Gender-specific pronoun
Encyclopedia
A language has 'gender-specific pronouns' when personal pronoun
s have different forms according to the gender
of their referents.
The English language
has three gender-specific pronouns in the 3rd. person singular
, whose declined
forms are also gender-specific: he (masculine), she (feminine), and it (neuter, used for objects, abstractions, and most animals). The other English pronouns (I, you, they...) do not make gender distinctions; i.e., they are genderless or gender-neutral
. (See English personal pronouns
.)
and their declined forms, with examples of their use:
s, even ships named after men such as USS Barry, countries, and oceans have been referred to using the feminine pronouns. The origins of this practice are not certain, and it is currently in decline (though still more common for ships, particularly in nautical usage, than for countries). In modern English, calling objects "she" is an optional figure of speech
, and is advised against by The Chicago Manual of Style
.
individuals prefer to be referred to by the gender pronoun appropriate to the gender with which they identify. Some genderqueer
or similarly-identified people prefer not to use either he or she, but a different pronoun such as they
, zie, or so forth. Drag
performers, when in costume, are usually referred to by the gender pronouns for the gender they are performing (for example, drag queen
s are usually called "she" when in drag).
(though not in the modern Indo-Iranian languages
, which are the largest branch of this family), third-person pronouns are gender-specific, while first and second person pronouns are not.
For example, in French
,
are all gender-inclusive; but
In some languages (including most modern Germanic languages
) this distinction is neutralised in the plural: English
and Modern Russian
both have gender-inclusive forms for the third person plural pronouns: 'they'/'them' and они (oni).
Where a language has grammatical gender
, gendered pronouns are sometimes used according to the grammatical gender of their antecedent
, as French il ('he') for le livre ('the book' - masculine), whereas in Spanish, el libro is also masculine, but it would not be considered correct to refer to it by using the masculine pronoun él. Instead, something such as "Where is the book?" "It is on the table", would be rendered as "¿Dónde está el libro?" "Está sobre la mesa" where the pronoun is omitted. However, when the pronoun is used as a direct object, gender-specific forms reappear in Spanish. The sentence I can't find it. (always referring to the masculine noun libro (book) would be No lo encuentro, whereas if I can't find it refers to a magazine (revista in Spanish, which is feminine) then the sentence would be No la encuentro.
If it is absolutely necessary to provide a subject when referring to an object, a demonstrative can be used instead of a pronoun: ¿Qué es eso? translates literally What is that?. And a suitable answer would be Eso es un libro or Eso es una revista, (That's a book, That's a magazine) with the genderless eso as subject in both cases.
Besides there may be gender-specific pronouns in languages where grammatical gender has otherwise been largely lost or reduced. Danish
continues to distinguish gender in third person singular pronouns, even though it no longer distinguishes masculine and feminine nouns grammatically.
For some languages, such as Norwegian and Swedish, there has been considerable effort in trying to provide for gender-neutral expression.
). However it also uses this three-way distinction in the plural: þeir (m. only), þær (f. only), þau (n., which includes mixed gender). It is therefore possible to be gender-specific in all circumstances should one wish - although of course þau can be used for gender-inclusiveness. Otherwise the form used is determined grammatically (i.e., by the gender of the noun replaced). In general statements the use of menn could be preferable as it is less specific than þau.
there is a word hän (borrowed from Finnish
) that means either han ('he') or hon ('she'). It has spread to hacker slang. Some more common gender-inclusive pronouns however are hen ('he'/'she') and henom ('him'/'her'). The Swedish Language Council
recommends den ('it') for third person singular of indefinite gender. However, large parts of the Swedish LGBT
community consider this a derogatory term, since it implies that the person referred to is linguistically equated with a lifeless thing. Instead the terms hen and henom is preferred if one wants to refer to someone without a definite placement inside the binary system of masculine and feminine.
A (also known as Eastern Tocharian) distinguishes gender in the first person, using näṣ for the male speaker and ñuk for the female speaker.
underwent a transition similar to Chinese when an archaic demonstrative kare (彼) was resurrected to translate the 'he' of European languages, while a word kanojo (彼女) was invented to translate 'she'. In the spoken language, the words carry the connotation of boyfriend and girlfriend respectively, and instead ano hito (あの人, literally 'that person') is used in those cases where a pronoun is required. Unlike Western languages, pronouns in Japanese are a type of nouns rather than a distinct class.
