# gender-neutral substitute for "his or her"

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-neutral-substitute-for-his-or-her/401725>\
**Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\
**Created:** [April 26, 2007, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-neutral-substitute-for-his-or-her/401725 "2007-04-26T12:55:36Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![Virnovum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/ba8739/32.png) [@Virnovum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Virnovum)\
**Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-neutral-substitute-for-his-or-her/401725/41 "2007-05-11T04:30:54Z")

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[QUOTE=IvoryTowerDenizen]  
On the academic boards I visit the convention seems to be hu. The usage is like this: “When hu goes to class hu needs to bring their syllabus”.

It is probably (but I don’t know for certain) derived from human.  
[/QUOTE]

Hu’s on first? 😛

I like the Spivak pronouns (E for he/she, em for him/her, etc) the most, because if you slur your speech a little, it still sounds like english, as opposed to that Thon or Xyrs nonsense.

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**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2007, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-neutral-substitute-for-his-or-her/401725/42 "2007-05-16T20:52:26Z")

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I just knock the ‘th’ off ‘they’ and its related words, and use ‘ey’, 'em, ‘emself’… when I remember about it.

I have a feeling that, logically, that last one shoulf be ‘eirself’, but somehow ‘emself’ comes out more easily.

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