Thinking about leaving the UK

[Benta]

I have been wondering how nations where the language makes much of gender (including nouns that are not obviously sexy) are coping with the present demand for gender-neutral (as opposed to neuter gender) pronouns.

"Coping"? That's a joke. In Germany, the language is going through ridiculous contortions such as:
Ingenieur or Ingenieurin (M/F).
Solution:
Ingenieur*in
Ingenieur/in
Ingenieur:in
This gendering is driving everyone nuts and sending a lot of voters to fringe political parties.

[ebastler]

I have been wondering how nations where the language makes much of gender (including nouns that are not obviously sexy) are coping with the present demand for gender-neutral (as opposed to neuter gender) pronouns.

Not very well... Even the nouns cause us problems.

E.g. in German, "Student" means student, and "Studentin" means female student. "Studenten" has historically been used to denote the plural, whether talking about a group of male-only students or a mixed group, while "Studentinnen" clearly denotes the plural of the female form. But recent concerns are that females might feel excluded when one talks about "Studenten".

So we are now expected to either write "Student:innen" (and speak it with a glottal stop at the colon), or use "Studierende" as a workaround. The latter means "those who study", which happens to be what the undesirable "Studenten" means as well -- don't ask...

Regarding pronouns, we don't have an equivalent of the English "they" or "them" (used to designate a neutral singular). At least nothing has arrived in the mainstream yet; some very progressive ideas have been suggested but thankfully have not caught on.

[coppice]

I have been wondering how nations where the language makes much of gender (including nouns that are not obviously sexy) are coping with the present demand for gender-neutral (as opposed to neuter gender) pronouns.

Some languages are at the other extreme, like Chinese. They just had a third person pronoun (他) until interactions with Europeans led them to combine female (女) with third person (他) to create a character for she (她), but they are only different in writing. They are pronounced the same. All the fuss about gendered and non-gendered pronouns makes no sense to them. Its just a short tag to avoid using a full name over and over.

[Bud]

Demand ? 

[TimFox]

I have been wondering how nations where the language makes much of gender (including nouns that are not obviously sexy) are coping with the present demand for gender-neutral (as opposed to neuter gender) pronouns.

Not very well... Even the nouns cause us problems.

E.g. in German, "Student" means student, and "Studentin" means female student. "Studenten" has historically been used to denote the plural, whether talking about a group of male-only students or a mixed group, while "Studentinnen" clearly denotes the plural of the female form. But recent concerns are that females might feel excluded when one talks about "Studenten".

So we are now expected to either write "Student:innen" (and speak it with a glottal stop at the colon), or use "Studierende" as a workaround. The latter means "those who study", which happens to be what the undesirable "Studenten" means as well -- don't ask...

Regarding pronouns, we don't have an equivalent of the English "they" or "them" (used to designate a neutral singular). At least nothing has arrived in the mainstream yet; some very progressive ideas have been suggested but thankfully have not caught on.

I still don't like "them" as third-person singular, since it is useful to distinguish singular and plural pronouns.
Historically, since English has always been a licentious language, there are many instances of singular them, but I thought we had made progress.
There were efforts to invent a new pronoun for third-person singular with neutral gender (not neuter gender "it"), but the advocates could not agree with each other on a single neologism.

[tggzzz]

I have been wondering how nations where the language makes much of gender (including nouns that are not obviously sexy) are coping with the present demand for gender-neutral (as opposed to neuter gender) pronouns.

Not very well... Even the nouns cause us problems.

E.g. in German, "Student" means student, and "Studentin" means female student. "Studenten" has historically been used to denote the plural, whether talking about a group of male-only students or a mixed group, while "Studentinnen" clearly denotes the plural of the female form. But recent concerns are that females might feel excluded when one talks about "Studenten".

So we are now expected to either write "Student:innen" (and speak it with a glottal stop at the colon), or use "Studierende" as a workaround. The latter means "those who study", which happens to be what the undesirable "Studenten" means as well -- don't ask...

Regarding pronouns, we don't have an equivalent of the English "they" or "them" (used to designate a neutral singular). At least nothing has arrived in the mainstream yet; some very progressive ideas have been suggested but thankfully have not caught on.

I still don't like "them" as third-person singular, since it is useful to distinguish singular and plural pronouns.
Historically, since English has always been a licentious language, there are many instances of singular them, but I thought we had made progress.
There were efforts to invent a new pronoun for third-person singular with neutral gender (not neuter gender "it"), but the advocates could not agree with each other on a single neologism.

30 year ago there was a movement to elide his/her into hir. The SJW cretins were so ignorant some of them denied that "their" was the existing gender-neutral ewuivalent.

