The “were” or “wer” in “werewolf/werwolf” is usually* explained as coming from Old English wer which means “man” (thus, “man-wolf”) but specifically means “man” in the sense of “adult male human being”. (The word is cognate with the Latin vir which means the same thing.)
*The Oxford English Dictionary does note that “The first element has usually been identified with Old English wer man…but the form were- in place of wer- (compare however were- and wergild)…and the variants in war- , var- , makes this somewhat doubtful.”
It really seems to me that that’s kind of looking for things to get upset about, though. I can understand not wanting to use “man” in the old-fashioned sense of “human” or “person”–personally, I pretty much always use “human” and “humankind” or “humanity” in those The Rights of “Man” sorts of contexts–and I can even see that words like “fireman” can (even if almost sub-consciously) imply that people who go fight fires are men (that is, adult males). I can’t really imagine very many people from the last thousand years or so are seeing the word “werewolf” and saying “Oh, a man-wolf! An adult male who turns into a wolf! Not some weak, girly woman!” (Even if that is where the were- came from.) At this point “were” meaning “adult male human being” is totally archaic and obsolete.
Sort of—see the above post— in the sense that were = “a male person”, but on the other hand I don’t see wif-wylf, wife-wolf or any such variation in the dictionary.
(Just to mess with our heads, “wif” is neuter in (Old) English.)
There is definitely a time where using “they” is considered misgendering–and it’s specifically in the trans community. It can be a way of refusing to acknowledge that a trans woman is a woman or a trans man is a man.
That said, I have seen suggestions of a trend where singular they has spready further than just unknown and non binary gender. I’ve seen it used in hypotheticals where the gender is known or part of the sentence, e.g. “A young girl, out on the town, may want to cover up their drink to make sure it isn’t spiked.” I suspect that, for some people, using “they” in the hypothetical sense is becoming the default, and they have to think about it to use “she” or “he.”
I have yet, however, to observe anyone referring to specific individuals using “they.” I actually wonder if the the person in the OP knows anyone who actually does that.
Heck, it seems such an odd request that I’d wonder if you misunderstood. Like maybe they just meant “don’t use ‘he’ or ‘he or she’ when gender is unknown.” That at least makes some sense. Even “he or she” is kinda gender binary, leaving out the possibility the unknown gendered person is actually a “they.”
I don’t think it was a misunderstanding - specifically because I first assumed I had misunderstood, and asked for clarification - and the conversation went on. I guess like anything, there will be a spectrum of views on a topic, and some of those views will be extreme/fringe - so there are people out there who want to change the way we think and assume about gender, which is fine, and there are other people who feel it would be better to erase the entire concept of gender, which is absurd.
That’s part of the problem I’m trying to address. “They” isn’t gender-neutral for many people, and your example is one of them.
The pronouns I’m advocating for are intended to be correct regardless of the situation—whether you know someone’s preferred gender or not. They’re always correct, so long as the referent is a person. They are pronouns that no one chooses, not rejects. They’re truly gender-neutral.
I appreciate the intent. And I agree we’d do better with coined words rather than running with hoary old over-burdened “they”.
But ref @BigT if we have people who insist on their pronoun being gendered and other people who insist on their pronoun being non-gendered, there is no word (existing or coined) that the rest of us can use safely and make both those folks happy with us.
An coined word for “gender-indifferent animate-only” third person that comes in singular, plural, count indeterminate, and possessive forms would be nice. And is probably the least bad solution. But it’s not a cure all.
I suppose one could cite the modern English second-person “you” which is count-indeterminate (that is, the same word for singular and plural), but in that example we have the deficiency that there aren’t separate words for singular and plural “you”.
When coining new pronouns, don’t forget we might want separate subjective and objective forms. (I don’t see exactly why we need them, but we already have a lot.) At least English is simpler than some other languages that have separate forms for direct object, indirect object, and object of a preposition!
If I’m not mistaken, we have TWO people on this board using E, em, es, emself now. It’s catching on!
There have been several attempts over the last decade or so to coin new pronouns – I remember co, cos, coself – that never got any traction. Maybe E, etc., will.
@Senegoid. That’s last point is why “y’all” came into being. It’s making second person plural distinct from second person singular. Though I’m semi-kidding here.
@Acsenray. Example in other language? Not exactly.
But in English we have “him” & “her” for gendered singular, and fall back to they/them for plural. Partly I suspect to avoid the problem of how to gender the pronoun for a group of people of possibly mixed actual gender. So out of sheer laziness, “they/them” picks up yet another vague overloaded meaning. Once we have ungendered singular, it becomes easy (as you’ve done) to deliver an ungendered plural too.
But if they’re different words, then the author has to decide whether they’re (heh) referring to one, more than one, or doesn’t/can’t know the quantity.
Which now triggers messy circumlocutions like “All person(s) shall …” to avoid “He or all hes and she or all shes shall …”. Replacing that with your proposed “E/they shall …” is halfway home. Let’s go all the way.
If we/you are inventing new terms from whole cloth, let’s clean up the rough edges of English-as-evolved at least where the new terms touch it. [Aside: “we/you” at the start of this paragraph is another count-indeterminate usage, albeit with a side of self-membership ambiguity.]
An obvious problem (and one mentioned upthread either here or in the “Could have / Could of” thread) is that the main remaining trigger for different verb conjugations in English is singular/plural. Any count-indeterminate pronoun stumbles there, perhaps to fall down. Witness collective vs countable nouns and the differences between US & e.g. UK English. “The team is …” vs. “The team are …”, etc.
I’m inventing my ideas as I’m going along here; there’s no deep thought or extensive research into others’ proposals involved. So they may be probably are all wet.
The problem is mostly that trying to coin such words has continually failed. It’s easier to coin words for new concepts or for things that people don’t use a lot. But pronouns are so embedded in language that we really haven’t added new ones. The best cases new one is “y’all.”
And I think that may be the way to go. Instead of something to replace they, they becomes an acceptable singular, and we come up with a plural they that uses existing language, in the same way “y’all” came from “you all” which would imply a plural.
I don’t think they actually works right now, though.
It’s not about “they” being seen as gendered. It’s about it being seen as avoiding acknowledging someone’s preferred gender. Even trying to write around using pronouns when talking with trans people can be as denying gender, as seen in the Stack Exchange rules on the subject–you can only do so if you do that for everyone.
Currently, the only solution I see is using some non-gendered default while using preferred pronouns when they are known. Barring that, use the same non-gendered pronouns for everyone, so it becomes clear that it’s not just about trans people. Whether you use “they” or some pronoun you think is better isn’t as relevant in that second case.
I would take it further and suggest that it is a “young person” who should be warned about the spiking of drinks as it is a danger for any unwary young drinker.
The very concept that oysters are made out of food is alien and meaningless to me. You will do me the courtesy of eschewing the ingestion of them forthwith.
And it doesn’t matter if I happen to be in a position to witness said consumption. Your failure to comply with my eminently reasonable instruction would be an unconscionable display of tyranny and disrespect to me.
I didn’t know that about Bengali. That is cool. I believe the name for it is rational and nonrational noun classes.
“Noun class” is the broader term that includes grammatical gender. Bantu languages have several noun classes with no correspondence to natural gender. Bantu is why the concept of noun classes developed, for when the word gender didn’t fit well. Swahili noun classes include different ones for humans, animals, various types of objects, abstract nouns, etc.