4 ms·
Doubtful. > 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
by staticassertion 6y ago
Doubtful.
> 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.
- Izkata 6y ago> Doubtful Absolutely true. At least one whole generation grew up taught in school that singular "they" isn't a thing. I was on the tail end of that and read a lot of books written by the previous generation, so it never stuck strongly in my head, but that's what GP is referring to.
- kelnos 6y agoI don't think that's the case. I think many people (myself included) were taught only that "they" is plural, not that it explicitly cannot be singular. The distinction there may be too subtle to matter for some people, though. Either way, clinging to a frozen-in-time interpretation of a living, changing language is foolish for anyone who would like to easily understand and be easily understood. And not waste time in our too-short lives on pointless language nitpickery like we're doing here.
- staticassertion 6y agoI suppose I should have said it's doubtful that you lived at a time when the argument against singular they was legitimate. I'm sure many teachers are teaching students incorrect things all the time. But by modern English standards, which I would define through works like Fowlers', the legitimate argument against singular they is long over.
- jhgb 6y ago> Anyone arguing against singular 'they' may as well be arguing for a gender neutral 'he' That seems like a flawed analogy; many people abuse the traditional generic usage of 'they' but I've seen few people abuse the traditional generic usage of 'he'.
- staticassertion 6y agoThe main historic arguments against singular they and for neutral he are intertwined.
- jhgb 6y agoWhat are the main historic arguments against singular they?
- staticassertion 6y agoMostly they're bad ones, you can read about them in the linked articles, specifically what's noted in Fowler's 1926 is probably the best place to start.