I cannot use them/they/their as first person singular

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Wendy Croom

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I know it's the thing these days, but I cannot do it. It's like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. I wrote a paper for English class 40 years ago bemoaning the lack of non-gendered first person singular. I got a C on it because the only option I could come up with was "one".
Can we start a brainstorming session to come up with a solution? I want to be inclusive, but I need it to be grammatical.
 

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As far as I'm aware, the singular they is perfectly grammatical now. Language changes and evolves over time, and both the Chicago Manual Style and the Associated Press (AP) style book approve of the singular they. I don't mean to sound harsh, but I doubt any alternative will be as widely accepted. This may be something you just need to get used to.
 

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Singular "they" goes back to the 1600s, IIRC.

There are a number of gender-neutral pronouns in use out there if you can't bring yourself to use "they," but I think it's worth remembering that language is fluid. Choose your strategy, and practice until you become comfortable.
 

mccardey

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I know it's the thing these days, but I cannot do it. It's like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. I wrote a paper for English class 40 years ago bemoaning the lack of non-gendered first person singular. I got a C on it because the only option I could come up with was "one".
Can we start a brainstorming session to come up with a solution? I want to be inclusive, but I need it to be grammatical.

Start by doing. Then keep doing it. It's not really something you cannot do. You want to be inclusive? Then force yourself through the nails-on-a-chalkboard/evolving-pronoun nexus. Reframe the new pronoun as opportunity - something really easy that you can do to help include other people along the lines that they're requesting.
 
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pharm

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Singular they is perfectly grammatical. I also very much doubt it's "nails on the chalkboard" the 9 times out of 10 you don't even notice yourself using it.

But even if it were:
Start by doing. Then keep doing it. It's not really something you cannot do. You want to be inclusive? Then force yourself through the nails-on-a-chalkboard/evolving-pronoun nexus. Reframe the new pronoun as opportunity - something really easy that you can do to help include other people along the lines that they're requesting.
 

Ellis Clover

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The thing with enby (non-binary) [and PoC, Romani, First Nations and other marginalised groups of] people - these are all *real* people whose real lives are affected by others' choice to exclude them. Your refusal to adopt inclusive terminology, at zero personal cost to you, causes real harm. Why not just do it? I promise it's super easy - and even if it wasn't, it's the right thing to do.
 
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katfireblade

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Okay, so I'm making an assumption here. I'm sorry if it's wrong.

99% of the time I've noticed that when people bemoan the singular "they," they're generally upset because some English teacher, parent and/or other grammar-correcting type-person hammered into them it was wrong. Hard. So I'm assuming this is what's going on here, and my answer will be framed accordingly.

Firstly, lots of people like to assume this is a new and edgy thing, PC going overboard or some such nonsense. This is terribly incorrect.

In fact, the singular "they" has been in use for literal centuries. The earliest documentation of it's use is in 1375, in the medieval romance William and the Werewolf. That it showed up in a written document also implies that it had been in accepted use much, much longer than that. It wasn't until the 17th century that a lot of grammar-correctionists started laying down the law about "they" being a plural pronoun and stating that the singular "you" should be used instead--ironic considering that "you" was also once a plural pronoun that later became singular. And by "later," I mean, in 1660 George Fox wrote an entire book stating that anyone who used the singular you was an idiot or a fool. It took less than a century to make that grammar book obsolete.

Though teachers and a whole bunch of know-it-alls put the smackdown on the singular "they," there is evidence that it has never truly stopped being used. Examples of it can be found in many written works from the 18th century on, the most hilarious of which was a dude mansplaining to three women in the New Bedford Medley in 1794 why singular use "they" was awful and wrong (and insulting them while doing so), to which they tartly replied that they were using it deliberately to conceal gender and if he was so smart then he should come up with a better term. To my knowledge he never replied.