Nevertheless, pronouns in Japanese usually have traditionally carried a strong gender connotation (though it has somewhat
weakened nowadays), even first-person ones. For instance, ore (俺 or オレ) or boku (僕 or ボク) is used as 'I'/'me' mainly by men (women have begun using boku nowadays), while watashi (私 or わたし) or atashi (あたし or アタシ) is used by females. (However, homosexuals
are usually mocked in media by use of female pronouns; examples for such cases are Hard Gay
and Sho Tsukioka from Battle Royale
.)
For males and neutral objects one can use 그, additionally with a suffix. For females, 그녀 has come into use, though can still have a somewhat demeaning connotation (녀 being the Chinese-derived (女) for woman). However, in place of these pronouns, gender-neutral 이 사람 is often heard instead.
The pronoun เธอ (ther, lit: you) is semi-feminine. It can be used when the speaker or the listener (or both) are female. It is seldom used when both parties are male.
, all "pronouns" (of grammatical class KOhA) are all gender-inclusive. The closest equivalent of 'he' and 'she' are ti, ta and tu, which are equivalent to 'this' and 'that', and ri, ra and ru, which are equivalent with 'the latter', 'the former', and 'something I mentioned earlier'.
A quite heavy way to obtain a gender-specific "pronoun" would be saying ti poi nanmu (this, which is a man) and ti poi ninmu (this, which is a female).
In common usage, the Esperanto
pronouns ŝi, li, and ĝi correspond to English 'she', 'he', and 'it'. Although its creator Zamenhof
recommended using ĝi in cases of unstated gender, this is done infrequently. The gender-inclusive demonstrative pronoun tiu is commonly used instead (a usage that does not occur in English). Reformers have coined gender-inclusive pronouns like ri or ŝli specifically for persons, and 'riism
' has in fact made some limited progress.
The major reform project Ido
introduced a specifically gender-inclusive pronoun, lu, which can mean 'he', 'she', and 'it' (both animate and inanimate
). See below.
In Ido
, the pronouns ilu, elu and olu, correspond to English "he", "she" and "it", respectively. But in addition there is the gender-inclusive pronoun lu, which may in principle be always used instead of any of the preceding pronouns, but whose basic purpose is to be used when the biological sex of a human being or animal cannot or will not be determined. This is useful especially in some cases such as "The reader can review this, if he or she desires to do so". Since "reader" ("lektero" in Ido) may refer either to a male or to a female person, "ilu" or "elu" are not appropriate, as each excludes one gender. And "olu" is not appropriate either, since it only refers to inanimate beings. So "lu" is used: "La lektero povas rividar co, se lu deziras lo".
Notice that in the plural, ili, eli and oli are used for groups of males, females and inanimate beings respectively, whereas li can be, and usually is, used instead of any of these, leaving the former exclusively when it is felt necessary to explicitly indicate the gender, as in "Viri e mulieri separesis. Ili livis ed eli restis". (Men and women split up. The former [literally "they" with an indication of masculine gender] left, and the latter [literally "they" with and indication of feminine gender] stayed).
But li is the only alternative for groups of people of mixed sexes, or when the actual sex of some people cannot or will not be determined.
Interlingua
has both gender-specific and gender-neutral pronouns
. All first and second-person pronouns are gender neutral, as are several third-person pronouns such as su ('his', 'her', 'its'), and se (himself, herself, itself, themselves). Ille, illa, and illo correspond to English 'he', 'she', and 'it', although ille can also be used as a general term. The three pronouns have plurals that are formed by adding -s.
Interlingua is one of two major auxiliary languages that are not constructed but are considered to be reflections of a pre-existing reality. The other is Latino sine Flexione
. Occidental
is sometimes placed in this group as well. Of the three languages, only Interlingua is widely spoken today.
In Novial
the third person pronoun le means 'he' or 'she' or 'it'. There are also the gender-specific pronouns lo, la and lu ('he', 'she', and 'it', respectively). Each has a corresponding plural les, los, las and lus all translated as 'they' in English.
