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The serious answer is that in normal colloquial English, they was typically only used as a singular pronoun when talking about an unknown person; for example:

The serious answer is that in normal colloquial English, they was typically only used as a singular pronoun when talking about an unknown person; for example: A: Somebody called asking for you. B: Oh, what did they want? This has always sounded perfectly natural in colloquial English (at least in the US; I can't speak for other countries). Contrast with the following: A: Joe called asking for you. B: Oh, what did they want? This construction is slowly becoming more widespread, but would have sounded absolutely bizarre and ungrammatical to most native speakers (regardless of literacy/education) before the movement for gender-identity inclusiveness became mainstream, because people didn't really conceive of the possibility of knowing a specific person but not being able refer to them as "he" or "she". ----- In response to sibling comments: I think this explanation is a lot more convincing than any variant of "singular they is (or was) wrong". There are two very different kinds of singular they, which elicit very different grammaticality responses from native English speakers.

a1369209993 7y ago
That doesn't sound any less grammatical than: A: Joe called asking for you. B: Oh, what did she want? (or vice versa if Joe is female) It turns out that - in a purely objective, language-design sense - the anatomical details (or clothing, whatever) of the bag of meat hosting the specific person this particular use refers to is a really, really dumb way to assign a grammatical gender to a proper noun.
- umanwizard 7y ago
  This is sort of an orthogonal issue. Even without knowing Joe's gender, A would have accepted either "what did he want" or "what did she want", under the assumption that B does know Joe's gender. However, A would not have accepted "what did they want" as grammatical under any circumstances. > in a purely objective, language-design sense There is no such thing as this in linguistics. "Anatomical details" is certainly not the weirdest or most arbitrary-seeming way of assigning noun classes, across the world's languages. Compare e.g. the Ganda language. From Wikipedia: > ten classes called simply Class I to Class X and containing all sorts of arbitrary groupings but often characterised as people, long objects, animals, miscellaneous objects, large objects and liquids, small objects, languages, pejoratives, infinitives, mass nouns, plus four 'locative' classes
  - a1369209993 7y ago
    > However, A would not have accepted "what did they want" as grammatical under any circumstances. Huh, so what do they use when B doesn't know Joe's gender? > There is no such thing as this in linguistics. Well, more pedantically: in the sense that it makes determining whether a sentence is grammically correct more dependent (or dependent, if it wasn't already) on random details of the outside world that shouldn't matter until we check for semantic correctness. > is certainly not the weirdest or most arbitrary-seeming way of assigning noun classes Of course not, natural langauges (actually by definition) are 'designed' by pseudo-evolutionary processes; if anything, it's surprising they aren't worse.
- deleted 7y ago
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- scrollaway 7y ago
  > It turns out that - in a purely objective, language-design sense Let me introduce you to many of the world's languages which have a concept of completely arbitrary object gender. A spoon is feminine in French. It's masculine in german. A fork is feminine in both. Oh and a knife is neutral in german (not in french, which doesn't have a concept of neutral; a knife is masculine. Unless you mean like a dagger… that's feminine.) You'll note the abscence of genitals, chromosomes, or anatomical details on most of the above.
afastow 7y ago
> but would have sounded absolutely bizarre and ungrammatical to most native speakers (regardless of literacy/education) before the movement for gender-identity inclusiveness became mainstream, because people didn't really conceive of the possibility of knowing a specific person but not being able refer to them as "he" or "she". I strongly disagree. I don't think responding "Oh, what did they want?" would have ever sounded bizarre or ungrammatical even if this was decades ago and everyone knew that Joe was a man. Language isn't always literal. Using a singular "they" (a pronoun normally used for an unknown person) instead of "he" in that context doesn't necessarily mean the speaker literally doesn't know if Joe is a man. It could just as easily be a subtle way to indicate that the speaker doesn't know Joe very well.

a1369209993 7y ago

That doesn't sound any less grammatical than: A: Joe called asking for you. B: Oh, what did she want? (or vice versa if Joe is female) It turns out that - in a purely objective, language-design sense - the anatomical details (or clothing, whatever) of the bag of meat hosting the specific person this particular use refers to is a really, really dumb way to assign a grammatical gender to a proper noun.

umanwizard 7y ago
This is sort of an orthogonal issue. Even without knowing Joe's gender, A would have accepted either "what did he want" or "what did she want", under the assumption that B does know Joe's gender. However, A would not have accepted "what did they want" as grammatical under any circumstances. > in a purely objective, language-design sense There is no such thing as this in linguistics. "Anatomical details" is certainly not the weirdest or most arbitrary-seeming way of assigning noun classes, across the world's languages. Compare e.g. the Ganda language. From Wikipedia: > ten classes called simply Class I to Class X and containing all sorts of arbitrary groupings but often characterised as people, long objects, animals, miscellaneous objects, large objects and liquids, small objects, languages, pejoratives, infinitives, mass nouns, plus four 'locative' classes
- a1369209993 7y ago
  > However, A would not have accepted "what did they want" as grammatical under any circumstances. Huh, so what do they use when B doesn't know Joe's gender? > There is no such thing as this in linguistics. Well, more pedantically: in the sense that it makes determining whether a sentence is grammically correct more dependent (or dependent, if it wasn't already) on random details of the outside world that shouldn't matter until we check for semantic correctness. > is certainly not the weirdest or most arbitrary-seeming way of assigning noun classes Of course not, natural langauges (actually by definition) are 'designed' by pseudo-evolutionary processes; if anything, it's surprising they aren't worse.
deleted 7y ago
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scrollaway 7y ago
> It turns out that - in a purely objective, language-design sense Let me introduce you to many of the world's languages which have a concept of completely arbitrary object gender. A spoon is feminine in French. It's masculine in german. A fork is feminine in both. Oh and a knife is neutral in german (not in french, which doesn't have a concept of neutral; a knife is masculine. Unless you mean like a dagger… that's feminine.) You'll note the abscence of genitals, chromosomes, or anatomical details on most of the above.

afastow 7y ago

> but would have sounded absolutely bizarre and ungrammatical to most native speakers (regardless of literacy/education) before the movement for gender-identity inclusiveness became mainstream, because people didn't really conceive of the possibility of knowing a specific person but not being able refer to them as "he" or "she". I strongly disagree. I don't think responding "Oh, what did they want?" would have ever sounded bizarre or ungrammatical even if this was decades ago and everyone knew that Joe was a man. Language isn't always literal. Using a singular "they" (a pronoun normally used for an unknown person) instead of "he" in that context doesn't necessarily mean the speaker literally doesn't know if Joe is a man. It could just as easily be a subtle way to indicate that the speaker doesn't know Joe very well.