and that is one of the reasons why my PS is blank. The other is that I really cannot work out what to put there.

Ben

As to what to put on your PS: that's easy! Talk about yourself, about what you're into, about the various things you do on h2g2, about what you like about h2g2, about some cool places for people to go to on h2g2, about entries you've written...

But I sort of like that you've left yours blank. It's saying something just like volumes of information (like on my PS!) does, just in a slightly different way. Perhaps it says more. As they say, silence speaks volumes.

I'd agree with Z, 'they' and 'tem' are not as bad as 'zie' 'hir' etc, and I'd try to use that even if I knew the gender of the person I was refering to if I could make it read nicely, unless their gender was relevant.

I just re-read what I posted earlier Echo, I hope it didn't sound like I was lecturing! (If it did ) I just wanted to show how it might be possible to rephrase something so you didnt need to use the personal pronouns so much.

atomic iguana