It's been so common it even shows up in classic literature by authors like Jane Austen, Henry James, Charles Dickens, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

So what did the language police replace the singular "they" with? Why...the "nongendered" he. This is where humankind became mankind, when we started referring to every animal of unknown gender as "he," when the use of language started sweeping women and non-binary people out the door, then firmly shutting it behind them. Language follows thought, but thought also can follow language--if you don't believe it, then ask why the CDC is no longer allowed to use the phrase global warming, but must instead resort to the much more friendly sounding climate change, or why an anti-gay hate organization might pick a name like the American Family Association? We react powerfully and unconsciously to words and phrases--it's why well written propaganda and advertisements are so danged effective on us.

But the worst part was that "he" was never really used as a universal pronoun. Instead "he" implied and was used as male. For example, if one was writing about a nurse, secretary, or other job largely seen as feminine work, people defaulted to she even when they didn't know the gender of the person being written about. On the flip side, when talking about jobs seen as traditionally male--soldier, president, doctor--people defaulted to "he," again, even when the gender of the person in question was unknown. This isn't an old problem, this is something that started almost right away and has continued to this very day. You might recognize this particular topic, since it's one of a slew of conversations that are currently being held about the many problems surrounding trying to turn an obviously gendered pronoun neutral.

One of the compromises we had for a while was using "he/she" in writing, but not only was that awkward to read, but it was extremely cumbersome to try and say aloud. For example: Teachers need to catch their students' attention, so he or she needs to make his or her presentation as engaging as possible. When faced with mouthfuls like that, most people just dropped a gender. Usually the female one. And now that we're acknowledging that humans can and always have come in more than two genders, this compromise becomes even more limiting.

And that's the heart of the issue; we have never come up with a better term. We've tried--there must be several dozen suggestions running around out there--but many have problems or just never caught on (for example: zir/zim is too close to a misspelled her/him or sir/him and brings those pronouns to mind). The singular "they," on the other hand, never truly lost traction. It's been in common use through almost three centuries of various authorities doing their level best to make it disappear, and in accepted use five or more centuries before that.

Honestly, you have seen it, read it, and probably even used it without realizing it. The very fact that you made it through school, read classic works by some of the authors listed above, and likely never noticed it tells me that, like many people, you were so familiar with it's usage as to make it virtually unnoticeable. I mean, until a language movement swooped in out of nowhere and threw a great big shiny spotlight on the term.

I think of the singular "they" like a rubber band--attempts to pluck it out of the language simply ended in it snapping back, and giving a lot of perfectly intelligent and wonderful people's ideas of proper grammar quite the sting when it did so. ;)

Considering the word's history and how things are going I'd say to give all the English & Grammar Police from your childhood a middle finger and find peace with the word. Not only is it not going anywhere, but it never really did. It's been stealthing through our language the whole time, looking at us with woebegone eyes and asking if we finally consider it a good puppy and can it come out of the doghouse now?

We just...relented and said yes. :)

But honestly, I do get hating certain words--I despise ginormous. But I'm fine with moist. Go figure. (Also, "ain't" is my favorite legitimate contraction ever to be forgotten--I might be a bit of a word geek.)
 
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mccardey

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Okay, so I'm making an assumption here. I'm sorry if it's wrong.

99% of the time I've noticed that when people bemoan the singular "they," they're generally upset because some English teacher, parent and/or other grammar-correcting type-person hammered into them it was wrong. Hard. So I'm assuming this is what's going on here, and my answer will be framed accordingly.

Firstly, lots of people like to assume this is a new and edgy thing, PC going overboard or some such nonsense. This is terribly incorrect.

In fact, the singular "they" has been in use for literal centuries. The earliest documentation of it's use is in 1375, in the medieval romance William and the Werewolf. That it showed up in a written document also implies that it had been in accepted use much, much longer than that. It wasn't until the 17th century that a lot of grammar-correctionists started laying down the law about "they" being a plural pronoun and stating that the singular "you" should be used instead--ironic considering that "you" was also once a plural pronoun that later became singular. And by "later," I mean, in 1660 George Fox wrote an entire book stating that anyone who used the singular you was an idiot or a fool. It doesn't take that long for language to change, or for a new generation to shrug off what an older one swears by.

