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No need to keep a tally; in 2018, any document that exclusively uses masculine pronouns for genderless subjects reads as outdated. When writing on technical to

by GuiA 8y ago

No need to keep a tally; in 2018, any document that exclusively uses masculine pronouns for genderless subjects reads as outdated. When writing on technical topics, the chief concern is to be clear, accurate, and straightforward. Anything that might distract your reader is undesirable. By referring to “the user” as “he”, you’re already distracting roughly 50% of your potential readership (if you’re writing the documentation for a Do It Yourself Vasectomy Kit, perhaps you get a pass). Switching up pronouns every other time is a strategy, but it is indeed one that can hurt the readability of a document. This article covers various strategies nicely: https://www.herodios.com/pronouns.html https://www.herodios.com/pronouns.html (Note that this document was written over 20 years ago, so the “rules of style” when this document was written were roughly the same as they are now)

anonytrary 8y ago
> By referring to “the user” as “he”, you’re already distracting roughly 50% of your potential readership (if you’re writing the documentation for a Do It Yourself Vasectomy Kit, perhaps you get a pass). Do you have any research/data to back this up? I'm a male and I am not distracted when people use "she" (or "he" for that matter). I have never heard anyone in person complain about not being able to focus on an article because they used "he" instead of "she". > Anything that might distract your reader is undesirable. Concision is of utmost importance in any language. Many of the examples in your link sacrifice readability and concision for the purpose of avoiding pronouns. What really distracts me is when people use "(s)he", "s/he", "he or she" (oh no -- which one should be first?), or periodically switch between "he" and "she" absolutely everywhere -- all for the purpose of filling a contrived equality quota.
- GuiA 8y ago
  There is a user, they are using the system, and that’s about as much as we know about them.
  - anonytrary 8y ago
    "He" clocks in at two characters, it's a very concise way of referring to an arbitrary person. "The user" takes longer to write and longer to say. Forcing the reader to juggle around "or" conditions (i.e. with "he or she") is even worse and I consider it bad practice. Your readers will thank you for concreteness and brevity.
    - GuiA 8y ago
      You’ll notice that my previous post uses “they” as shorthand for “the user”. If your last remaining argument is that “he” is 2 letters and “they” is 4 and thus it’s unequivocally better to always use “he”, it’s not a very good one.
- mixmastamyk 8y ago
  We need an "it" that can be applied to a person.
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    English has had one for a long time, “they”. Elitist prescriptivists who wanted English to be Latin because of bizarre linguistic fashion tried to purge it, but never did from general use, and prescriptivism, especially on points that have never aligned with common usage,has fallen out of favor, so there is little reason not to use it now but adherence to a particularly archaic elitism.
    - mixmastamyk 8y ago
      It’s useful to have a singular and plural form, required probably not.
CathyWest 8y ago
> you’re already distracting roughly 50% of your potential readership If by 50% you mean 100% of the women having trouble making it through an article with multiple instances of "he" not immediately followed by "or she", that's a pretty bold claim. I suspect the key factor in people's inability to focus on the central point of the article lies in their political persuasion rather than the shape of their genitalia.
- GuiA 8y ago
  50% refers to the mix of male and female people who get distracted by this; in my experience as a technical writer who would always use “he” when I was less experienced, perhaps 70% of women and 30% of men? It was certainly one aspect of my writing I got a lot of feedback on. Changing that habit was fairly easy, and has entirely solved the problem. I’m not sure what’s political about pointing out that “the user” of eg a computer system is not always a “he”, but if you want to bring the conversation there, have fun. If anything, it’s starting to feel to me like people with no interest in technical writing are coming out of the woodwork and making this political!
  - CathyWest 8y ago
    > 50% refers to the mix of male and female people who get distracted by this; in my experience as a technical writer who would always use “he” when I was less experienced, perhaps 70% of women and 30% of men? But who were these people? I don't doubt that there exists a population such that half of it complains about lack of gender neutral language in technical writing, but it does not necessarily follow that the same half should also be arbiters of techincal writing style. > It was certainly one aspect of my writing I got a lot of feedback on. Changing that habit was fairly easy, and has entirely solved the problem. > > I’m not sure what’s political about pointing out that “the user” of eg a computer system is not always a “he”, but if you want to bring the conversation there, have fun. Back when the convention in English (and various other languages) was that male pronouns were used in mixed or unspecified situation there was no need to point this out, it was given by the convention. Pronouns with masculine grammatical gender being exclusively applicable to men is a recent innovation, without which the problem you are trying to solve wouldn't even exist. These shifts in meaning can of course happen organically, but I find it very curious that this particular one happened at the same time as the rise of feminism in the 20th century. More extreme examples of the same politicised language is using "womyn" instead of "woman" in order to prevent it from ending in "man".
zeveb 8y ago
> any document that exclusively uses masculine pronouns for genderless subjects reads as outdated. Correct English is never out of style. Different languages do different things, and that's okay. Some languages apply grammatical gender to more than just sex, e.g. tools, or fruit. That's okay. English uses grammatical gender to distinguish between male, female & neuter objects, and defaults to male when referring to unknown males-or-females. That's okay too. It's all part of the rich panoply of life. > By referring to “the user” as “he”, you’re already distracting roughly 50% of your potential readership I really doubt every woman is distracted by proper grammar. And of course by not using correct English, you distract people who use & prefer it.
- GuiA 8y ago
  Except there is no such thing as “Correct English”. If we were speaking about eg contemporary France French, you would have a point - there is a governing body decreeing what is correct French and what isn’t. That is not the case for English. But even that is besides the point, because “they” as a genderless pronoun has been used for over half a millennia. (William Caxton, 1460: “Each of them should...make themself ready”)

