Dictator needed

Posted Mar 30, 2012 12:42 UTC (Fri) by nix (subscriber, #2304)
In reply to: Dictator needed by sorpigal
Parent article: Fedora release naming "is a" bit contentious

"They" is just wrong; we don't need another "you" in this language.. Being absolutely wrong using "they" as singular is not better than being sometimes wrong about the possible gender of the referent.

Sigh, not this again.

MWDEU is scathing:

1. Common-gender pronoun. [...] the plural pronouns have been pressed into use to supply the missing form since Middle English [quote from Chaucer elided]...
A second kind of reference connects they, their, them to singular nouns that can apply to both sexes. Again, we can see that the practice has a long history: [quotes from Swift, Goldsmith, Thackeray, Spencer, Orwell and Burchfield elided].
As most commentators note, the traditional pronoun for each of these cases is the masculine third person singular, he, his, him. This tradition goes back to the 18th-century grammarians, who boxed themselves into the poisition by first deciding that the indefinite pronouns must always be singular. They then had to decide between the masculine and feminine singular pronouns for use in reference to the indefinites, and they chose the masculine (they were, of course, all men).

MWDEU also provides a wonderful example of a place where the use of anything but singular/indefinite they (or, I suppose, feminine singular) goes terribly wrong:

... everyone will be able to decide for himself whether or not to have an abortion -- Albert Blumenthal, NY State Assembly (cited in Longman 1984).

As for 'he or she', MWDEU has this to say (in addition to a whole entry on the subject, analyzing it in some depth):

Some commentators recommend he or she, his or herhim or her to avoid the sex bias of the masculine and the presumed solecism of the plural. Bollinger 1980 points out that this solution, too, is old, going back to the 18th century, but that many commentators are also hostile to the forms as unwieldy... Even the he or she formula can lead the unwary into trouble, as in this instance where it is used to refer to a plural pronoun:

Those who have been paid for the oil on his or her property -- Lucia Mouat, Christian Science Monitor, 4 Aug. 1983 (cited by Allan Metcalf, American Speech, Fall 1984).

So, yes, 'they' is just wrong, as long as you consider Chaucer, Swift, Thackeray, Orwell, and, hell, pretty much every other English speaker of the last thousand years whose words have been recorded to be wrong. (It is notable how many treatises decrying singular/indefinite they then proceed to accidentally use it within the next chapter. It is part of English. Live with it.)

to post comments

singular they

Posted Mar 31, 2012 17:33 UTC (Sat) by giraffedata (guest, #1954) [Link] (8 responses)

So, yes, 'they' is just wrong, as long as you consider Chaucer, Swift, Thackeray, Orwell, and, hell, pretty much every other English speaker of the last thousand years whose words have been recorded to be wrong.

You haven't even come close to showing that pretty much every English speaker of the last thousand years whose words have been recorded used singular they.

Also, speakers from hundreds of years ago are not very relevant to what should be considered correct today. People who care about grammar reject much of the grammar of Chaucer and Shakespeare for current use.

English grammar rules tend to be arbitrary, so it doesn't matter much if one was established recently, in defiance of previous usage. For whatever reason a person seeks to follow rules of grammar, a rule such as "'they' is plural" that has been in place since it was manufactured by 17th century grammarians counts. (Of course, so do others that might conflict with that one).

singular they

Posted Mar 31, 2012 17:57 UTC (Sat) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (7 responses)

For whatever reason a person seeks to follow rules of grammar, a rule such as "'they' is plural" that has been in place since it was manufactured by 17th century grammarians counts.

The problem with that »rule« is that it is largely based on wishful thinking on the part of grammar prescriptivists, 17th century or otherwise.

If you disagree, check out Language Log, where some of the most important real-life, 21st century, English grammarians hang out. If Geoffrey K. Pullum, who is a linguistics professor at the University of Edinburgh and a co-author of The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language – widely considered definitive – says that singular »they« is OK, I tend to take his word over that of mere amateurs in the comment sections of Linux web sites.

singular they

Posted Apr 1, 2012 5:19 UTC (Sun) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link] (4 responses)

there is no single right answer to this question any more than there is a right answer to top-posting vs bottom-posting in e-mail

the 'right' answer depends on your audience. It doesn't matter what the 'official' answer is if the people that you are talking with disagree.

singular they

Posted Apr 1, 2012 5:20 UTC (Sun) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link] (3 responses)

To clarify, the point of writing and talking is to communicate, If the form of your message gets in the way, you are wrong, now matter what the official position on what you did is.

singular they

Posted Apr 1, 2012 11:59 UTC (Sun) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (2 responses)

The problem at hand isn't so much that some people misunderstand singular »they« (which would indeed be a communication problem).

