Shakespeare Used The Singular They, And So Should You
By Emily Roche
Last month, the Swedish Academy announced its decision to add a new gender-neutral pronoun to the April 2015 edition of the official dictionary of the Swedish language.
As one of around 13,000 new words to be added to the dictionary, the gender-netural pronoun “hen” will be added alongside third-person singular pronouns “han” (“he”) and “hon” (“she”), and will be used “to refer to a person without revealing their gender– either because it is unknown, because the person is transgender, or the speaker or writer deems the gender to be superfluous information,” The Guardian reports. Although the “hen” pronoun has been in and out of popular use in Sweden since the 1960s, it began to gain mainstream popularity around 2000. It is mainly because of support from Sweden’s transgender and gender non-conforming community that the pronoun has garnered enough support to make it into the dictionary.
The English language, while lacking in a canonized true gender-neural third person singular pronoun, has long since used the plural pronoun “they” as a stand-in for much the same reasons as the Swedish “hen:” either when the gender of the subject is unknown or irrelevant. And despite what many a grammar fanatic has virulently proclaimed in your high school English class, the use of “they” as an English-language alternative to the ever awkward “he/she” is nothing new or radical. In fact, the same professor who corrected your singular “they” to “he or she” on your essay may have also taught you The Canterbury Tales, Hamlet, Mansfield Park, and The Universal Declaration of Human Rights — all of which, by the way, use a singular they at least once.
Most English speakers have no problem using a singular “they” when they’re referring to a subject whose gender is unknown, and sentences like “Somebody left their coat here!” don’t strike many of us as odd. When someone is being asked to use “they” in place of “he” or “she” in order to respect an addressee’s gender identity, things become more difficult for some people.
Say Gillen, a junior in Gallatin who uses the singular “they” pronoun, believes that although Sweden’s adoption of the “hen” pronoun “is a significant step towards social affirmation of non-conforming folks and queerness in general,” it also may place limits on linguistically expressed gender identity. “I know that in the queer safe spaces I’ve experienced, it can be very liberating for non-binary folks to choose their own pronouns,” Gillen says, adding that, “not every non-binary Swedish person is going to fit in the hen box.” While individuals who identify with the gender they were assigned at birth seldom have to think about their own pronoun usage, members of transgender communities often rely on correct, respectful pronoun use to express their true genders in meaningful ways. Leah, a freshman in Gallatin, also uses they/them/theirs/themselves as a preferred gender pronoun. “I just don’t really understand the gender binary and I feel uncomfortable adhering to it,” they explain, “I’m still figuring out how to mess with gender within such strict binary distinctions. …I’d like to present as both [masculine and feminine] in certain ways.”
Sweden’s new pronoun is certainly newsworthy because, although it’s not the only (or first) country where gender-neutral pronouns have been rising in use and popularity, it is one of the first where such a pronoun has been canonized in the dictionary. New or “neo” pronouns such as “zie/hir/hirs/hirself” and “xie/xyr/xyrs/xyrself” have been gaining popularity in English-language queer and transgender communities as a truly gender-neutral replacement for singular “they,” which many people still find difficult to use in context. Sweden’s decision to adopt another set of pronouns is setting a positive example by showing plasticity in developing as social norms and expectations change. “I get so much grief for my “ungrammatical” request,” Gillen added, explaining why using singular “they” is still difficult for many people. “It’s proven difficult for folks to abandon their notions of language and adopt something they’re unfamiliar with…. I’m positive that if it was granted some kind of official recognition, usage would increase.”
[Image via Lena Warnke]