Personal pronoun
Personal pronouns are pronouns used as substitutes for proper or common nouns. All known languages contain personal pronouns.- English personal pronouns :English in common use today has seven personal pronouns:*first-person singular...
s have different forms according to the gender
Gender
Gender is a range of characteristics used to distinguish between males and females, particularly in the cases of men and women and the masculine and feminine attributes assigned to them. Depending on the context, the discriminating characteristics vary from sex to social role to gender identity...
of their referents.
The English language
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
has three gender-specific pronouns in the 3rd. person singular
Grammatical conjugation
In linguistics, conjugation is the creation of derived forms of a verb from its principal parts by inflection . Conjugation may be affected by person, number, gender, tense, aspect, mood, voice, or other grammatical categories...
, whose declined
Declension
In linguistics, declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and articles to indicate number , case , and gender...
forms are also gender-specific: he (masculine), she (feminine), and it (neuter, used for objects, abstractions, and most animals). The other English pronouns (I, you, they...) do not make gender distinctions; i.e., they are genderless or gender-neutral
Gender-neutral pronoun
A gender-neutral pronoun is a pronoun that is not associated with any gender. It designates two distinct grammatical phenomena, the first being pronouns/periphrastics that have been assigned nontraditional meanings in modern times out of a concern for gender equity, and the second being genderless...
. (See English personal pronouns
English personal pronouns
The personal pronouns in the English language can have various forms according to gender, number, person, and case. Modern English is a language with very little noun or adjective inflection, to the point where some authors describe it as analytic, but the Modern English system of personal pronouns...
.)
English gender-specific pronouns
The following is a complete list of the gender-specific English personal pronounsEnglish personal pronouns
The personal pronouns in the English language can have various forms according to gender, number, person, and case. Modern English is a language with very little noun or adjective inflection, to the point where some authors describe it as analytic, but the Modern English system of personal pronouns...
and their declined forms, with examples of their use:
| Subject Subjective (grammar) In linguistics, a subjective pronoun is a personal pronoun that is used as the subject of a sentence. Subjective pronouns are usually in the nominative case for languages with a nominative–accusative alignment pattern.... |
Object Objective (grammar) An objective pronoun in grammar functions as the target of a verb, as distinguished from a subjective pronoun, which is the initiator of a verb. Objective pronouns are instances of the oblique case.... |
Possessive Adjective Possessive adjective Possessive adjectives, also known as possessive determiners, are a part of speech that modifies a noun by attributing possession to someone or something... |
Possessive Pronoun Possessive pronoun A possessive pronoun is a part of speech that substitutes for a noun phrase that begins with a possessive determiner . For example, in the sentence These glasses are mine, not yours, the words mine and yours are possessive pronouns and stand for my glasses and your glasses, respectively... |
Reflexive Reflexive pronoun A reflexive pronoun is a pronoun that is preceded by the noun, adjective, adverb or pronoun to which it refers within the same clause. In generative grammar, a reflexive pronoun is an anaphor that must be bound by its antecedent... |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| masculine | He laughed. | I kissed him. | His leg hurts. | This house is his. | He can support himself. |
| feminine | She laughed. | I kissed her. | Her arm hurts. | This house is hers. | She can support herself. |
| neuter | It is a very nice house. | I have bought it. | Its yard is big. | That cage is its. | It sells itself. |
Ships and countries
Traditionally shipShip
Since the end of the age of sail a ship has been any large buoyant marine vessel. Ships are generally distinguished from boats based on size and cargo or passenger capacity. Ships are used on lakes, seas, and rivers for a variety of activities, such as the transport of people or goods, fishing,...
s, even ships named after men such as USS Barry, countries, and oceans have been referred to using the feminine pronouns. The origins of this practice are not certain, and it is currently in decline (though still more common for ships, particularly in nautical usage, than for countries). In modern English, calling objects "she" is an optional figure of speech
Figure of speech
A figure of speech is the use of a word or words diverging from its usual meaning. It can also be a special repetition, arrangement or omission of words with literal meaning, or a phrase with a specialized meaning not based on the literal meaning of the words in it, as in idiom, metaphor, simile,...
