improper nouns

[Isaac]

I hope improper noun is the correct word for the part of language I'm talking about


in english languge, we have he (him, his), she (her, hers), it (it, its) and they (them, theirs)... I think we should have a set that doesn't denote gender, but is specificly human and singular... currently non of them do that... so I would like to see if anyone can come up with a word by some means... I think removing he(him,his) & she(her,hers) from our common language would be benificial in removing geneder biases...

--thankyou

[Poop]

in english languge, we have he (him, his), she (her, hers), it (it, its) and they (them, theirs)... I think we should have a set that doesn't denote gender, but is specificly human and singular... currently non of them do that... so I would like to see if anyone can come up with a word by some means... I think removing he(him,his) & she(her,hers) from our common language would be benificial in removing geneder biases...

You can just say "he or she" or "she or he." You could say "her or his" or "his or her." You could say "him or her" or "her or him." None of those choices are one word, but I think what you're asking is for people to set out to with the intent to change the language. I don't think that's how language changes; I think it's more of an evolutionary thing.

[Edo]

in english languge, we have he (him, his), she (her, hers), it (it, its) and they (them, theirs)... I think we should have a set that doesn't denote gender, but is specificly human and singular... currently non of them do that... so I would like to see if anyone can come up with a word by some means... I think removing he(him,his) & she(her,hers) from our common language would be benificial in removing geneder biases...

As far as I can tell, gendered pronouns don't change a hell of a lot. Japanese has no gendered pronouns at all (beyond kare and kanojo, which are closer to nouns), but plenty of issues with a deeply patriarchal society.

English is actually pretty workable as far as sexism goes; most of the alternate feminine forms of nouns have disappeared from the language, nouns don't have arbitrary genders attached, and we don't have the plural masculinization of the Romance languages.

[swerve]

some folks in the genderqueer community (yes there is only one and it is a monolith. ( that's a joke, folks.)) use sie instead of he or she, and hir instead of his or her.

but it can be hard to change habits.

[Tom]

I prefer good old s/he. Or, as stepp once pointed out, when you think someone's say, female, but not sure, you do a (s)/he. Pretty neat way of doing it if you ask me.

Of course it doesn't translate well to speaking. Though you could just say "she or he" or "he or she".

You dont need to completely change the nouns to solve the problem. English already has enough options for you to do that.

[swerve]

You dont need to completely change the nouns to solve the problem. English already has enough options for you to do that.

depends on how you define "the problem" doesn't it? i agree that english has a lot of flexibility but in the area of pronouns it really only has two gendered pronoun options and folks who see themselves as neither gender are trying to forge new words. i think it is a fine project.

[Tom]

Oops, good point. I completely overlooked that

[comastalker]

btw, he/she are articles, aren't they ?

in german language, almost all leftist people thay "mensch" rather than "er"/"sie", which is equal to "human"; so, in analogy you'd say "human goes to shool every day".

[jacobhaller]

You'd think English wouldn't keep screwing up. But every gender-neutral word gets a gender-specific meaning. 'Dad,' 'Man,' 'boy,' 'father,' 'son' ... only 'were' first got and then lost a gender-specific meaning.

[travesty*]

My mother talks about this alot - she keep mentioning a Margaret Atwood book, where they call everyone per (short for person), instead of him or her.

English isn't really that bad for its pronouns. We do need a neutered word, for all the people who put themselves (or the Gods put them) in between "categories." One will form itself eventually. Our language is quite adaptive.

If you really want to make a change, attack french - even if you have a million females, if one male is in a group, the group counts as male. Now that's sexist.

[|Y|]

Interesting that this post gets bumped now. I was having an argument with a friend of mine over the singular they recently. I almost use it without thinking about it, as it seems perfectly natural.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they

What's funny is that I was sort of complaining how anarchism has pervaded not only the way I think, but the very way I speak.

With the use of singular they, english can become completely gender neutral.

[Killer]

If you really want to make a change, attack french - even if you have a million females, if one male is in a group, the group counts as male. Now that's sexist.

Feel free to correct me, but I think french is the most sexist language in the world.

With the use of singular they, english can become completely gender neutral.

That´s interesting, I didn´t know of this. Icelandic has he, she, it, and plurals for every of pronoun of the three.

[|Y|]

That´s interesting, I didn´t know of this. Icelandic has he, she, it, and plurals for every of pronoun of the three.

I've always wanted to learn icelandic, but it's like one of the most least spoken "widely spoken" languages out there, if that makes sense. So I decided not to learn it.

I had for the longest time misgivings for english, I thought that it was the "imperialist language," but the more I read about it, it seems to be this bastard child of all lanuages combined (which makes it a complex language, and that is its real flaw). It's genderless if singular they is taken into account.

The hardest thing for me to grasp about spanish is gender.

[Poop]

Feel free to correct me,

Okay.

but I think french is the most sexist language in the world.

You mean French?

[Killer]

The hardest thing for me to grasp about spanish is gender.

I took three spanish courses (since I took the language course), but the gender wasn´t what I found hardest. What I found hardest were the irregular verbs, but that´s probably because I wasn´t really a disciplined student. Given enough time, they should sink in pretty good. Maybe irrelevant to this is that German can also be confusing, gender-wise. For instance, the word used for a girl is neutral (German has three genders, by the way, in case anyone was wondering).