[pdenisowski]

we have made great progress in making the Genitive optional; you can now use the Dative instead

As Bastian Sick would say "Der Dativ ist dem Genitiv sein Tod"   That series should be mandatory reading in German schools.

And we are currently working on those pesky male/female endings, in the interest of inclusive, gender-neutral language.

Don't forget the Gendersternchen (gender star)

[nctnico]

I have been wondering how nations where the language makes much of gender (including nouns that are not obviously sexy) are coping with the present demand for gender-neutral (as opposed to neuter gender) pronouns.

That is a good question... I'd find it demeaning to label somebody as 'it'.

[tggzzz]

I have been wondering how nations where the language makes much of gender (including nouns that are not obviously sexy) are coping with the present demand for gender-neutral (as opposed to neuter gender) pronouns.

That is a good question... I'd find it demeaning to label somebody as 'it'.

In English you can use "they", e.g. "they went upstairs" refers equally to people who are male, female, all the forms of DSD, sexual and religious proclivities.

[tooki]

As it stands, the most visible remaining change is to use "ss" instead of "ß" at the end of a word if the preceding vowel is a short one. Very logical, since that is how it has always worked within words too. And very visible, since "dass" is such a common word. (And one many writers need to give some tought to -- is it "das" or "dass" now?)

Since Switzerland already didn’t use the ß even before the reform, this is amusing to me.

As a speaker/writer of Swiss Standard German, I literally have no feel for when a German would insert an ß instead of ss (especially in the old rules!), since in Switzerland we always use ss.

[ebastler]

As a speaker/writer of Swiss Standard German, I literally have no feel for when a German would insert an ß instead of ss (especially in the old rules!), since in Switzerland we always use ss.

With the new rules it has actually become quite straightforward. It's "ss" after a short vowel (lassen, Fass) and "ß" after a long vowel (Soße, Kloß) -- whether used in the middle of a word or at the end.

The single "s" is trickier: In the middle of a word I think it always follows a long vowel, and is always voiced (as opposed to the "ß" which is unvoiced). But at the end of a word, "s" can follow either a long vowel (las) or a short one (was, das). And I won't go into how you figure out when to use "s" vs. the homophone "ss/ß" at the end of a word...

Well, we can't make it too easy for learners of the language; have a reputation to maintain! 

[tooki]

I have been wondering how nations where the language makes much of gender (including nouns that are not obviously sexy) are coping with the present demand for gender-neutral (as opposed to neuter gender) pronouns.

Not very well... Even the nouns cause us problems.

E.g. in German, "Student" means student, and "Studentin" means female student. "Studenten" has historically been used to denote the plural, whether talking about a group of male-only students or a mixed group, while "Studentinnen" clearly denotes the plural of the female form. But recent concerns are that females might feel excluded when one talks about "Studenten".

So we are now expected to either write "Student:innen" (and speak it with a glottal stop at the colon), or use "Studierende" as a workaround. The latter means "those who study", which happens to be what the undesirable "Studenten" means as well -- don't ask...

Regarding pronouns, we don't have an equivalent of the English "they" or "them" (used to designate a neutral singular). At least nothing has arrived in the mainstream yet; some very progressive ideas have been suggested but thankfully have not caught on.

Well, ultimately the problem is that it’s impossible to make everyone happy.

English is not devoid of gender-specific nouns for professions or roles. Actor/actress, steward/stewardess, and aviator/aviatrix are classic examples, but there are more obscure ones like seamster/seamstress. In many cases, one or the other form fell out of use organically (like aviatrix and seamster). In others, like actress, it’s been deliberate.

But in the end you can’t win: in many cases where we already had separate forms, like actress, activists argue that the existence of a separate word implies a difference in status between the male and female forms, with the female form of course being assigned lower status. (And that’s ignoring truly disingenuous people doing things like comparing tailor to seamstress to claim the female form is lower-status, even though those are two related, but distinct, professions.) And then in the cases where we didn’t originally have separate forms (like fireman), they argued that by not having it, we are ignoring the existence of women who work in those fields. 

(That of course is why in some cases, we just switched to different phrases altogether, like firefighter, police officer, and flight attendant, all of which had existed for a long time anyway.)


I don’t claim to know what the solution is, neither for English nor German. What I do feel is that a) most people don’t give a shit either way (and studies support this), and that b) the most rabid proponents as well as the most rabid opponents of gender-neutral language get themselves worked into such frenzies that they are incapable of working towards a middle ground that everyone can be happy with. This is not helped by some (mostly right-leaning) political parties deliberately using this as a wedge issue. But I suppose we shouldn’t really explore that topic since it’ll get the thread closed.