Though teachers and a whole bunch of know-it-alls put the smackdown on the singular "they," there is evidence that it has never truly stopped being used. Examples of it can be found in many written works from the 18th century on, the most hilarious of which was a dude mansplaining to three women in the New Bedford Medley in 1794 why singular use "they" was awful and wrong (and insulting them while doing so), to which they tartly replied that they were using it deliberately to conceal gender and if he was so smart then he should come up with a better term. To my knowledge he never replied.

It's been so common it even shows up in classic literature by authors like Jane Austen, Henry James, Charles Dickens, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

So what did the historians replace the singular "they" with? Why...the "nongendered" he. This is where humankind became mankind, when we started referring to every animal of unknown gender as "he," when the use of language started sweeping women and non-binary people out the door, then firmly shutting it behind them. Language follows thought, but thought also can follow language--if you don't believe it, then ask why the CDC is no longer allowed to use the phrase global warming, but must instead resort to the much more friendly sounding climate change, or why an anti-gay hate organization might pick a name like the American Family Association? We react powerfully and unconsciously to words and phrases--it's why well written propaganda and advertisements are so danged effective on us.

But the worst part was that "he" was never really used as a universal pronoun. Instead "he" implied and was used as male. For example, if one was writing about a nurse, secretary, or other job largely seen as feminine work, people defaulted to she even when they didn't know the gender of the person being written about. On the flip side, when talking about jobs seen as traditionally male--soldier, president, doctor--people defaulted to "he," again, even when the gender of the person in question was unknown. This isn't an old problem, this is something that started almost right away and has continued to this very day. You might recognize this particular topic, since it's one of a slew of conversations that are currently being held about the many problems surrounding trying to turn an obviously gendered pronoun neutral.

One of the compromises we had for a while was using "he/she" in writing, but not only was the awkward to read, but it was extremely cumbersome to try and say aloud. For example: Teachers need to catch their students' attention, so he or she needs to make his or her presentation as engaging as possible. When faced with mouthfuls like that, most people just dropped a gender. Usually the female one. And now that we're acknowledging that humans can and always have come in more than two genders, this compromise becomes even more limiting.

And that's the heart of the issue; we have never come up with a better term. We've tried--there must be several dozen suggestions running around out there--but many have problems or just never caught on (for example: zir/zim is too close to a misspelled her/him or sir/him and brings those pronouns to mind). The singular "they," on the other hand, never truly lost traction. It's been in common use through almost three centuries of various authorities doing their level best to make it disappear, and in accepted use five or more centuries before that.

Honestly, you have seen it, read it, and probably even used it without realizing it. The very fact that you made it through school, read classic works by some of the authors listed above, and likely never noticed it tells me that, like many people, you were so familiar with it's usage as to make it virtually unnoticeable. I mean, until a language movement swooped in out of nowhere and threw a great big shiny spotlight on the term.

I think of the singular "they" like a rubber band--attempts to pluck it out of the language simply ended in it snapping back, and giving a lot of perfectly intelligent and wonderful people's ideas of proper grammar quite the sting when it did so. ;)

Considering the word's history and how things are going I'd say to give all the English & Grammar Police from your childhood a middle finger and find peace with the word. Not only is it not going anywhere, but it never really did. It's been stealthing through our language the whole time, looking at us with woebegone eyes and asking if we finally consider it a good puppy and can it come out of the doghouse now?

We just...relented and said yes. :)

But honestly, I do get hating certain words--I despise ginormous. But I'm fine with moist. Go figure. (Also, "ain't" is my favorite legitimate contraction ever to be forgotten--I might be a bit of a word geek.)


