pronouns to abstract character

[Eclectic_Asininity]

you meant "grammatical structure," right?
otherwise, the sentense doesn't make any sense.
seriously, use a dictionary.

doesn't add anything to the arguments.
in fact, they don't even help your points.
reading them is a ego boost; now my ego is back, rising to the roof.

an example is an example.
the example doesn't change anything; it only supports my original point: "it's not a recent thing influenced by the gender-thingy, but had been that way for centuries."

You can't even spell "sentence" and you talk like an anime villain. I've had more fulfilling arguments with chatGPT, you both have about the same level of repetitiveness, but at least the neural network has the excuse of being a machine learning algorithm. I hope you can find something fulfilling in life, because the fact that you get an "ego boost" from an online argument is pretty pathetic.

Ciao.

 

[K5Rakitan]

Use what you want.

https://public.oed.com/blog/a-brief-history-of-singular-they/

 

[AetherialCore]

You can't even spell "sentence" and you talk like an anime villain. I've had more fulfilling arguments with chatGPT, you both have about the same level of repetitiveness, but at least the neural network has the excuse of being a machine learning algorithm. I hope you can find something fulfilling in life, because the fact that you get an "ego boost" from an online argument is pretty pathetic.

Ciao.

Valē!
Victōria mea estne?

i don't know, just flexing my (bad) classical latin after the guy ran away to chatGPT.
damn the AIs are truly stealing people's job, huh.

and... oof *died from typo*

 

[SailusGebel]

yooooooo.
the master shitposter is still reading the thread.
sensei, please give use your score!!!
which side is spitting fire???
wkwk

I'm not reading your banter thoroughly to understand everything. And to tell you the truth, I don't care about the English language. I would still write the way I was taught\learned. Though it would be nice if unbiased scholars, linguists, philologists, and so on would revise and update English. By unbiased, I mean people who aren't a part of left-wing, trans people, republicans, democrats, bigots, and so on. People who actually study and know English. And it would be nice if they updated textbooks according to the changes(or no changes).

 

[LunaSoltaer]

I'm not reading your banter thoroughly to understand everything. And to tell you the truth, I don't care about the English language. I would still write the way I was taught\learned. Though it would be nice if unbiased scholars, linguists, philologists, and so on would revise and update English. By unbiased, I mean people who aren't a part of left-wing, trans people, republicans, democrats, bigots, and so on. People who actually study and know English. And it would be nice if they updated textbooks according to the changes(or no changes).

Do you realize just how utterly decimating that list of qualifications is?

Id be hard pressed to find Anyone (not an infant, obviously) that meets all of those criteria and that's ignoring your so on, which makes your list not exhaustive and your quest even more daunting.

And then you're looking for a trained linguist out of THAT. Like, good luck cause you absolutely will need it.

 

[SailusGebel]

Do you realize just how utterly decimating that list of qualifications is?

Id be hard pressed to find Anyone (not an infant, obviously) that meets all of those criteria and that's ignoring your so on, which makes your list not exhaustive and your quest even more daunting.

And then you're looking for a trained linguist out of THAT. Like, good luck cause you absolutely will need it.

I more than understand that it's impossible to gather such people. That's why I said I don't care and will simply continue to write the way I was taught\learned.

 

[KrakenRiderEmma]

There are people called lexicologists who spend their whole careers studying how language is used, tracking how it changes, making recommendations for usage, and who try to avoid bias, politics, etc.

It's as close as you're going to get, for language, to the equivalent of a medical doctor or human biology researcher's opinon on human anatomy.

Here's what those people have to say: "singular they" is used all the time, and has been used in hundreds of sources consistently for centuries. The controversy over it is silly and relatively new. Singular they is the tradition, and complaining about it is the "making it political for no reason" stance, basically.

https://public.oed.com/blog/a-brief-history-of-singular-they/
https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/singular-nonbinary-they

Two different competing dictionaries, the most popular from the UK, and from the USA.

Short quote to illustrate:

One common bugbear of the grammatical stickler is the singular they. For those who haven’t kept up, the complaint is this: the use of they as a gender-neutral pronoun (as in, “Ask each of the students what they want for lunch.”) is ungrammatical because they is a plural pronoun.

Much has been written on they, and we aren’t going to attempt to cover it here. We will note that they has been in consistent use as a singular pronoun since the late 1300s; that the development of singular they mirrors the development of the singular you from the plural you, yet we don’t complain that singular you is ungrammatical; and that regardless of what detractors say, nearly everyone uses the singular they in casual conversation and often in formal writing.

"You" used to be a plural pronoun with the singular being "thou." Now everyone uses "you" for singular and plural second person. It's not a big deal.