[ebastler]

[...] most people don’t give a shit either way (and studies support this) [...]

Not the studies and polls from Germany which I have seen. When a large share of respondents say that they "don't care", the question has typically been asked in an asymmetrical way -- "How important do you think gender-neutral language is?" -- so the "don't care about it" actually implies a negative opinion.

When asked directly whether they want gender-neutral language to be used, between 2/3 and 3/4 of respondents are critical or fully opposed, depending on the specific poll and on the usage scenario under discussion -- newspapers, broadcasting, government/aministration, private communications etc.

[tooki]

I’m not talking about polls/questionnaires/studies that ask about e.g. “how important is gender neutral language” towards reaching a specific goal. (Because one’s opinion on gender-neutral language as such is unrelated to whether you think using it will have an impact on the goal.) In those, it’s very clear that most people do not think it is productive.

But in many asking about people’s opinion on it as such, the largest group is “I don’t care”. And as I said, I think most people are indifferent.

Just to be clear, in English the phrase “I don’t care” means “ist mir egal” = “I am indifferent to it”. Whereas the phrase “I don’t care for it” means you expressly dislike it. So without some linguistic contortions, “I don’t care” does not mean “I am opposed to”. (I will say that I hate it when surveys have a Likert scale that goes something like “1 = strongly favor, 3 = don’t care, 5 = strongly oppose”, precisely because “I don’t care” is not exactly the same as “neither in favor nor opposed”. Even worse are the ones that make it a 1-4 scale, forcing you to be “somewhat in favor” or “somewhat opposed” even when you are neither!)

 https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studien_und_Umfragen_zu_geschlechtergerechter_Sprache has a bunch of surveys and polls, and the answers are fascinating. But one needs to look at the exact question asked, because they are not at all comparable to each other!

[Zero999]

But in the end you can’t win: in many cases where we already had separate forms, like actress, activists argue that the existence of a separate word implies a difference in status between the male and female forms, with the female form of course being assigned lower status. (And that’s ignoring truly disingenuous people doing things like comparing tailor to seamstress to claim the female form is lower-status, even though those are two related, but distinct, professions.) And then in the cases where we didn’t originally have separate forms (like fireman), they argued that by not having it, we are ignoring the existence of women who work in those fields. 

And there are women who don't like the depreciation of the word actress.

(That of course is why in some cases, we just switched to different phrases altogether, like firefighter, police officer, and flight attendant, all of which had existed for a long time anyway.)


I don’t claim to know what the solution is, neither for English nor German. What I do feel is that a) most people don’t give a shit either way (and studies support this), and that b) the most rabid proponents as well as the most rabid opponents of gender-neutral language get themselves worked into such frenzies that they are incapable of working towards a middle ground that everyone can be happy with. This is not helped by some (mostly right-leaning) political parties deliberately using this as a wedge issue. But I suppose we shouldn’t really explore that topic since it’ll get the thread closed.

I'm in the don't care category, perhpas more towards the conservative, since I'm agains change, just fore change's sake.

[themadhippy]

And there are women who don't like the depreciation of the word actress

whats up with  luvvie

[Zero999]

And there are women who don't like the depreciation of the word actress

whats up with  luvvie

I've heard that term used to refer to both sexes. No doubt it's seen as distasteful to both.

I really dislike people meddling with language. Let things evolve naturally.

[coppice]

And there are women who don't like the depreciation of the word actress

whats up with  luvvie

I've heard that term used to refer to both sexes. No doubt it's seen as distasteful to both.

In places like the BBC, every engineer and semi-technical person refers to the "creative" types as the luvvies.

[tggzzz]

English is not devoid of gender-specific nouns for professions or roles. Actor/actress, steward/stewardess, and aviator/aviatrix are classic examples, but there are more obscure ones like seamster/seamstress. In many cases, one or the other form fell out of use organically (like aviatrix and seamster). In others, like actress, it’s been deliberate.

Over the past few years it has become rare to hear the word "actress", "actor" being used for each/all genders.

But in the end you can’t win: in many cases where we already had separate forms, like actress, activists argue that the existence of a separate word implies a difference in status between the male and female forms, with the female form of course being assigned lower status. (And that’s ignoring truly disingenuous people doing things like comparing tailor to seamstress to claim the female form is lower-status, even though those are two related, but distinct, professions.)

The classic example of that is doctor/nurse. Of course there have been counter-examples for generations, but that was (and to a lesser extent is) the bias.