by GuiA 8y ago

anonytrary 8y ago

> By referring to “the user” as “he”, you’re already distracting roughly 50% of your potential readership (if you’re writing the documentation for a Do It Yourself Vasectomy Kit, perhaps you get a pass). Do you have any research/data to back this up? I'm a male and I am not distracted when people use "she" (or "he" for that matter). I have never heard anyone in person complain about not being able to focus on an article because they used "he" instead of "she". > Anything that might distract your reader is undesirable. Concision is of utmost importance in any language. Many of the examples in your link sacrifice readability and concision for the purpose of avoiding pronouns. What really distracts me is when people use "(s)he", "s/he", "he or she" (oh no -- which one should be first?), or periodically switch between "he" and "she" absolutely everywhere -- all for the purpose of filling a contrived equality quota.

GuiA 8y ago
There is a user, they are using the system, and that’s about as much as we know about them.
- anonytrary 8y ago
  "He" clocks in at two characters, it's a very concise way of referring to an arbitrary person. "The user" takes longer to write and longer to say. Forcing the reader to juggle around "or" conditions (i.e. with "he or she") is even worse and I consider it bad practice. Your readers will thank you for concreteness and brevity.
  - GuiA 8y ago
    You’ll notice that my previous post uses “they” as shorthand for “the user”. If your last remaining argument is that “he” is 2 letters and “they” is 4 and thus it’s unequivocally better to always use “he”, it’s not a very good one.
mixmastamyk 8y ago
We need an "it" that can be applied to a person.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  English has had one for a long time, “they”. Elitist prescriptivists who wanted English to be Latin because of bizarre linguistic fashion tried to purge it, but never did from general use, and prescriptivism, especially on points that have never aligned with common usage,has fallen out of favor, so there is little reason not to use it now but adherence to a particularly archaic elitism.
  - mixmastamyk 8y ago
    It’s useful to have a singular and plural form, required probably not.

CathyWest 8y ago

> you’re already distracting roughly 50% of your potential readership If by 50% you mean 100% of the women having trouble making it through an article with multiple instances of "he" not immediately followed by "or she", that's a pretty bold claim. I suspect the key factor in people's inability to focus on the central point of the article lies in their political persuasion rather than the shape of their genitalia.

GuiA 8y ago
50% refers to the mix of male and female people who get distracted by this; in my experience as a technical writer who would always use “he” when I was less experienced, perhaps 70% of women and 30% of men? It was certainly one aspect of my writing I got a lot of feedback on. Changing that habit was fairly easy, and has entirely solved the problem. I’m not sure what’s political about pointing out that “the user” of eg a computer system is not always a “he”, but if you want to bring the conversation there, have fun. If anything, it’s starting to feel to me like people with no interest in technical writing are coming out of the woodwork and making this political!
- CathyWest 8y ago
  > 50% refers to the mix of male and female people who get distracted by this; in my experience as a technical writer who would always use “he” when I was less experienced, perhaps 70% of women and 30% of men? But who were these people? I don't doubt that there exists a population such that half of it complains about lack of gender neutral language in technical writing, but it does not necessarily follow that the same half should also be arbiters of techincal writing style. > It was certainly one aspect of my writing I got a lot of feedback on. Changing that habit was fairly easy, and has entirely solved the problem. > > I’m not sure what’s political about pointing out that “the user” of eg a computer system is not always a “he”, but if you want to bring the conversation there, have fun. Back when the convention in English (and various other languages) was that male pronouns were used in mixed or unspecified situation there was no need to point this out, it was given by the convention. Pronouns with masculine grammatical gender being exclusively applicable to men is a recent innovation, without which the problem you are trying to solve wouldn't even exist. These shifts in meaning can of course happen organically, but I find it very curious that this particular one happened at the same time as the rise of feminism in the 20th century. More extreme examples of the same politicised language is using "womyn" instead of "woman" in order to prevent it from ending in "man".

zeveb 8y ago

> any document that exclusively uses masculine pronouns for genderless subjects reads as outdated. Correct English is never out of style. Different languages do different things, and that's okay. Some languages apply grammatical gender to more than just sex, e.g. tools, or fruit. That's okay. English uses grammatical gender to distinguish between male, female & neuter objects, and defaults to male when referring to unknown males-or-females. That's okay too. It's all part of the rich panoply of life. > By referring to “the user” as “he”, you’re already distracting roughly 50% of your potential readership I really doubt every woman is distracted by proper grammar. And of course by not using correct English, you distract people who use & prefer it.

GuiA 8y ago
Except there is no such thing as “Correct English”. If we were speaking about eg contemporary France French, you would have a point - there is a governing body decreeing what is correct French and what isn’t. That is not the case for English. But even that is besides the point, because “they” as a genderless pronoun has been used for over half a millennia. (William Caxton, 1460: “Each of them should...make themself ready”)