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Determine which of the problems the author has solved and which s/he has not; and of those not solved, decide which the author knows s/he has failed to solve. If you disagree with the author, on what basis do you rest your disagreement?

Obviously the first "s/" refers to the abbreviation of "of the problems", but what does the second "s/" mean?

TIA

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oristarA wrote:

Obviously the first "s/" refers to the abbreviation of "of the problems"

That's not correct. "s/he" is being used here to abbreviate "she or he".

"Determine which of the problems the author has solved and which he or she has not; and of those not solved, decide which the author knows he or she has failed to solve."

It's just a writing shortcut, and it's not a correct use of punctuation.
A more common (& more correct) shortcut with the same meaning is "he/she".

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Thanks Monger, I've got it now! Very Happy

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Gag, snarl, and yuck. S/he is absolutely wrong. She/he is not right either, but less wrong than s/he. She or he. He or she. That's it.

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s/he
s/he is she or he - infuriating but how else to do it? - much better in Chinese where they share a word!

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I remember Babelfishing something from French... It only turned up as "it". I don't get this unnecessary gender-division of European grammar anyway - What's next, will we come up with separate negro and fag nouns? What if you were a black lesbian? Your nouns would be several miles long.

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OK Rounin, let's have IT for both sexes as well as objects.

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Lucky European languages tend to stick to 2 (French) or sometimes 3 (German) genders...

Lots of languages have horribly complicated noun classification systems that include bizarre categories other than gender like flat things, things used to poke with, round things, and so on, each with its own conjugation pattern (like Carrier, a British Columbian native language).

And then there are languages which classify nouns largely randomly into 10 or more categories, like many Bantu languages including Swahili. I mean, gender for nouns other than things that actually have gender is hard enough, but try remembering to distinguish 12 categories!

If you wanted to make a generic-looking "it" in such a language, it'd be some monstrosity akin to s/he like: ki/vi/m/wa/a/tu/f/thing. (not based on any real language)

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Roberta wrote:

Gag, snarl, and yuck. S/he is absolutely wrong. She/he is not right either, but less wrong than s/he. She or he. He or she. That's it.

Used to be that way, marvel at modern medicine and rennounce antiquity. Tee hee.

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There are almost always more elegant ways of dealing with this, rather than using "s/he" or "he or she." It just takes a little creativity on the part of the writer. Using plurals helps:

Rather than, "When a child rides in a car, he or she should be protected by a booster seat."

Try: "When small children ride in cars, they should be protected by booster seats."

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Rounin wrote:

What if you were a black lesbian? Your nouns would be several miles long.

If someone is a black lesbian she is simply that - a black lesbian. Someone that is Lesbian is automatically female. It's a gender specific word.

The use of "he/she" is when the speaker isn't sure of gender or wants to be sure that both genders are included.

btw, "s/he" is sometimes also written as "(s)he" too. Neither of these may be "proper" English but the writer is intenionally going out of their way not to exclude anyone on basis of their gender which is generally a good thing.

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When small children ride in cars, they should be protected by booster seats.

Or, more recently gaining popularity:

"When a child rides in cars, they should be protected by booster seats."

Using "they" as the gender-neutral 3rd-person singular pronoun is extremely common in speech, and creeping into writing more and more.

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I don't think that using 'they' when there's only one person makes sense... where did it come from? Avoiding a gender?

Completely inconsequential, but in speech, I would use 'he or she,' and in writing, either s/he or he/she. As fishin' said, it may be shorthand, but it's better than 'language sexism,' however ludicrous the idea may be.

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mezzie wrote:

Or, more recently gaining popularity:

"When a child rides in cars, they should be protected by booster seats."

Using "they" as the gender-neutral 3rd-person singular pronoun is extremely common in speech, and creeping into writing more and more.

Perhaps, but it's wrong, wrong, wrong.

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Well, that depends... If it catches on more and more, it'll become less and less wrong... Very Happy

There have even been treatises written to add this as a part of the Standard language in order to do away with the problem of using "he" as the default.

It's pretty much Standard in many varieties of spoken English already! Only a matter of time...

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drom, I'm not sure how it developed (I'm not well-versed in the history of English!), but it certainly is prevalent in most people's casual speech. Children use it all the time. I do know that the usage has been around since the 16th century, according to the OED.

Pronouns in English have changed radically over the years, and the meaning of "they" extending to gender-neutral 3rd-person would be just another minor alteration. Kind of like "you" gradually extending to both singular and plural (though many varieties of English have a distinct plural form, like y'all, youse, yinz, etc.).

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Quote by Henry Spencer, U of T, from a thread on this very topic:

Quote:

The New Fowler's Modern English Usage, while vaguely disapproving of the
practice (and noting that Fowler objected to it), observes that the OED
makes a good case that it has been common practice for centuries, notes
that it can be found in places in New Fowler's itself, and surrenders,
concluding: "The process now seems irreversible.".

(Not everyone approves of the New Fowler's. It is mostly rewritten from
the original, and is only one man's opinion. But then, so was the
original. And while Fowler often gave good advice, he was notorious for
being far more influenced by late-Victorian grammar textbooks -- which
*were* often seriously revisionist -- than by the actual history of the
English language.)

I also note that it's not a particularly obscure usage. You don't need
to resort to the OED; my desk dictionary (Webster's New Collegiate 1975)
lists it, and does not flag it as colloquial.

Also, in case my last post wasn't clear, "you" was originally a plural pronoun, and was expanded to singular use, overtaking the whole "thee" "thou" "thy" paradigm. So singular "they" to us now should be no more offensive to our ears than singular "you" a couple hundred years ago!

The "new" plurals "youse", etc. are an attempt to disambiguate the paradigm once again.

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Mezzie I'm with you. Officially in the textbooks I write for English learners, 'they' can be used as an honorary singular in sentences like the one about the seatbelt. Wrong just means 'What was wrong when I was taught grammar as a kid' and to each generation there is a new and shifting wrong. How many people would say 'It is I' unless they wanted to sound archaic or pompous? Yet 'the verb to be shouldn't take an accusative' so 'it is me' is wrong, wrong, wrong (pace the Musketeer above)

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Hehehe, good example there with "it is I".

Another popular one is "He is not as tall as I", where "I" is supposed to be short for "I am", when in fact "He is not as tall as me" is spoken by the majority of people because the complement of "as" is, in a sense, its object.

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I'm one of those 20-something dorks who actually says "it is I". . . too much latin and a grandmother grammarian. . .

I agree that s/he is bulky, but I recently turned in an essay which was given back to me. Comment? "Using 'he' as the indefinite pronoun is to be avoided. Use 'they'"

But it's wroooooooooong. . .

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