It is rather that some people erroneously believe English grammar has a »rule« that says »they« must always be plural – a rule which leading experts on the subject agree does not exist, and which has never really existed in actual practice, as demonstrated by several centuries' worth of writings from many authors including ones like Shakespeare or Austen who are otherwise considered among the greatest in the history of English-language literature –, and that they try to force this »rule« onto other people because the use of singular »they« offends their sense of aesthetics (which is an arrogance problem).

singular they

Posted Apr 1, 2012 17:41 UTC (Sun) by giraffedata (guest, #1954) [Link] (1 responses)

some people erroneously believe English grammar has a »rule« that says »they« must always be plural

It isn't erroneous. There is no RFC for English grammar, so you can't say so definitively whether any rule exists or does not exist. Rules of English grammar exist vaguely in the collective minds of English speakers/listeners. There is quite clearly a rule that "they" is plural, just as there is one that it is singular.

The Pullum article you cite doesn't use the word "rule." It says singular they is "grammatical." Let's not assume we know exactly what he means by that. There are at least two very different kinds of grammar, prescriptive and descriptive, and it isn't even controversial that singular they conforms to descriptive grammar of English. I.e. people say it. Pullum notes that Strunk and White, a prescriptive grammar which is about the closest we can come to an RFC, incontrovertibly pronounces "they" plural.

The Pullum article also does not directly address "they" with a definite singular antecedent ("the user turned off their computer") (in fact it explicitly disclaimed that), commenting on the indefinite case ("everyone turned off their computers"), which is rather different because an indefinite pronoun can more easily be associated in the mind with multiple people.

As for whether a plural "they" prescription exists, I'm influenced heavily by the fact that I've been studying English grammar in earnest for about 40 years and until 2 years ago had never heard anyone claim that singular they is grammatical. Until then, lots of people argued for plural they, but it was always with, "we have to change the grammar because the existing one holds women back and/or disrespects them." And of course, lots of people have used it throughout history, but the same is true of plenty of things widely accepted as errors, so that doesn't influence me much.

singular they

Posted Apr 1, 2012 22:46 UTC (Sun) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link]

Pullum notes that Strunk and White, a prescriptive grammar which is about the closest we can come to an RFC, incontrovertibly pronounces "they" plural.

Strunk and White try to be prescriptivist, but they prescribe lots of things that – irrespective of the actual merit of the stuff they prescribe – they then don't actually adhere to themselves, in the selfsame book. This makes one wonder exactly how far prescriptivist grammar gets one. They should at the very least eat their own dog food.

If the actual RFCs were anything like Strunk and White we would still communicate by semaphore flag. The best one can do with a copy of Strunk and White is burn it for heat in winter.

singular they

Posted Apr 4, 2012 13:54 UTC (Wed) by sorpigal (subscriber, #36106) [Link]

The wonderful and horrible thing about English is that there isn't any real authority on the subject except for general use and consensus. If you like you can think of my insistence on treating 'they' as plural as a campaign to direct that general consensus towards a use that I prefer.

singular they

Posted Apr 5, 2012 9:10 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]

Quite. I could have quoted CGEL but I thought that that would be too much like using a thermonuclear weapon to swat flies.

Dictator needed

Posted Apr 4, 2012 14:11 UTC (Wed) by sorpigal (subscriber, #36106) [Link] (1 responses)

> So, yes, 'they' is just wrong, as long as you consider Chaucer, Swift, Thackeray, Orwell, and, hell, pretty much every other English speaker of the last thousand years whose words have been recorded to be wrong.
You nailed it. The nice thing about English is that every speaker is an authorized reformer equal to all others. I take it you don't want to join my campaign for the abolition of the use of 'they' as a singular. Would you care, instead, to join me in condemning the practice of writing the currency sign as a prefix to a number? It reads better to say e.e. 100$ than $100, so it should be switched (and $100 is absolutely wrong!).

Dictator needed

Posted Apr 5, 2012 9:42 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]

Would you care, instead, to join me in condemning the practice of writing the currency sign as a prefix to a number? It reads better to say e.e. 100$ than $100, so it should be switched (and $100 is absolutely wrong!).

The problem there is that prefixed currency symbols are not just almost universally preferred, but even when using the ISO currency codes one normally prefixes them (e.g. GBP 100, not 100 GBP).