What I find annoying is that some people have a tendency to say one is better than the other. But that's a different topic.

[tooki]

English is not devoid of gender-specific nouns for professions or roles. Actor/actress, steward/stewardess, and aviator/aviatrix are classic examples, but there are more obscure ones like seamster/seamstress. In many cases, one or the other form fell out of use organically (like aviatrix and seamster). In others, like actress, it’s been deliberate.

Over the past few years it has become rare to hear the word "actress", "actor" being used for each/all genders.

Ummm… yeah. I stated that “actress” has fallen out of favor, and that this is deliberate. And since this was mentioned as an example where one of the (previously stated) pair fell out of favor, if the “actress” in “actor/actress” has fallen out of favor, it stands to reason that “actor” has taken up the slack.

But in the end you can’t win: in many cases where we already had separate forms, like actress, activists argue that the existence of a separate word implies a difference in status between the male and female forms, with the female form of course being assigned lower status. (And that’s ignoring truly disingenuous people doing things like comparing tailor to seamstress to claim the female form is lower-status, even though those are two related, but distinct, professions.)

The classic example of that is doctor/nurse. Of course there have been counter-examples for generations, but that was (and to a lesser extent is) the bias.

What I find annoying is that some people have a tendency to say one is better than the other. But that's a different topic.

Yeah, that’s a good example.

[tooki]

But in the end you can’t win: in many cases where we already had separate forms, like actress, activists argue that the existence of a separate word implies a difference in status between the male and female forms, with the female form of course being assigned lower status. (And that’s ignoring truly disingenuous people doing things like comparing tailor to seamstress to claim the female form is lower-status, even though those are two related, but distinct, professions.) And then in the cases where we didn’t originally have separate forms (like fireman), they argued that by not having it, we are ignoring the existence of women who work in those fields. 

And there are women who don't like the depreciation of the word actress.

Absolutely. Many people, both women and men, find it sounds odd to suddenly hear women referred to by what has historically been the male or mixed form.

[unseenninja]

One thing which bugs me about Swedish (and for that matter, most other languages) is nouns having gender.

In Swedish, "a table" is "ett bord" whereas "a car" is "en bil".

There is absolutely no rhyme or reason as to whether "ett" or "en" is used. I find this aspect of languages utterly baffling. It conveys zero information and appears to be completely redundant. Maybe the thread's resident linguist can enlighten me to how things came to be this way?

[IanB]

There is absolutely no rhyme or reason as to whether "ett" or "en" is used. I find this aspect of languages utterly baffling. It conveys zero information and appears to be completely redundant. Maybe the thread's resident linguist can enlighten me to how things came to be this way?

I'm not a linguist, but what I have learned from my research is that noun genders were not originally associated with male or female. They were simply different "kinds" or "types", which were useful to help disambiguate meanings in sentences by means of the appropriate articles and word endings. But over time, it became convenient to call them genders and describe them as masculine or feminine (there are not otherwise many obvious types you could use, that would not also be normal adjectives).

[unseenninja]

There is absolutely no rhyme or reason as to whether "ett" or "en" is used. I find this aspect of languages utterly baffling. It conveys zero information and appears to be completely redundant. Maybe the thread's resident linguist can enlighten me to how things came to be this way?

I'm not a linguist, but what I have learned from my research is that noun genders were not originally associated with male or female. They were simply different "kinds" or "types", which were useful to help disambiguate meanings in sentences by means of the appropriate articles and word endings. But over time, it became convenient to call them genders and describe them as masculine or feminine (there are not otherwise many obvious types you could use, that would not also be normal adjectives).

Perhaps, but I'm struggling to come up with any cases where Swedish would miss anything or become less clear if the definite form of all nouns used "en" or "ett". English works just fine with "a". It just seems so... pointless.

[IanB]

Perhaps, but I'm struggling to come up with any cases where Swedish would miss anything or become less clear if the definite form of all nouns used "en" or "ett". English works just fine with "a". It just seems so... pointless.

It depends if there are, or were, words that sound the same, but have different meanings (homophones), words like cannon and canon in English. If they had different genders, you could perhaps tell them apart more easily without context. But I agree it is a bit of a stretch, and English does OK without them.

In the past, Old English did of course have genders, and cases, and other such grammar features of Germanic languages. They got simplified out of the language a long time ago, perhaps due to the mixing of peoples with different dialects, and a desire for more convenient communication.

The odd thing is that ancient languages seemed to start out with complex grammars, and then got simplified. So there must have been some reason for the originators of the Indo-European family of languages to introduce such features, even if the precise reason is lost to time.