, and is advised against by The Chicago Manual of Style
The Chicago Manual of Style
The Chicago Manual of Style is a style guide for American English published since 1906 by the University of Chicago Press. Its 16 editions have prescribed writing and citation styles widely used in publishing...
.
Pronouns and transgender persons
In general, transgenderTransgender
Transgender is a general term applied to a variety of individuals, behaviors, and groups involving tendencies to vary from culturally conventional gender roles....
individuals prefer to be referred to by the gender pronoun appropriate to the gender with which they identify. Some genderqueer
Genderqueer
Genderqueer is a catch-all term for gender identities other than man and woman, thus outside of the gender binary and heteronormativity...
or similarly-identified people prefer not to use either he or she, but a different pronoun such as they
Singular they
Singular they is the use of they to refer to an entity that is not plural, or not necessarily plural. Though singular they is widespread in everyday English and has a long history of usage, debate continues about its acceptability...
, zie, or so forth. Drag
Drag (clothing)
Drag is used for any clothing carrying symbolic significance but usually referring to the clothing associated with one gender role when worn by a person of another gender. The origin of the term "drag" is unknown, but it may have originated in Polari, a gay street argot in England in the early...
performers, when in costume, are usually referred to by the gender pronouns for the gender they are performing (for example, drag queen
Drag queen
A drag queen is a man who dresses, and usually acts, like a caricature woman often for the purpose of entertaining. There are many kinds of drag artists and they vary greatly, from professionals who have starred in films to people who just try it once. Drag queens also vary by class and culture and...
s are usually called "she" when in drag).
Other languages with gender-specific pronouns
In these languages some personal pronouns are specific as to gender. Though this usually does not apply to all personal pronouns in the language, a speaker usually does not (at least traditionally) have an option of whether to use gender-inclusive pronouns, since the gender-specific ones do not have inclusive alternatives.Indo-European Languages
In most Indo-European languagesIndo-European languages
The Indo-European languages are a family of several hundred related languages and dialects, including most major current languages of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and South Asia and also historically predominant in Anatolia...
(though not in the modern Indo-Iranian languages
Indo-Iranian languages
The Indo-Iranian language group constitutes the easternmost extant branch of the Indo-European family of languages. It consists of three language groups: the Indo-Aryan, Iranian and Nuristani...
, which are the largest branch of this family), third-person pronouns are gender-specific, while first and second person pronouns are not.
For example, in French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
,
- First person singular je ('I'), me ('me')
- Second person singular (familiar) tu, te ('you')
- First person plural nous ('we', 'us')
- Second person plural vous ('you')
- Third person possessives leur ('their') and son/sa/ses ('his'/'her'/'its'/'their')
are all gender-inclusive; but
- Third person pronouns il ('he'), le ('him'), ils ('they', referring to an all-male or mixed-gender group) are all masculine.
- Third person pronouns elle ('she'), la ('her') and elles ('they', referring to an all-female group) are all feminine.
In some languages (including most modern Germanic languages
Germanic languages
The Germanic languages constitute a sub-branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of all of the languages in this branch is called Proto-Germanic , which was spoken in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe...
) this distinction is neutralised in the plural: English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
and Modern Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
both have gender-inclusive forms for the third person plural pronouns: 'they'/'them' and они (oni).
Where a language has grammatical gender
Grammatical gender
Grammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
, gendered pronouns are sometimes used according to the grammatical gender of their antecedent
Antecedent (grammar)
In grammar, an antecedent is a noun, noun phrase, or clause to which an anaphor refers in a coreference. For example, in the passage "I did not see John because he wasn't there", "John" is the antecedent of the anaphor "he"; together "John" and "he" are called a coreference because they both refer...
, as French il ('he') for le livre ('the book' - masculine), whereas in Spanish, el libro is also masculine, but it would not be considered correct to refer to it by using the masculine pronoun él. Instead, something such as "Where is the book?" "It is on the table", would be rendered as "¿Dónde está el libro?" "Está sobre la mesa" where the pronoun is omitted. However, when the pronoun is used as a direct object, gender-specific forms reappear in Spanish. The sentence I can't find it. (always referring to the masculine noun libro (book) would be No lo encuentro, whereas if I can't find it refers to a magazine (revista in Spanish, which is feminine) then the sentence would be No la encuentro.
