Should there be a gender-neutral form of he or she pronouns?

Why fall back on an argument from authority when you could so easily check the facts? The Chicago Manual of Style talks at length about relative pronouns (5-58--5-63), that v. which (5-202), split infinitives (5.106, 5.160), and ending a sentence with a preposition (5-162, 5-169). I will quote all their advice back to you, and you tell me what's wrong with it.


5-58 Definition. A relative pronoun is one that introduces a subordinate (or relative) clause and relates it to the main clause. Relative pronouns in common use are who, which, what, and that.

'what' What? They've forgotten the zero pronoun which is quite prominent in all registers.


Who is the only relative pronoun that declines: who (nominative), whom (objective),

The problem here is that 'who' often doesn't decline. Omission of pertinent information is often a feature of style manuals. In modern English 'whom' respectfully declines to be declined most of the time.

Although who refers only to a person (but see 5.62), it can be used in the first, second, or third person.

Not true. It's used for animals in some situations, just as the pronouns 'he & she' are used for animals and sometimes for inanimates [ship]. Section 5.62 doesn't seem to clear this up, but I might have glossed over it a bit too quickly.

Which refers only to an animal or a thing.

Again, not true. There are a few special cases where 'which' is used with human antecedents.


What refers only to a non-living thing. Which and what are used only in the second and third person.

I'd like to see an example or some examples.


The antecedent may also be a noun ophrase or a clause, but the result can sometimes be ambiguous: in the bedroom of the villa, which was painted pink, does the which refer to the bedroom or to the villa?

Virtually every isolated sentence that's out of context "can sometimes [very often] be ambiguous". This is a ploy all too often used by style manuals as a way to avoid dealing with the language issue in greater depth. Your guess is as good as mine as to why they do this.


5-202, under that, which. These are both relative pronouns (see 5.58-62). In polished American prose, that is used restrictively to narrow a category or identiy a particular item being talked about (any building that is taller must be outside the state); which is used nonrestrictively -- not to narrow a clas or identify a particular item but to add something about an item already identified. (alongside the officer trotted a toy poodle, which is hardly a typical police dog.) which should be used restrictively only when it is preceded by a prepeosition (the situation in which we find ourselves,

Here we have a description of language which/that is patently false, Thomas. And yet, here we are at the 15th edition. Focus in on the portion that I've blued, above.

This is a manual, presumably written largely as a guide for academic writing and yet when we look at the data, we find that in academic prose, [one of the most polished of proses], 'which' used in restrictive clauses outnumbers its uses in non-restrictive clauses by roughly a three to one margin.

In both news and fiction, again the data shows 'which' is used in restrictive clauses much more often than it is used in non-restrictive clauses.

Now there are perfectly logical reasons that this is so, [those for another day] but how in the world could this style manual be so far off in their analysis of language.

It's so astonishing that I have to keep going back to see if I'm the one who has misread what they wrote. Have I?

But the Chicago Manual of Style isn't one of the language mavens Pinker polemicised against. You might have found it useful, JTT, to read this book before attacking it.

Arguably, Thomas, there likely is some very valuable information to be found in this manual. But just from what you've posted here, I'd suggest that ESLs and ENLs, who want to really know how language works, avoid it for all but the punctuation and citation sections.

As a guide to how language works in a wider sense, that is, in all registers, I'll suggest that its main value would be as recycled paper.

And what evidence, beyond your say-so and the fact that Pinker doesn't like `language mavens', can you present that any of this advice is false JTT?

On second thought, forget about it. I have made my point, you have made yours, we're not going to persuade each other, and there's really no point in continuing this.

I use "they" all the time for this purpose.

It has been a long time since I've taken any courses for grammar or writing. And let's just say that my current job doesn't demand much in that respect.

Thomas wrote:

And what evidence, beyond your say-so and the fact that Pinker doesn't like `language mavens', can you present that any of this advice is false JTT?

On second thought, forget about it. I have made my point, you have made yours, we're not going to persuade each other, and there's really no point in continuing this.

Thomas,

This is so unlike you. I can't say as I've ever seen you dismiss an opportunity to find the truth in such a cavalier fashion. And I mean this in a most genuine manner.

This is like a foxy, a mysteryman or a tico.

...

