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Thanks. Curse this language. I just want to refer to people! It’s simple encapsulation and abstraction. I shouldn’t have to care about implementation details ir
by jws 6y ago
Thanks. Curse this language. I just want to refer to people! It’s simple encapsulation and abstraction. I shouldn’t have to care about implementation details irrelevant to the context.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- ryanianian 6y ago"They" is an acceptable gender-neutral pronoun.
- FentanylFloyd 6y agoit's an idiotic newspeakism, lol it's well enough that 'you' can be both singular and plural, we don't need another one
- kortilla 6y agoAcceptable to some, still not frequent enough though to be normalized.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- lolc 6y agoI don't even notice it anymore.
- itamarst 6y agoIt's been used since the time of Jane Austen (by Jane Austen, in fact), it's perfectly normal: https://pemberley.com/janeinfo/austheir.html https://pemberley.com/janeinfo/austheir.html
- jhgb 6y agoCuriously, the page you've linked explains that it isn't normal to use it in this case: "can only be used with a morphologically and syntactically singular antecedent when what it refers to is semantically collective and/or generic and/or indefinite and/or unknown".
- DonHopkins 6y agoThen please help normalize it, instead of worrying about hurting the illiterate feelings of those who find it unacceptable.
- DonHopkins 6y agoAnd it's not even as tricky and nuanced as the rules about "this" in JavaScript! https://john-dugan.com/this-in-javascript/ https://john-dugan.com/this-in-javascript/
- cpach 6y agoHow about “they”…?
- throw_away 6y agosingular they is the generalization you're looking for
- jws 6y agoI'm old enough that "they" is not singular, it is a grammatical error punishable by red ink and deducted points.
- Spivak 6y agoBut the usage of they to refer a single person is older than anyone alive if that makes you feel better about sticking it to your picky grade school teachers.
- jfk13 6y agoSo is the use of "he" to refer to an individual of unspecified gender. (The OED quotations for sense 2(b) "In anaphoric reference to a singular noun or pronoun of undetermined gender" go back to at least 1200AD.)
- microtherion 6y agoYou're older than William Shakespeare? There's not a man I meet but doth salute me As if I were their well-acquainted friend
- staticassertion 6y agoDoubtful. > According to the third edition, The New Fowler's Modern English Usage (edited by Burchfield and published in 1996) singular they has not only been widely used by good writers for centuries, but is now generally accepted, except by some conservative grammarians, including the Fowler of 1926, who, it is argued, ignored the evidence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they Elsewhere in the article you'll find dates like: 1375, 1382, 1400, 1489, 1759, etc, and references to these by Fowler's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Dictionary_of_Modern_English_Usage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Dictionary_of_Modern_English... Anyone arguing against singular 'they' may as well be arguing for a gender neutral 'he' - an argument lost over a century ago by virtually any modern English standard.
- jfim 6y agoYou can use "the author" or refer to the article or paper. [name of paper] mentions that X is faster than Y. The author suggests the cause of the speed up is Z, while we believe it is W.
- damudel 6y agoDon't worry about it. Some people lose their marbles because they think females get erased when male language is used. Just erase both genders and you'll be fine. Use singular they.