If it is absolutely necessary to provide a subject when referring to an object, a demonstrative can be used instead of a pronoun: ¿Qué es eso? translates literally What is that?. And a suitable answer would be Eso es un libro or Eso es una revista, (That's a book, That's a magazine) with the genderless eso as subject in both cases.
Besides there may be gender-specific pronouns in languages where grammatical gender has otherwise been largely lost or reduced. Danish
Danish language
Danish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in the country of Denmark. It is also spoken by 50,000 Germans of Danish ethnicity in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where it holds the status of minority language...
continues to distinguish gender in third person singular pronouns, even though it no longer distinguishes masculine and feminine nouns grammatically.
For some languages, such as Norwegian and Swedish, there has been considerable effort in trying to provide for gender-neutral expression.
Icelandic
Icelandic uses a similar system to other Germanic languages in distinguishing three 3rd-person genders in the singular - hann (masculine gender), hún (feminine gender), það (neuter genderGrammatical gender
Grammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
). However it also uses this three-way distinction in the plural: þeir (m. only), þær (f. only), þau (n., which includes mixed gender). It is therefore possible to be gender-specific in all circumstances should one wish - although of course þau can be used for gender-inclusiveness. Otherwise the form used is determined grammatically (i.e., by the gender of the noun replaced). In general statements the use of menn could be preferable as it is less specific than þau.
Norwegian
In Norwegian a new word is proposed, hin ('sie' or 'hir') to fill the gap between the third person pronouns hun ('her') and han ('him'). Hin is used, but in limited groups; it is not yet embraced by society as a whole. One can also use man or en or den (en means 'one'). These three are considered impersonal.Swedish
In some dialects of the Swedish languageSwedish language
Swedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
there is a word hän (borrowed from Finnish
Finnish language
Finnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland Primarily for use by restaurant menus and by ethnic Finns outside Finland. It is one of the two official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a...
) that means either han ('he') or hon ('she'). It has spread to hacker slang. Some more common gender-inclusive pronouns however are hen ('he'/'she') and henom ('him'/'her'). The Swedish Language Council
Swedish Language Council
The Swedish Language Council is the primary regulatory body for the advancement and cultivation of the Swedish language. The council is partially funded by the Swedish government and has semi-official status...
recommends den ('it') for third person singular of indefinite gender. However, large parts of the Swedish LGBT
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...
community consider this a derogatory term, since it implies that the person referred to is linguistically equated with a lifeless thing. Instead the terms hen and henom is preferred if one wants to refer to someone without a definite placement inside the binary system of masculine and feminine.
Tocharian
Uniquely among Indo-European languages, TocharianTocharian languages
Tocharian or Tokharian is an extinct branch of the Indo-European language family. The name is taken from the people known to the Greeks as the Tocharians . These are sometimes identified with the Yuezhi and the Kushans. The term Tokharistan usually refers to 1st millennium Bactria, which the...
A (also known as Eastern Tocharian) distinguishes gender in the first person, using näṣ for the male speaker and ñuk for the female speaker.
Japanese
Written JapaneseJapanese language
is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...
underwent a transition similar to Chinese when an archaic demonstrative kare (彼) was resurrected to translate the 'he' of European languages, while a word kanojo (彼女) was invented to translate 'she'. In the spoken language, the words carry the connotation of boyfriend and girlfriend respectively, and instead ano hito (あの人, literally 'that person') is used in those cases where a pronoun is required. Unlike Western languages, pronouns in Japanese are a type of nouns rather than a distinct class.