One intersting aspect is that until recently, determining gender was considered an either or proposition. Now, we know that gender is not always clearly discernible. We have not only the intersexed but also many individuals who identify themselves as "gender outlaws" These people consider themselves neither male nor female.

It would be useful if the pronouns would become gender neutral. Perhaps, one day, the language will change to reflect the fact that no one but her or himself can determine what gender she or he is.

Also let's get rid of calling women ma'am, ma'am of course is a contraction for madam, a married woman. So every time I check out at Safeway, I hear the clerk say, " Thank You Ma'am" or "Do you need help out with your things, ma'am?" So not only is the clerk making an assumption as to what my gender is but what my marital staus is! Funny, the term "Sir" is marital status neutral.

Once in awhile, I will correct the clerk and say (as Kate Hepburn did in The Aviator) "oh it's Miss, I am single." They never get it though but I love seeing the dumbfounded look on their face.

And what evidence, beyond your say-so and the fact that Pinker doesn't like `language mavens', can you present that any of this advice is false JTT?

On second thought, forget about it. I have made my point, you have made yours, we're not going to persuade each other, and there's really no point in continuing this.

February 02, 2005
The Chicago Manual of Style --- and grammar

In the 1890s a proofreader working for the University of Chicago Press prepared a single sheet of guidance on typographic fundamentals and house style. It was augmented over time, and grew into a full style manual. The latest version was published in 2003 as the 15th edition of The Chicago Manual of Style. From the first sheet with printing on it to the last it has xviii + 958 = 976 pages, an increase in bulk of almost three orders of magnitude from that original information sheet. I finally ordered the 15th edition at the LSA book exhibit in January, when I saw that it included a new 93-page chapter on ?'Grammar and Usage'. My copy just arrived. Unfortunately, I now see, the new chapter does not represent an improvement.

The Chicago Manual of Style (CMS) is an unparalleled resource for those engaged in publishing, particularly of academic material. But the Press decided to farm out the topic of grammar and usage, and the writer they selected was Bryan A. Garner, a former associate editor of the Texas Law Review who now teaches at Southern Methodist University School of Law and has written several popular books on usage and style. His chapter is unfortunately full of repetitions of stupidities of the past tradition in English grammar ?- more of them than you could shake a stick at.

Presenting a representative sample would take a long time. Suffice it to say that on on page 177 he appears to claim that progressive clauses are always active (making clauses like Our premises are being renovated impossible); on page 179 he states that English verbs have seven inflected forms, including a present subjunctive, a past subjunctive, and an imperative (utter nonsense); on page 187 he reveals that (although he agrees, like every other grammarian, that the misnamed "split infinitive" is grammatical) he thinks that the adverb is "splitting the verb" in this construction (it isn't; it's between two separate words); on page 188 he describes word sequences like with reference to as "phrasal prepositions" (they aren't); and so it goes on and on. (I'm not asking you to just accept my word that these are analytical mistakes. Full argumentation on these points, and alternative analyses that make sense, can be found in The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, a work that was available in published form a full year before the Preface was added to the 15th edition of CMS. A few days of revision would have sufficed to remove the blunders from Garner's chapter.)

When the University of Chicago Press started on the revisions that led to CMS 15, they could have lifted the phone and made an on-campus call to the late, great James McCawley, a professor in the Department of Linguistics there throughout his long career, and an author of many books with the Press. They could have asked him for advice. They did not, clearly. McCawley knew the field of English syntax as well as anyone alive, and would perhaps have offered to do the chapter himself, or to read and critique the chapter when it was submitted, or to advise them on who might be chosen to do write it. But once again, people who had ample opportunity to get expert help in dealing with a quintessentially linguistic question of great importance made their decisions without (it seems) consulting anyone in the one field focused on matters linguistic. (I say "once again" because I'm thinking of Mark's recent masterful critique of the College Board and its ignorant policies in designing putative tests of grammar knowledge.) They commissioned a tired rehash of traditional grammar repeating centuries-old errors of analysis instead of trying to obtain a more up-to-date presentation. A real lost opportunity that has lessened the authority of a wonderful reference book, one that on topics from punctuation to citation to indexing to editing can really be trusted. Just avert your eyes from the grammar chapter; while not completely without merit (it moves on from Strunk and White), it just isn't trustworthy in the way the rest of the book is.

Posted by Geoffrey K. Pullum at February 2, 2005 12:40 PM

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/001869.html