There’s a discussion over in the BBQ Pit about whether people should put their preferred pronouns in their e-mail signatures, their bios, etc.
As I said over there, I think it should become common practice. I was thinking in terms of transgender and other gender non-conforming people – they put their pronoun preferences out there to avoid confusion and to avoid being mis-gendered. However, if only transgender and gender non-conforming people post their preferred pronouns, it basically calls them out as different, other, or weird in some way. Someone else in that other thread also mentioned that it makes sense for companies with a global or diverse workforce. There are many foreign names where I haven’t the faintest idea whether they are typically names for men or women. Even common English-language names like Pat, Charlie, Taylor, and others are pretty ambiguous.
There is someone I work with who has a non-English name that I can’t tell whether it’s a man’s name or woman’s name. And, their voice is ambiguous enough that I haven’t been able to figure it out over the phone, either. This is someone from another office who I have never met in person and I remain in the dark about their gender.
For this thread, maybe it makes sense to focus on whether cis-gender and other gender-conforming people should generally post their pronouns. Here’s an article that says yes:
Why we should start using pronouns | Prospect.
Here’s another one:
I agree with those positions. I think that encouraging everyone to post their preferred pronouns can have two positive effects. First, it will make for a more inclusive environment, where cis-, trans-, and non-gendered people will feel welcome and not singled out. Second, it will avoid confusion, even for people who are gender conforming, but have neutral or uncommon names.
I can’t really think of a negative effect, but I’m willing to learn.