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From: edhall@randvax.UUCP (Ed Hall)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: ``They'' vs. ``one'' vs. nothing
Message-ID: <2379@randvax.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 2-Apr-85 04:02:53 EST
Article-I.D.: randvax.2379
Posted: Tue Apr  2 04:02:53 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 5-Apr-85 02:59:12 EST
Distribution: net
Organization: Rand Corp., Santa Monica
Lines: 97

In my previous postings, I've tried to address why I feel the current
state of affairs--with ``he' as the prefered third-person singular
pronoun--is a bad one.  In brief, language is an important molder of
a person's ideas and of their connection to their society.  Studies
show that the mental image created by the use of ``he'' is usually
that of a male person, not a genderless person.  I have to confess
to this, myself.  I don't remember anyone specifically teaching me
this mental image, any more than I remember anyone teaching me that
the ``man'' at the end of ``fireman'' meant someone of the male
gender.  But I have yet to discuss these things with a person--of
either sex--who didn't form the same sort of male-biased image in
their mind, at least when they were a child.

A change needs to be made; what the language needs is a good, genderless,
third-person singular pronoun.  In its current usage ``one'' is
insufficient, since it bears a connotation of ``either you or me''--sort
of a mixture of first and second persons, in terms of nuance, despite its
using a third-person syntax.  Besides, when one uses ``one'', it makes
one sound a bit pretentious, doesn't it?  One sounds like one is putting
on airs...  Still, ``one'' is completely UNambiguous in terms of number;
it is hard to come up with a word that is more forceful in insisting on
its singular nature--a source of problems in using to indicate a
representative of a group.

On the other hand, ``they'' has a very strong sense of third person,
no sense of gender--and a fairly strong sense of plural number.  It
is this latter quality that makes many people--such as Marcel--
have conniption fits when ``they'' is suggested as a third-person
singular pronoun.

This leaves us in a quandry--both of our alternatives seem to have
serious problems.  Yet there is a bit of linguistic history that points
towards a solution: the evolution of the word ``you''.  About two hundred
years ago, ``you'' became a singular as well as a plural pronoun,
replacing ``thee'' and ``thou''.  Of course, this change didn't occur
overnight.  At first it was considered very sloppy usage.  But as time
went on more and more people came to use it, until ``thee'' and ``thou''
became ``old-fashioned'' and then fell from use altogether.

Why did this happen?  I have a hunch: people wanted to use the same
mode of address when speaking to one or several people, and were
tired of constantly having to make the distinction.  Except in very
rare cases the number of people in the speaker's audience made little
difference, or was available from the social context.  Thus little
was lost by making ``you'' more ambiguous, compared to the gain
achived by creating a simpler form of expression.

The same sort of evolutionary change is occuring with ``they''
(with the same howls from those groups resisting the change).
Why?  I can see two reasons.  One, in most of the current usage
of ``he'', number is unimportant except when the ``he'' is an
individual already determined by context.  The generic ``he''
usually refers to an arbitrary individual from a particular
group of one or more.  This is parallel to the use of ``you'',
where number is also unimportant or part of the context.
Two, in most cases where the generic ``he'' is used, *gender*
is unimportant as well.  This is the crux of the issue at hand--
the *unintentional* specification of gender creates a built-in
semantic prejudice for that gender.

All sorts of contrived examples have been generated (some even posted
to the net) ``proving'' how incorrect ``they'' is.  These all have one
or more of the following flaws:

1) A specific individual, of known gender, is being refered to.

2) A singular verb is used with ``they''--compare this to using a
   singular verb with ``you''.  Both sound equally ``wrong''.

3) A plural noun is used in conjunction with ``they'' used in a
   singular sense, or vice-versa.  See the last sentence of my first
   paragraph:  ``... [a] male-biased image in their mind, at least
   when they were a child''.  Note the singular ``mind'', but the
   plural ``they''.

4) A dialog is invented where the loss of the singular/plural
   distinction creates an ambiguity in our perception of the
   situation.  Note that equally ambiguous dialogs can be created
   involving the word ``you''--and are just as likely to happen in
   real life.

5) A singular ``they'' is used in a situation which is specific
   to individuals of a particular sex.  Actually, these examples
   don't bother me much, since gender is generally obvious from
   syntax.

Other than such ``examples'', every complaint against the singular
``they'' seems to boil down to ``it's ungrammatical'' or ``it sounds
bad''.  To each of these, I answer (in addition to the 200+ lines
of stuff I've posted on this): ``Time will tell.''  20 years from
now, I suspect that singular ``they'' will be firmly established in
the mainstream of English--unless reactionaries manage to whip up
enough backlash to reverse the trend.  It is from such fears that
I find the motivation to write.

		-Ed Hall
		decvax!randvax!edhall