All of this - but esp the bolded.
 

RCRichardson

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What's your solution, if you're not happy to use they/them?


Well, Helix, I know this isn't going to be popular, but I would go back to the generic "he," which is what was hammered into my head when I went to school back in the late 1800's.

While it might sound sexist by today's standards, sometimes the alternative ("they/their/them") can be just as illogical. For example . . .


"All I know," said the sea captain, "is that whoever died alone on that island took their last breath two days ago."


As an alternate solution this might sound extreme, but maybe we should treat people like animals and refer to them as "it" . . .


"The infamous White-Top Murderer," said Holmes, "made one mistake--it didn't take off its shoes before it ran into the woods."
"How could it have made such a mistake?" asked Watson.
"We'll just have to ask it when we find it," replied Homes, silently wondering if it would be found guilty by a judge who wore its own white wig on the top of its own head.



It kind of makes you question the sex of "Cousin It" on "The Addams Family" (ha,ha!).
 
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mccardey

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Well, Helix, I know this isn't going to be popular, but I would go back to the generic "he," which is what was hammered into my head when I went to school back in the late 1800's.

While it might sound sexist by today's standards, sometimes the alternative ("they/their/them") can be just as illogical. For example . . .


"All I know," said the sea captain, "is that whoever died alone on that island took their last breath two days ago."


As an alternate solution this might sound extreme, but maybe we should treat people like animals and refer to them as "it" . . .


"The infamous White-Top Murderer," said Holmes, "made one mistake--it didn't take off its shoes before it ran into the woods."
"How could it have made such a mistake?" asked Watson.
"We'll just have to ask it when we find it," replied Homes, silently wondering if it would be found guilty by a judge who wore its own white wig on the top of its own head.



It kind of makes you question the sex of "Cousin It" on "The Addams Family" (ha,ha!).

omg *sigh*
 

Helix

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Well, Helix, I know this isn't going to be popular, but I would go back to the generic "he," which is what was hammered into my head when I went to school back in the late 1800's.

While it might sound sexist by today's standards, sometimes the alternative ("they/their/them") can be just as illogical. For example . . .


"All I know," said the sea captain, "is that whoever died alone on that island took their last breath two days ago."


Sounds fine to me. Why is that illogical? You know that you can still use he and she. Or have you fallen for the nonsense that 'they' (in the plural) are coming for mah words?

As an alternate solution this might sound extreme, but maybe we should treat people like animals and refer to them as "it" . . .


"The infamous White-Top Murderer," said Holmes, "made one mistake--it didn't take off its shoes before it ran into the woods."
"How could it have made such a mistake?" asked Watson.
"We'll just have to ask it when we find it," replied Homes, silently wondering if it would be found guilty by a judge who wore its own white wig on the top of its own head.


Something that never changes in discussions like these is selection of preposterous examples used to shore up a dodgy argument. This one is particularly silly. I mean, Sherlock Holmes would know which pronoun to use.

It kind of makes you question the sex of "Cousin It" on "The Addams Family" (ha,ha!).

Why would you do that? Do you not understand the joke?
 

ap123

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Well, Helix, I know this isn't going to be popular, but I would go back to the generic "he," which is what was hammered into my head when I went to school back in the late 1800's.

While it might sound sexist by today's standards, sometimes the alternative ("they/their/them") can be just as illogical. For example . . .


"All I know," said the sea captain, "is that whoever died alone on that island took their last breath two days ago."


As an alternate solution this might sound extreme, but maybe we should treat people like animals and refer to them as "it" . . .


"The infamous White-Top Murderer," said Holmes, "made one mistake--it didn't take off its shoes before it ran into the woods."
"How could it have made such a mistake?" asked Watson.
"We'll just have to ask it when we find it," replied Homes, silently wondering if it would be found guilty by a judge who wore its own white wig on the top of its own head.



It kind of makes you question the sex of "Cousin It" on "The Addams Family" (ha,ha!).

