| 词组 | epicene pronouns |
| 释义 | epicene pronouns A problem of long standing in English is finding a gender-neutral singular pronoun to use in reference to indefinite pronouns like anyone, everyone, and someone. The spoken language has long used they, their, and them, but this folk solution has not sufficed for the academically trained and grammatically oriented, for whom number sometimes seems to be more important than common sense. The most usual grammarian's solution (buttressed at least once by the British parliament) has been to recommend the masculine he, his, him. Some grammarians and theorists, beginning in the 19th century, have chosen the road of neologism. This has led to such proposed forms as ne, nis, nim, hiser, thon, en, unus, talis, ir, iro, im, ons, he'er, shis, heris, co, cos, tey, ter, tern, s/he, and so on and on. The latest we have heard of are che, chim, chis, chimself, proposed by someone from Texas in December 1985. There may never be an end to these ingenious proposals. The best, most informative, and most entertaining summary of this whole matter is an article by Dennis E. Baron in American Speech, vol. 56, no. 2, Summer 1981. The same discussion is presented in a somewhat revised form as the tenth chapter of his book Grammar and Gender (1986). Under this heading Nickles 1974 disapproves of they, their, and them used in reference to indefinite pronouns. We discuss the matter at they, their, them 1. |
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