Language Does More: Gender-Neutral Language

The beginning of the 21st Century marked in historical increase in LGBTQ+ visibility: The first official pride month began in June of 2000, with the first Transgender Day of Visibility beginning in 2009. With these societal changes, linguistic changes have followed. The shift toward gender inclusive language has been one of the most prominent changes in American English in the last 30 years.

One of the more recent shifts, often attributed the trans community, is using they/them pronouns to identify a singular individual. For many, using they/them in the singular tense actually comes quite naturally in certain syntactic environments, for example: “the mail carrier is here! I hope they brought my package”, or “there’s a new coworker starting tomorrow; I can’t wait to meet them!” Despite its relatively common usage in spoken English, however, formal education has long taught that their are only two grammatically correct third person singular pronouns (he/she).

Interestingly, the use of “they” as a singular, gender neutral pronoun can be traced back centuries — long before it became associated with the modern trans community. The Oxford English Dictionary cites examples of “they” being used in the singular form as far back as 1375. It wasn’t until around the 1900s that “they” in the singular became “incorrect”, and the official standard became strictly “he” or “she”. 

What can we learn from the unexpected history of the singular they? Well, to start, it seems that English speakers have been somewhat aware (albeit not entirely consciously, perhaps) that it’s weird to have a gender-neutral plural option but no gender neutral singular option since the beginning. It creates a grammatical gap, an unbalanced declension chart. Speakers and writers have long been reconciling this gap by simply inserting the gender-neutral plural option into the singular slot in cases where the gender is unknown or irrelevant.

Singular They’s history also reminds us is that while speakers of languages across the globe are inventing and using new words constantly, almost all of them are words that belong to what linguists call the “open classes” - or categories of words that accept new members. The open classes include nouns, lexical verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. In contrast, the closed classes in English include pronouns, determiners, conjunctions, and prepositions.

Basically, it is exceedingly rare for any language to naturally integrate a brand-new pronoun. Singular They gets to circumvent this linguistic rule for two reasons: 1) because it already exits as a plural pronoun, and 2) despite its plurality, it has a long history of usage in the singular sense. These traits all set Singular They up for success compared to other attempts at inventing new pronouns.

Regardless of one’s personal stance regarding sex and gender, the argument against using “they/them” because it is “grammatically incorrect” is not a strong one. Indeed, Purdue’s Online Writing Lab writes: “While the English language does not have a unique gender-neutral third-person singular pronoun, they has been used to identify singular persons in speech, popular literature, and dictionary reference materials since at least the 12th century. In fact, singular use of  they has been officially recognized as correct  by several key bodies such as the  Associated Press, American Psychological Association (APA) and Modern Language Association (MLA), the Oxford English Dictionary, and the Merriam-Webster Dictionary.”

Beyond pronouns, other kinds of gender-neutral language has become increasingly popular. Terms like “server” instead of “waiter” or “waitress”, and “siblings” rather than “brothers and sisters” has increased in usage dramatically over the last 20 years. In business, the most notable change appears when speaking to a group, with many opting to use the word “folks” rather than “ladies and gentlemen”. 

Avoiding gendered greetings when addressing a large group can protect those who identify themselves outside of male or female gender binary. Calling people by their preferred pronouns has become common courtesy, and the gradual societal shift towards using gender-neutral language is a win for not only those in the LGBTQ+ community, but for cisgender, heterosexual people as well. A study from 2020 by the American Psychological Association finds that, “gender prejudice occurs more in gendered rather than genderless languages”. In other words, cultures that use languages with more gendered words and phrases tend to have a higher amount of gender inequality than cultures that do not use much gendered language. As English shifts to using fewer gendered terms, it will be interesting to see whether gender prejudices decrease as well. 

If there is one constant about language, it’s that it will never stay the same. English will continue to change to fit the needs of the people that speak it. Maybe one day English will not have any gendered pronouns at all, or maybe things will move in the other direction and English will have all sorts of pronouns and words to describe any identity. In the meantime, we can appreciate the malleability of language, recognize just how much English has changed over the course of our lifetimes, and learn to be excited to see what’s next to come linguistically.