From: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Newsgroups: sci.lang,alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: New words for gender neutral pronouns in English
Date: 24 Aug 92 02:53:41 GMT
Organization: Princeton University
Originator: news@nimaster

In article <10476@spark.ed.ac.uk> iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A Derzhanski) writes:
>In article <1992Aug21.235443.23863@Princeton.EDU> roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:
>>In article <10455@scott.ed.ac.uk> iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A Derzhanski) writes:
>>>In article <1992Aug20.160932.7499@rdg.dec.com> cockburn@edieng.enet.dec.com (Craig Cockburn) writes:

>>>>Thought readers here might appreciate these old notes, posted 6 years ago
>>>>on the singular use of "they" in English. This usage dates from 1526 <...>

>>>>I hope that this will establish in everyone's minds that the use of 
>>>>singular "they" is as correct as anything can be in English.

>>>The use of singular "they" is as correct as anything can be because it
>>>dates from 1526?  

>>Oh, come off it.  Do you see a "Therefore" between the two paragraphs?

>Yes, I do, - an implied one.  Don't you see it?  Otherwise how can the
>old notes, which are all about the age of singular "they", establish
>anything regarding its correctness in people's minds?

The statements are not all about age.  They are about continuity of
usage, usage by the best writers, specific sentences and situations in
which "they" has long been used, etc.  

However, the "age" argument itself is necessary, to counteract all the
"PC" bullshit.

>>><...>  Given that every single Indo-European language (bar
>>>the few which have lost the category of gender) uses its equivalent of
>>>`he' as a gender-neutral pronoun, I can't help thinking that this was
>>>the strategy of Proto-Indo-European, Proto-Germanic, etc., and in this
>>>sense gender-neutral "he" is the original state of affairs, hence as
>>>natural as anything. 

>>Au contraire!

>Pas du tout.  In the subsequent paragraph you actually confirm what
>I'm saying here, and I welcome the additions.

>>English STOPPED using genders for things other than
>>humans and the occasional animal; accordingly, gender became closely
>>allied with sex in English, unlike all those other languages.
>>Accordingly, English-speakers felt the need for a generic singular that
>>was NOT male- or female-gendered, because they did not always wish to
>>specify the sex of the person being referred to.

>This sounds very reasonable.  I may not quite see how that need arose,

I'll tell you again.  Gendered words (the personal pronouns) were
*almost always* used for identification of a person's sex.  That is, the
gender-sex connection became far stronger in English than in other
languages.  Nobody thinks of a penis when they hear "der Tisch" in
German.  When we hear a gendered pronoun, we think of a person -- and
have to loop back to see whether a male or just anyone was meant by
"he." Often we can't tell.  So we often avoid the use of "he," as with
"someone, anyone, everybody," etc.  And some other situations require
it, too, as with "Who makes you their confidant?"   Answering "Jane" to
the question "Who makes you his confidant?" is pretty weird to most
English speakers.

>but I'd like to thank you for being the first netter to propose an
>explanation of the fact that English, of all languages, developed a
>gender-neutral pronoun in addition to a full set of gender-specific ones.

Well, I'm certainly not the first to propose this.  In fact, someone
posted a long linguistic discussion of "they" just a few days ago.

>'Tis a very long time that I've been asking for such an explanation,
>and the response was always an argument from political correctness.

The OED, Evans and Evans, and a hundred other sources would ahve helped.

>Of course, now I'm going to ask what pronoun was used as a generic
>singular BEFORE English stopped using genders for things other than
>humans and the occasional animal, and before English speakers felt the
>need for an ungendered generic pronoun.  I suggest to you that it was
>the same one that is used in all other Indo-European languages, viz.
>the third person singular masculine pronoun.

Right.  And after the big language change that began in 1066, that old
way just didn't do anymore.  English lost most of its inflections for
nouns and pronouns (it had been fully inflected, like German or Latin,
previously), and the rules of inflection that had been natural, because
used all over every sentence, became less crucial, and were observed
less strictly.  That's why one can say "She is as tall as me": the
inflected structure was replaced by a positional structure. 

But this didn't solve the g-s problem.  Sex and gender became more and
more intertwined.  And "they" was often used as a g-s.  Not until Latin
grammars were used as the basis for the first English grammars did this
bug anyone; at no time has the enforcement of the male-inclusive rule
succeeded.

So, as far as "natural state of affairs" goes, I'd say that the
evolution of a language by its speakers over a millenium, give or take,
is as natural as it gets.  

>>Now calm down and look at the argument you call "ridiculous" [that
>>"[i]t was only later grammarians who tried to enforce the rule that
>>they are plural words, and force us to use 'he', etc.]  a little more
>>closely.

>I'm quite calm, just a little annoyed by being told that grammarians
>have invented (copied from Latin, whatever) something that evidently
>has always been there.

But it hasn't!  It went away until the Latinists tried to drag it back.

>>It is *not* an argument from antiquity; instead, it is an
>>argument from continuity.  The usage has been established for a long
>>time, AND IS STILL WITH US.  i.e., it has not changed.

>Can't the same argument from continuity be made for gender-neutral "he",
>which is older than singular "they", and is also still with us?

Right.  Both are in use.  (Which is the thing the "grammatically
correct" can't stand.)

>>Why does this matter? Because the usual criticism of generic-singular
>>"they" is that it is a modern coinage, brought about by "political
>>correctness" or some such nonsense.

>It is not nonsense, it is a legitimate impression, albeit probably an
>incorrect one.  You see, that's what one encounters all the time.  Not

Really?  

>an argument from continuity, not one which links singular "they" to
>other developments in the English language, but an argument from
>political correctness.  Those who would tell us that gender-neutral
>"he" is unfair to women etc. often sound as though they have invented
>singular "they". 

Look, nobody's perfect.

> Hence the reaction of those of us who actively
>dislike political correctness (or some of its incarnations).

Alas, most of those who claim to disdain it. are also those who label
the things they don't like, "PC."

>This, incidentally, is also my response to E Kirschenbaum's reply
>to E Sommarskog's remark.

>In any case, I'll admit that singular "they" is not a modern coinage
>invented by feminists, but neither is gender-neutral "he" a (less)
>modern coinage invented by grammarians.

Both true.  Both usages are well-established; both have been felt to be
necessary over the centuries.  Alas, the privilege of "He" has been
abused by the Latinists, though, and *has* been used to exclude women by
the Politically Convenient.

>>The usage is, and has long been, standard and accepted and often
>>preferred by great speakers and writers.

>Often preferred?  Often, but not always?  So gender-neutral "he" never
>completely disappeared from English, even for a short time?

No, not so far as I know.

Roger