Nevertheless, pronouns in Japanese usually have traditionally carried a strong gender connotation (though it has somewhat
weakened nowadays), even first-person ones. For instance, ore (俺 or オレ) or boku (僕 or ボク) is used as 'I'/'me' mainly by men (women have begun using boku nowadays), while watashi (私 or わたし) or atashi (あたし or アタシ) is used by females. (However, homosexuals
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
are usually mocked in media by use of female pronouns; examples for such cases are Hard Gay
Masaki Sumitani
is a Japanese comedian, retired professional wrestler and tarento , best known under his performing name of , which he adopted the name from the original wrestler Razor Ramon...
and Sho Tsukioka from Battle Royale
Battle Royale
thumb|260px|Cover of the 2009 expanded edition, ISBN 978-1-4215-2772-3 is a 1999 Japanese novel written by Koushun Takami. The story tells of schoolchildren who are forced to fight each other to the death....
.)
Korean
Korean nowadays uses two different gender-specific pronouns not previously in everyday use. They have developed alongside the globalization of English and have become standard use in Seoul dialect.For males and neutral objects one can use 그, additionally with a suffix. For females, 그녀 has come into use, though can still have a somewhat demeaning connotation (녀 being the Chinese-derived (女) for woman). However, in place of these pronouns, gender-neutral 이 사람 is often heard instead.
Afro-Asiatic languages
In most Afro-Asiatic languages only the first-person pronouns (singular and plural) are gender-inclusive: second and third person pronouns are gender-specific.Thai
Thai pronouns are numerous. Here is only a short list.| First person | Second person | Third person | |
|---|---|---|---|
| masculine | ผม (phom) | นาย (nai) (informal) | หมอนั่น (mhor nun) (derogative) |
| feminine | ดิฉัน (di chan) ชั้น (chan) | นางนั่น (nang nun) (derogative) | |
| neuter | ฉัน (chan) เรา (rao) | คุณ (khun) เธอ (ther) | เขา (khao) |
The pronoun เธอ (ther, lit: you) is semi-feminine. It can be used when the speaker or the listener (or both) are female. It is seldom used when both parties are male.
Lojban
In LojbanLojban
See also discussed by Arthur Protin, Bob LeChevalier, Carl Burke, Doug Landauer, Guy Steele, Jack Waugh, Jeff Prothero, Jim Carter, and Robert Chassell, as well as , the concepts which "average English speakers won't recognize" because most of them "have no exact English counterpart".Like most...
, all "pronouns" (of grammatical class KOhA) are all gender-inclusive. The closest equivalent of 'he' and 'she' are ti, ta and tu, which are equivalent to 'this' and 'that', and ri, ra and ru, which are equivalent with 'the latter', 'the former', and 'something I mentioned earlier'.
A quite heavy way to obtain a gender-specific "pronoun" would be saying ti poi nanmu (this, which is a man) and ti poi ninmu (this, which is a female).
Esperanto
In common usage, the Esperanto
Esperanto
is the most widely spoken constructed international auxiliary language. Its name derives from Doktoro Esperanto , the pseudonym under which L. L. Zamenhof published the first book detailing Esperanto, the Unua Libro, in 1887...
pronouns ŝi, li, and ĝi correspond to English 'she', 'he', and 'it'. Although its creator Zamenhof
Zamenhof
Zamenhof is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:* Rozalia Zamenhof, née Sofer , mother of Ludwik* Romana Zamenhof , a Jewish Polish female Esperantist and pharmaceutist...
recommended using ĝi in cases of unstated gender, this is done infrequently. The gender-inclusive demonstrative pronoun tiu is commonly used instead (a usage that does not occur in English). Reformers have coined gender-inclusive pronouns like ri or ŝli specifically for persons, and 'riism
Riism
Gender asymmetry is one of the aspects of the constructed language Esperanto that is most frequently targeted for criticism. There are numerous proposals to regularize both grammatical and lexical gender....
' has in fact made some limited progress.
The major reform project Ido
Ido
Ido is a constructed language created with the goal of becoming a universal second language for speakers of different linguistic backgrounds as a language easier to learn than ethnic languages...
introduced a specifically gender-inclusive pronoun, lu, which can mean 'he', 'she', and 'it' (both animate and inanimate
Animacy
Animacy is a grammatical and/or semantic category of nouns based on how sentient or alive the referent of the noun in a given taxonomic scheme is...
). See below.
Ido
In Ido
Ido
Ido is a constructed language created with the goal of becoming a universal second language for speakers of different linguistic backgrounds as a language easier to learn than ethnic languages...