They/their/them doesn't sound illogical to me. Again, they/them/their is a very old and accepted usage. And if it did sound illogical to me, it wouldn't matter, because language is fluid. As people who write, we need to know and accept that.

As for the second half of your post, I think (hope) you're joking, but know the room. And in this room, which represents a cross section of human beings in the year 2019, there are people who will be (rightly) offended by those jokes, whose actual lives are threatened by people who make those types of comments.
 

Bing Z

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<start rant>
I hate the use of singular "they/them." I know it is accepted by some style guides. I still hate it. It is either ambiguous with a plural noun when the number of subjects is not known (or forgotten) or plain ugly with a singular verb. I don't understand why activists/linguists can't be as creative as teens on social media and create/popularize new words to do the job. I don't care which--zhe, eyeuk, pospudfs--just a unique identifier.

When I have to write things with gender-neutral pronoun, I try to reword the entire sentence. If I can't, I rewrite the whole thing for plural, so the 'they/them' becomes plural and I can use plural verbs w/o appearing stupid to myself. I don't care if it's supposed to be intended for one. It is now for many. Political correctness makes things fuzzy, anyway.

PS: On this board, I have noticed that very often an (unnamed) agent is referred to as she/her, rarely they/them or he/him.
</end rant>
Please go on with the discussion.
 

sandree

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I was critiqued (on another site) on some chapters in which I used they/them/their when referring to a non binary character. The general response ranged from confusion to grammar admonitions. Not one crit did not point out that this was a problem area in my piece. I don’t think these comments were bigoted, they were just a response to how awkward it sounded to their ear.

I went back and tried to refer to the character by name and use the plural more often but that sounded awkward as well. I think, perhaps, using another set of pronouns altogether might be more clear and easier for the ear to catch on to and accept.
 

lizmonster

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I was critiqued (on another site) on some chapters in which I used they/them/their when referring to a non binary character. The general response ranged from confusion to grammar admonitions. Not one crit did not point out that this was a problem area in my piece. I don’t think these comments were bigoted, they were just a response to how awkward it sounded to their ear.

I went back and tried to refer to the character by name and use the plural more often but that sounded awkward as well. I think, perhaps, using another set of pronouns altogether might be more clear and easier for the ear to catch on to and accept.

I ended up restructuring a lot of sentences for my enby character - primarily I used their name, and used "they" when it wouldn't be ambiguous.

But everyone who didn't know in advance the character was enby assumed they were a he.

If I were to do it over, I'd use they/them more often, or I'd use a different nonbinary pronoun. I
liked the flow I ended up with, but it did annoy me to have the character misgendered.

As a more meta-comment on this thread: it might be an interesting thought exercise for people to think about how they'd feel if someone seriously suggested "he" (for example) was just too awkward and jarring. People fall into more than two buckets, and when you assert that using one of two rigid pronouns is the "right" way to do it, you're erasing a whole lot of actual living human beings.

I was taught "no singular they" as well, back in the dark ages. You know what? I got over it.
 

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I know it's the thing these days, but I cannot do it. It's like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. I wrote a paper for English class 40 years ago bemoaning the lack of non-gendered first person singular. I got a C on it because the only option I could come up with was "one".
Can we start a brainstorming session to come up with a solution? I want to be inclusive, but I need it to be grammatical.

The problem is with you, not with English grammar.

Chaucer uses singular they. Jane Austen uses singular they. So the answer is to write harder if you object to singular they so terribly much.

Or learn Old English, which has a dual pronoun.

Emma Bull managed to write without using a gendered pronoun for the protagonist for an entire novel in Bone Dance. Ann Leckie has done the same for three books, in her Ancillary trilogy.

Finally, I'm going to remind people about Respecting Your Fellow Writer. Read The Newbie Guide to Absolute Write. We're serious about it. We have all sorts of members. Be respectful.
 
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