 

[CubicleHermit]

i read a book call "the mysteries of udolpho," which was from 1794, and remember seeing 'they' used as a singular pronoun for a person of unknown gender.
go learn the actual fundamentals of the english language that is not just your own notion of how the language should be; you won't be able to read the book unless you do.

The defense of "generic he" is almost always either people with a political axe to grind, or non-native-speakers who had an overly dogmatic teacher drill a rule into them that isn't actually so.

If I'm not mistaken you use he all the time, unless you are a very progressive citizen of USA.

The use of singular "they" for non-specific individuals beats the shit out of the "he or she" construction that was standard US Business English when I was in and got out of college, or the "just alternate he and she examples" that some textbook publishers had taken to using.

Other folks have gone into the older history in much more detail, but it's long-established, and in fact older than either singular-you or the "generic he" rule which was only codified by a bunch of grammar-nuts in last couple hundred years and has never been an absolute.

As for "they" for specific people who don't want to be identified as a specific gender, it's harmless enough. There's no sense in being intentionally disrespectful, even if you don't "get" why they use non-gendered pronouns.

Edit: I missed the point earlier about wanting a centralized "document" of English, which luckily could never happy. Unlike some languages, there's no central authority for English, and even if someone wanted one, it's unlikely that you'd get any two of the bigger mostly-English-speaking countries to agree on it, let alone get people to actually go along with it.

 

[SailusGebel]

The use of singular "they" for non-specific individuals beats the shit out of the "he or she" construction that was standard US Business English when I was in and got out of college, or the "just alternate he and she examples" that some textbook publishers had taken to using.

And to tell you the truth, I don't care about the English language. I would still write the way I was taught\learned.

 

[Deleted member 54065]

It's so nice to see when people argue, fight and denounce each other over pronouns, instead of actually working on solutions to perennial world problems.

But then again, what can we do? It's a time-proven problem, so we search for new, 'easily-solved' ones.

 

[Prince_Azmiran_Myrian]

It's so nice to see when people argue, fight and denounce each other over pronouns, instead of actually working on solutions to perennial world problems.

But then again, what can we do? It's a time-proven problem, so we search for new, 'easily-solved' ones.

Battles of ideas and spiritual warfare will not cease until the end.

 

[Deleted member 54065]

Battles of ideas and spiritual warfare will not cease until the end.

Well, I have no problems listening and considering new ideas. What I find laughable is how some people--driven by their blind pursuit of their ideals--would create more problems than solutions after shoving their philosophies down everyone's throats.

Kind of counter-productive really. One may silence the opposition, but quiet opposition is more dangerous than loud protests.

 

[Aader]

that's the thing, abstract characters do not have genders

I tried finding a textbook where they used "she" but it was a pain. I know there is one I read.

my dear fellow author, I must wholly disagree as the descendant of a long line of sailors. objects that are used to move people and items are female. why? I honestly don't know. fun fact ports and stations are male. ironic when you think it's the females who are penetrating the males. pegging much?

 

[Gibbs505]

If it is a concrete entity with its own definite actions affecting the real world on its own and not existing as a thought or an idea then it doesn't matter if it's the embodiment of time or the living number two.

But I asked not about "they" but "he" or "she"

I know but it is a viable alternative. Don't get locked into a single or a pair of words.

 

[TotallyHuman]

I know but it is a viable alternative. Don't get locked into a single or a pair of words.

I'm not locking myself to anything. I'm just asking a question, a rather concrete one.
It's like when people ask "how to do [thing] in Windows?" And get a response saying "switch to Linux", which is indeed a very viable alternative, but that wasn't what the question is about

 

[Gibbs505]

I'm not locking myself to anything. I'm just asking a question, a rather concrete one.
It's like when people ask "how to do [thing] in Windows?" And get a response saying "switch to Linux", which is indeed a very viable alternative, but that wasn't what the question is about

Fair coment, well, your question was:

In many books(usually textbooks) the authors use he, or sometimes she, when reffering to an abstract character they describe.
Something like:

When a physicist observes a natural phenomenon, he does it by...

When do people use "he" and when "she" when talking about an abstract entity?

In a text book there may be a photo referenced and the sex of the person shown may be clear.
If not, they pick an abstract pronoun according to their prejudices or concept of acceptability of the majority of the sex of the people in a particular occuption. I.E. There are more male physicists then female so the writer went with the majority.

in a novel, its used to describe a character when there is no reason to to add any more detail. Of course the writer could say nothing of "he" or "she'. For example.

"The tech crew garhered around the damaged computor.

The ratio of sex's is left up to the reader, if they care enough.

In my opinion, it is all personal peference as to what pronoun is picked.