, the pronouns ilu, elu and olu, correspond to English "he", "she" and "it", respectively. But in addition there is the gender-inclusive pronoun lu, which may in principle be always used instead of any of the preceding pronouns, but whose basic purpose is to be used when the biological sex of a human being or animal cannot or will not be determined. This is useful especially in some cases such as "The reader can review this, if he or she desires to do so". Since "reader" ("lektero" in Ido) may refer either to a male or to a female person, "ilu" or "elu" are not appropriate, as each excludes one gender. And "olu" is not appropriate either, since it only refers to inanimate beings. So "lu" is used: "La lektero povas rividar co, se lu deziras lo".
Notice that in the plural, ili, eli and oli are used for groups of males, females and inanimate beings respectively, whereas li can be, and usually is, used instead of any of these, leaving the former exclusively when it is felt necessary to explicitly indicate the gender, as in "Viri e mulieri separesis. Ili livis ed eli restis". (Men and women split up. The former [literally "they" with an indication of masculine gender] left, and the latter [literally "they" with and indication of feminine gender] stayed).
But li is the only alternative for groups of people of mixed sexes, or when the actual sex of some people cannot or will not be determined.
Interlingua
Interlingua
Interlingua
Interlingua is an international auxiliary language , developed between 1937 and 1951 by the International Auxiliary Language Association...
has both gender-specific and gender-neutral pronouns
Interlingua grammar
This article is an informal outline of the grammar of Interlingua, an international auxiliary language first publicized by IALA. It follows the usage of the original grammar text , which is accepted today but regarded as conservative....
. All first and second-person pronouns are gender neutral, as are several third-person pronouns such as su ('his', 'her', 'its'), and se (himself, herself, itself, themselves). Ille, illa, and illo correspond to English 'he', 'she', and 'it', although ille can also be used as a general term. The three pronouns have plurals that are formed by adding -s.
Interlingua is one of two major auxiliary languages that are not constructed but are considered to be reflections of a pre-existing reality. The other is Latino sine Flexione
Latino sine Flexione
Latino sine flexione , or Peano’s Interlingua , is an international auxiliary language invented by the Italian mathematician Giuseppe Peano in 1903. It is a simplified version of Latin, and retains its vocabulary...
. Occidental
Occidental language
The language Occidental, later Interlingue, is a planned language created by the Balto-German naval officer and teacher Edgar de Wahl and published in 1922....
is sometimes placed in this group as well. Of the three languages, only Interlingua is widely spoken today.
Novial
In Novial
Novial
Novial [nov- + IAL, International Auxiliary Language] is a constructed international auxiliary language intended to facilitate international communication and friendship, without displacing anyone's native language...
the third person pronoun le means 'he' or 'she' or 'it'. There are also the gender-specific pronouns lo, la and lu ('he', 'she', and 'it', respectively). Each has a corresponding plural les, los, las and lus all translated as 'they' in English.
See also
- English personal pronounsEnglish personal pronounsThe personal pronouns in the English language can have various forms according to gender, number, person, and case. Modern English is a language with very little noun or adjective inflection, to the point where some authors describe it as analytic, but the Modern English system of personal pronouns...
- Gender-neutrality in languages with grammatical genderGender-neutrality in languages with grammatical genderGender neutrality in languages with grammatical gender implies promoting language usage which is balanced in its treatment of the genders. For example, advocates of gender-neutral language challenge the traditional use of masculine nouns and pronouns when referring to both genders or to a person...
- Gender-neutral pronounGender-neutral pronounA gender-neutral pronoun is a pronoun that is not associated with any gender. It designates two distinct grammatical phenomena, the first being pronouns/periphrastics that have been assigned nontraditional meanings in modern times out of a concern for gender equity, and the second being genderless...
- Gender-specific job titleGender-specific job titleA gender-specific job title is a name of a job that also specifies or implies the gender of the person performing that job, such as stewardess...
- Grammatical genderGrammatical genderGrammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
- SheSheShe is the third person singular, feminine, nominative case pronoun in modern English.She can also may refer to:-Literature and film:* She: A History of Adventure, a novel by H...